Online communication strategies of the Cultural Routes of the Council of Europe

Abstract

<p>With the nomination of Santiago de Compostela as a World Heritage Site in 1985, cultural routes started to receive international attention as a new category of heritage: this led to the creation of the Cultural Routes programme by the Council of Europe, which nowadays (end of 2019) counts thirty-eight routes, thirty-four of which have a functioning website. As there is little research on how these routes use ICTs to support their goals, the research presented in this paper aims at understanding which narratives, information, services and functionalities are offered on the official website of each route and how these websites support potential travellers. To do so, the technique of benchmarking was applied and an analytical grid was developed, following an iterative process per saturation, which allowed classifying all the types of contents and functionalities offered by the websites. Forty-seven indicators of contents and functionalities were identified and grouped into six categories. The analysis clearly showed the commitment of the different stakeholders to stimulate cooperation and promote active involvement on their websites even though tourism practices appear not to be supported enough yet. It is advisable that this direction of an active involvement of users is taken by all the routes, to take advantage of the opportunities given by ICTs to reach the ambitious goals of the Cultural Routes programme, with a strategic use of social media channels for promotional purposes and dedicated mobile apps for tourism-oriented goals.</p>