Bibliometric Analysis of Postgraduate Theses with the Subject Title of Sports Marketing Published in Turkey

Abstract

The aim of this study is to conduct a bibliometric analysis of postgraduate theses published in Turkey between 1990 and 2025 with the subject and title related to sports marketing. A total of 78 postgraduate theses meeting the specified criteria were identified through the advanced search function in the YÖKTEZ database by entering "marketing" in the thesis title field and "sport" in the subject field. This research was carried out using document analysis, one of the qualitative research designs. The identified theses were saved in PDF format and processed using Microsoft Excel. The data were analyzed based on publication year, researcher gender, academic level, university, department, research method, sample group, and keywords. Among the 78 theses, 42 employed quantitative methods, 31 qualitative, and 5 mixed methods. The years with the highest number of theses were 2023, 2019, and 2017. A total of 60 were master’s theses and 18 were doctoral dissertations. Marmara University was the most productive institution, followed by Bahçeşehir University and Istanbul Gelişim University. The most common departments were Physical Education and Sports, Business Administration, and Sports Management. The most frequently studied groups were sports consumers, clubs, and fans. Keyword analysis revealed that the most commonly used terms were "sports", "marketing", "social", "football", and "customer." A growing academic interest in sports marketing has been observed in the last 10 to 15 years. Future research is recommended to increase methodological diversity, explore different sample groups, and adopt interdisciplinary approaches.