Two decades of viral marketing landscape: Thematic evolution, knowledge structure and collaboration networks

Abstract

This study offers a thorough examination of viral marketing research during the last two decades to uncover the changing nature of the field. Bibliometric analysis methods are used to analyze 791 peer-reviewed articles written by 1,820 authors and indexed in Scopus and Web of Science (WoS). The findings reveal how viral marketing research evolved over the past two decades, establish vital connections between authors, and uncover themes and trending topics. The study underscores the increasing practical importance of viral marketing by mirroring the substantial growth in research in the field, particularly from 2008 to 2014, with research topics such as Internet marketing, user-generated content, word-of-mouth, and e-word-of-mouth. From 2015 to 2020, viral marketing research exhibited a sustained growth phase, with the number of articles remaining relatively stable, covering topics such as viral marketing, social media, and social networks. In the most recent years, from 2021 to 2023, fluctuations occurred in the volume of articles driven by the focus on online marketing during the COVID-19 pandemic. While overall interest remains robust, these variations might signify a stabilization of the field with the entry of advanced topics such as influence maximization and popularity predictions. Overall, the diverse nature of viral marketing and evolving research landscape were notable across journals of a multidisciplinary nature; this suggests that viral marketing research is likely multidisciplinary, involving components of marketing, social network analysis, computational systems, complex system dynamics, data science, and engineering.