Protecting a remarkable landscape is only half the challenge. The research on these places has built strong tools for conservation, but the way people discover, understand, and choose to visit them remains much less clearly developed. Research on geoheritage has experienced rapid expansion in recent years, but the integration of management and marketing perspectives remains conceptually inconsistent.

The research shows a stable framework centred on geoheritage, geoconservation, and geotourism, with management focused mainly on inventorying, assessment, and decisions geared towards conservation. In contrast, marketing appears mainly through tourism, interpretation, communication, and digital engagement, rather than clearly articulated marketing theories or behavioural mechanisms.

Earlier reviews mapped the growth of geoheritage, geotourism, and geoparks, but they focused mainly on scientific classification and conservation frameworks. That left a theoretical disconnect between methods for governing sites and ideas for engaging visitors, even though connecting them is critical for effective geotourism development.

The study addresses this intersection by examining how site assessment connects with marketing and behavioural science. To find that connection, the study maps research on geoheritage management and marketing across a merged scholarly record using a repeatable process.

It tracks publication growth, country collaboration, citations, research sources, authors, and the way themes appear together and change over time. The goal is to identify where knowledge has become consolidated and where marketing and behavioural mechanisms are still missing from management research and practical work.

The study characterises the knowledge base on geoheritage management and marketing as represented in indexed scholarly literature. In everyday terms, it treats the research record like a map: not a map of landscapes, but a map of which ideas appear together, which grow, and which remain isolated.

After 2014, publication output enters a consolidated growth phase, increasing from 55 publications in 2014 to 124 in 2024, while remaining cyclical. The pattern includes a marked contraction in 2016, followed by a strong rebound in 2017, so the field’s growth is not a smooth climb.

The study cautions that the available 2025 values may be affected by indexing delays and should be interpreted carefully. Research on geoheritage management and marketing moved from almost no indexed publications for many years to a sustained, higher level after 2014, reaching 124 publications in 2024.

The sharp year-to-year swings show that this growth was substantial but not steady. The country distribution is markedly uneven, separating a persistently productive centre from a later-emerging periphery. Italy and Spain form a stable publication core, while China and Brazil show growth that strengthens towards the end of the period.

Other countries show either steady output or short-lived increases, which may reflect episodic participation rather than stable national research capacity. Research at the meeting point of management and the public use of geoheritage is organised around three closely connected ideas: geoheritage itself, protection through geoconservation, and use through geotourism.

That structure remains consistent across the research record, whose shared-word network is centred on geoheritage and management-related language. After 2015, the field shifts from broad conservation-and-tourism discussions towards a clearer focus on geoheritage, then settles around cultural heritage and geoconservation after 2022.

The research is mainly applied, prioritising inventories, site assessment, geopark governance, UNESCO-related approaches, and implementation tied to particular places. The growth after 2014 supports the view that this is a recently consolidated research area rather than a long-established cumulative tradition.

Overall, geoheritage management research is well established in conservation and assessment, with institutional consolidation around geopark management. However, it is only partially integrated with formal marketing theory, creating a significant opportunity for the next phase of research.

The study finds geoheritage management methodologically well established in conservation and assessment, but only partially integrated with formal marketing theory, leaving a significant opportunity for future research. Geoheritage research is now firmly organised around protection and tourism, yet formal marketing ideas remain weakly connected to it.

Better evidence about communication and visitor behaviour could make these places easier to value and protect.