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Purpose This paper aims to explore and analyse stakeholders’ perceptions of the development priorities and suggests more effective strategies to assist sustainable economic growth in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Design/methodology/approach The authors use the World Bank data set, which collects various stakeholders’ opinions on the UAE development. First, the exploratory factor analysis has been applied to detect the main groups of development priorities. Second, the fuzzy cluster analysis has been conducted to detect the groups of stakeholders with different attitudes towards the importance of extracted groups of priorities. Third, clusters have been compared according to demographics, media usage and shared prosperity goals. Findings The two main groups of development priorities have been extracted by the exploratory factor analysis: economic priorities and sustainability priorities. Four clusters have been detected according to the level of motivation when it comes to the economic and sustainability priorities: Cluster 1 (High economic – High sustainability), Cluster 2 (High economic – Medium sustainability), Cluster 3 (High economic – Low sustainability) and Cluster 4 (Low economic – Low sustainability). Members of the cluster that prefer a high level of economic and sustainability priorities (Cluster 1) also prefer more diversified economic growth providing better employment opportunities and better education and training for young people in the UAE. Research limitations/implications Limitations stem from the survey being conducted on a relatively small sample using the data collected by the World Bank; however, this data set allowed a comparison of various stakeholders. Future research should consider a broader sample approach, e.g. exploring and comparing all of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries; investigating the opinions of the expatriate managers living in the UAE that are not from GCC countries; and/or including other various groups that are lagging, such as female entrepreneurs. Practical implications Several practical implications were identified regarding education and media coverage. Since respondents prioritize the economic development factors over sustainability factors, a media campaign could be developed and executed to increase sustainability awareness. A campaign could target especially male citizens since the analysis indicates that males are more likely to affirm high economic and low sustainability priorities than females. There is no need for further diversification of media campaigns according to age since the analysis did not reveal relevant differences in age groups, implying there is no inter-generational gap between respondents. Originality/value This paper contributes to the literature by comparing the perceived importance of various development goals in the UAE, such as development priorities and shared prosperity indicators. The fuzzy cluster analysis has been used as a novel approach to detect the relevant groups of stakeholders in the UAE and their developmental priorities. The issue of media usage and demographic characteristics in this context has also been discussed.

The hotel industry undeniably holds strong market power. Its economic impact can affect the infrastructural, economic, and digital development of a particular region. In addition to numerous advantages, digital development has also posed certain challenges for the hotel industry, such as fierce competition and a struggle for market power, which in turn lead to constant searching for new beneficial solutions. Hotel websites need to be of good quality to have a positive impact on profitability. Quality websites are functional and useful, and innovation is a common factor observed when testing quality. The aim of this paper is to provide an overview of the innovation activity of Croatian hotel websites. Two methods were used for research purposes: the e-MICA framework and content analysis. Descriptive statistics and the significance of Chi-squared tests were used to analyse the results. Research findings suggest that Croatian hotels have adopted innovative features on their websites modestly: mostly, 5-star hotels, hotel chains, and foreign-owned hotels as well as hotels focused strategically on direct sales channels. The obtained results are important for future research which should analyse the issue in more depth. Furthermore, hoteliers could also benefit from these results, and use them to their advantage in order to revise and improve their existing strategies.