When businesses evaluate locations, they often compare sites to one another, or to a benchmark site that is known to be successful, to judge the suitability of the candidate locations. With Esri Business Analyst Online, small businesses, retailers, real estate professionals, and many other business segments can now take advantage of new comparison reports. Through an easy-to-use wizard, businesses can choose demographic and consumer spending variables to create the custom reports they require. Many locations are geographically dispersed, sometimes over large distances. Managers and analysts in charge of site selection thus often do not have intimate knowledge of the individual parcels or surrounding locations and rely on Business Analyst to provide accurate, detailed data reports, which allow them to respond to competitive pressures quickly and efficiently.

Easily Create Robust Customized Comparison Reports

A visual comparison of proposed locations to a successful benchmark site.

Organizations can now quickly access preformatted reports or create and save custom comparison reports with variables of their choosing that best meet their individual business needs.

For example, the recent economic downturn has led to numerous retailers closing store locations across the country. Business Analyst Online allows retailers to compare existing locations, not just in terms of same-store sales, but also with detailed analysis of the geographic region surrounding a particular store location. Combining factors such as local area population, daytime population, income, and competitors' locations, and viewing these in relation to their own customer and sales data, pinpoints the most viable locations and where there should be consolidation.

Economic developers use comparison reports to help attract new business to their cities. Benchmarking a prospective site to an already successful location highlights the demographic and geographic similarities between the sites. Economic developers can then use this analysis to show new businesses side-by-side data that can provide insights about the local labor force, population, and spending and lifestyle habits. Evaluating candidate sites in this manner reduces the time needed to compile and evaluate critical input factors when deciding whether to move ahead with a development or not.

Financial institutions are also using the new capabilities to compare their locations. By combining demographic characteristics provided by Business Analyst Online with individual site performance indicators, the characteristics common to successful sites can be easily identified. Business Analyst Online can then be used to find other suitable locations with similar characteristics.

Customized Level of Service

Thousands of companies and individuals have already integrated Business Analyst into their decision-making processes, making it an important business resource. The application is available in different subscription levels, from one-time-only reports to premium subscription packages and specialized development services. Nonsubscribers can purchase a day pass to take advantage of more than 50 preformatted reports and maps for 24 hours.

More Information

For more information about Esri Business Analyst Online, visit www.esri.com/bao.