The cultural sector affects the socioeconomic system from two angles: through societal value shifts, creative transformations, and national cultural needs, the cultural sector indirectly advances the welfare of the state. The economic value is expressed in terms of market relations.

The purpose of the study is to evaluate the worth of cultural organisations that are not visible to market dynamics. This was accomplished by assessing the consumer's usefulness, taking into account not only the money paid but also the social and cultural elements that influence the spectator's decision-making process (such as the amount of time spent on a visit, supplementary expenses, content, prior experiences, and company image). This might be a reflection of the consumer's actual consumption decision (all of his expenses could be viewed as the monetary equivalent of his interactions with the cultural establishment).


Using the Lithuanian National Drama Theatre (LNDT) example, the methodology was tested. The empirical study involved a survey of LNDT visitors, with over 800 participants. The methods of willingness to pay and trip costs were applied. By analysing various performances, it is possible to determine what factors influence theatrical attendance and raise people's willingness to pay for the show. The study links the debates over public funding of culture to the significance of cultural value and the social perspective of the cultural sector.

This paper aims to investigate how visitors value archaeological sites and their different attributes, using Italy as a case study.
The literature on the valuation of cultural heritage is very extensive and follows different approaches. Several economic studies, using different techniques such as contingent valuation and discrete choice modelling, estimate use as well as non-use values (see meta-analyses by Noonan, 2003; Eftec, 2005; Wright and Eppink, 2016), without exploring adequately the influence of cultural motivations on individuals’ preferences (Throsby et al., 2021). These studies mainly investigate built heritage, with less attention for archaeological sites (Rizzo, 2022). The differences in methodology, scope and object of the analyses do not allow for generalization. However, empirical findings seem to suggest that users attribute a significantly higher positive monetary value to heritage conservation than non-users; that appreciation is greater for adaptive re-use rather than for passive protection; and that educational experiences are highly valued. From the few empirical studies on archaeological sites, it emerges that willingness to pay for them is similar in value to historical sites but higher than museum (Noonan, 2003), and that educational programs (Riganti et al., 2004), as well as research and preservation activities (Kinghorn and Willis, 2008), are highly valued.
Following a different approach, managerial studies focus on investigating the attractiveness and competitiveness of cultural institutions, especially museums, considering a number of service attributes, which underlie value creation and satisfaction for visitors. In this vein, some studies investigate museum visitors’ experience, focusing on visitors’ expectations (Sheng and Chen, 2012), museums’ environment, service quality, and visitors’ behavioural intentions (Wu and Li, 2015). Recently, content analysis (Sullivan, 2001) has been widely used to analyse how electronic word-of-mouth affects the perception of services provided by museums (Su and Teng, 2018). In this vein, attention is paid to the role of user-generated reviews in influencing the decision to attend museums (Fernàndez-Hernàndez et al., 2021), in engaging museums visitors (Alabau-Montoya and Ruiz-Molina,2020), identifying the most relevant service attributes for museums visitors (Zanibellato et al., 2018; Orea-Giner and Vacas-Guerrero, 2020) and supporting decision-making to improve customer experience (Holmlund et al., 2020). TripAdvisor is widely recognised as a precious source of information (Ayeh et al., 2013), both for other consumers (Fang et al. 2016), and for cultural organizations to improve their services and competitiveness.
To the best of our knowledge, the use of content analysis is still lacking with regard to archaeological areas. The studies in this field have mainly used surveys (Huete-Alcocer et al., 2019; Qaddhat et al., 2021) and apps (Lercari and Jaffke, 2020) to investigate various issues related to the satisfaction of visitors and to the protection of archaeological areas.
We aim to fill this gap, applying content analysis to study visitors’ evaluation of archaeological sites to identify how their different attributes are perceived and contribute to the satisfaction of visitors’ experience.
Our results will be also analysed in the light of the main findings of the literature to see whether they are coherent with economic valuation results, and to what extent the findings for archaeological sites overlap with those of other cultural institutions, such as museums and built heritage.
Moreover, we will explore the policy implications and derive insights for a better governance and management of archaeological sites.

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