eWOM and growth strategies for the tourism industry in maritime museum networks. The case of the ARCA Adriatica tourist product

Museum networks are proliferating in the Mediterranean area showing new forms of collaboration between public and private institutions. Museums and heritage conservation play a fundamental role in tourism development. The purpose of the present working paper is to provide an analysis of the museum network experience in order to define a set of useful and viable marketing strategies to be adopted by the museum management with respect to the relative tourist context. The case of the Arca Adriatica maritime museum network - a network of eight maritime museums representing the core asset of an elaborated tourist product - has been analyzed and considered particularly relevant and of peculiar interest. After the analysis of the museum network and its most important related points of interest, managerial recommendations within strategic and tactical perspectives are hence presented.