ECIDC Member Market Analysis Services
In December of 2008, ECIDC obtained a yearly subscription to the online GIS application, ESRI Business Analyst Online (BAO) to aid our membership with: business retention and expansion decisions, industry and business relocation decisions, site comparison, target marketing, customer profiling, and much more. We wanted to provide them with the facts to support their decisions, giving them the hard data to understand their markets, needs, strengths, and weaknesses better than ever before. Since then we have expanded our offerings and knowledge of the useage of GIS applications to better serve our members through great partnerships with Lake Land College and the Crossroads Workforce Investment Board.
As we know, a site selectors’ job is to deselect sites and will find any excuse to do so. With this in mind, we need to make as much information available to them as possible so that they can easily see what our sites offer. With this tool, we are able to produce maps, reports, and data that the urban areas are producing in order to build strong cases in economic development and beyond. With this data, we are gaining a competitive edge against many other rural markets.
Real Examples of How our Market Analysis Services Can be Used
Business Recruitment-City of Marshall
Business Expansion-City of Tuscola
Target Marketing and Customer Profiling-Lake Shelbyville
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: What is a Geographic Information System (GIS)?
A: A GIS is a system composed of maps that can be linked with data to perform analysis. It gives the user the ability to connect data to a spatial location in order to analyze patterns to make educated decisions.
Consultants use a GIS to harvest information they need to develop intense analysis and reports for their clients. ECIDC provides these similar services and capabilities at a fraction of the cost, still maintaining the professionalism necessary to make a lasting impression!
Q: What type of information do I have access to?
A: We are able to provide detailed demographic reports, detailed street, aerial, or thematic maps displaying different trends in your market or study area, traffic count reports and maps, consumer expenditure data, market potential information, medical expenditure reports, health care provider information, gap analysis displaying the difference between actual supply versus current demand, customer analysis through tapestry segmentation which is used to find your customers and understand their tastes, lifestyles, and behaviors, and much more.
Q: Is the information current and from reputable sources?
A: ESRI updates the data yearly to provide us the most current data. It harvests the data from a number of credible sources which are all referenced within the reports.
Q: What value do these type of market analysis studies add to what I do?
A: GIS adds value by producing solid evidence to back up your business, organizational, economic development, or workforce development decisions. It allows you to capture and analyze data not just within a municipality, county, state, or a zip code, but we can analyze your market are also by address defined by rings, donuts, or drive times, county subdivisions, congressional districts, metropolitan areas, major market areas, census block groups, and census tracts so that you can most accurately capture the data you need to best support your case. ECIDC produces quality maps, graphs, and diagrams that can easily be added into reports or supporting documents. All reports and maps look very professional and display the ECIDC logo or can be changed to display your logo.
Q: What fees are involved to use ECIDC's Market Analysis Services?
A: First of all, you must be a member of ECIDC or a member of an organization that holds membership to utilize our subscription. The current yearly fee structure for the use of ECIDC's GIS mapping and reporting services is:
Up to 3 Reports $100
Up to 8 Reports 250
Up to 16 Reports 500
Up to 50 Reports 750
Specialized reports billed at $100/hour
Analysis and Consulting Projects billed at $100/hour
Contact Jean Anne Grunloh for pricing on more than 50 reports or for specialized reports.
Please remember that many times it takes more than one report per each request to capture all the information needed to fill a request. This fee is per report not per request.
For more information or to order reports contact:
Jean Anne Grunloh , Executive Director ECIDC
Phone: (217) 540-3517