Web Personalization : The State of the Art and Future Avenues for Research and Practice

Although web personalization has been examined by earlier literature reviews, an updated analysis of recent advances in the field is needed. The authors extend prior reviews of web personalization by discussing current areas of interest, research gaps and future directions. A literature review of the top 20 marketing and information systems journals published during the period of 2005–2015 (May) shows active research output and the domination of IS publications. The examined research addresses three categories: user-specific aspects, implementation, and theoretical foundations. We then analyze a total of ten themes: six on topics concerning user-specific aspects and implementation that stem from the dataset and four on theoretical foundations that are predetermined and reflected upon using the dataset. Both theme-specific and general future research suggestions are discussed. Advanced contextualization is suggested as the primary area suitable for future research and building evidence for attaining business goals as a secondary topic. Finally, we propose a conceptualization of interpolated web personalization to be tested as a potential complement to current (extrapolated) approaches.