Title: Analysing search engine advertising research: synthesis of two decades of research

Authors: Hamed Jafarzadeh; Aybüke Aurum; John D'Ambra; Amir Hossein Ghapanchi

Addresses: Department of IT Management, Faculty of Management, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran ' Aurum Academia, Sydney, Australia ' School of Information Systems, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia ' School of Information and Communication Technology, Griffith University, Gold Coast, Australia

Abstract: Search engine advertising (SEA) has attracted the attention of academic researchers from marketing, information systems, computer science, mathematics and other related fields. Aiming to provide a picture of the state of the art in this field, the present research systematically searches for and reviews the literature on SEA, analyses and structures them, and provides directions for future research. We searched extensively and collected 97 journal papers on SEA published in 64 journals from different disciplines and analysed them to answer our research questions. Using systematic mapping approach, this research has identified research topics (ten categories of topics were identified and visualised in a graphical representation), research approaches, nature of research and the interdependencies between them. The research also has identified directions for future research.

Keywords: search engine advertising; SEA; sponsored searches; paid searches; literature review; systematic mapping; search engines; online advertising; sponsored links; search result pages; search results.

DOI: 10.1504/IJISCM.2015.075641

International Journal of Information Systems and Change Management, 2015 Vol.7 No.4, pp.308 - 337

Received: 06 Apr 2015
Accepted: 21 Oct 2015

Published online: 30 Mar 2016 *

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