Who are your competitors and where are they located?     <back>

Begin your research by finding out the Standard Industry Classification (SIC) code or North American Industry Classification (NAIC) for your type of business. To do this, go to www.google.com and search on “SIC code lookup”. Once you locate a database that provides a SIC code lookup, simply type in your industry description.

For Customer Affects, the industry description is Marketing. It is best to be as general as possible in your description so that you can see all of the choices under a category and select the best one. For example, instead of typing in “Marketing Consulting” as the industry description, type in “Marketing”. There are a number of different categories under “Marketing” and the description that best matches our services is SIC code 874213, which represents Marketing Programs and Services. If “Marketing Consulting” had been used as the industry description, the category for Marketing Programs and Services would have never appeared.

To find out who your competitors are and where they are located, look up the companies that have the same SIC code as your business using Reference USA. Reference USA is an Internet based service that provides business and residential data. You can access this service via the Internet if you have a library card, password, and login.

Other great sources of information include survey results and databases. The U.S. Census Bureau at http://www.census.gov/ contains data and projections on people, businesses, and the economy. Dun’s Regional and Local Directories (at the library), lists companies by sales, employees, by industry, by SIC. The Thomas Register www.thomasregister.com (at the library) is the world’s leading information for manufacturing information and B2B e-commerce. In addition, the American Directory of Business (also at the library) can be used as a resource for business information.

No matter what information source you use, you will never have exact numbers. There is no way to find out about sole proprietorships and other organizations that have not registered anywhere. However, you will have enough information to get a good grasp on who your competitors are and where they are located.

When researching your competition, think about competition that might exist in the minds of people who are not very well informed about your product or service category. Look at what products or services are similar, and what threats they pose. For example, if you are opening a sneaker outlet, your competition may include stores selling shoes and sandals.

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