Determining the size of your target audience is critical to business success. Without knowing how many potential customers reside in your trade area, how can you plan effectively?
Fortunately, the Arkansas Small Business and Technology Development Center has access to detailed population data that can help business owners estimate the size of their customer base.
Whether you’re looking to start a new business, expand to an additional location, or refine your marketing and promotional efforts, demographic data available from ASBTDC can help.
One report in particular can be especially useful: the Detailed Age Profile.
This report shows current-year estimates and five-year projections of how many people live in a given area. The report is customizable for ages birth through 19, by gender, in single-year increments. For instance:
- For a day care center, the target demographic might be all children under five years of age.
- For a dance and gymnastics studio, it could be girls ages 4 through 14.
- For a pediatric clinic, everyone under age 18 may be the target demographic, with segments for under 2, 2-6, 7-12, and 13-17.
It’s easy to see how useful detailed population counts can be in developing sales forecasts and making other key business decisions.
This valuable report not only provides a reliable estimate of the current number of children in the area, but also a projected number of children five years from now.
Is the number of children in your local trade area growing rapidly, growing slowly, or remaining fairly stable – or is it actually declining? The Detailed Age Profile provides the answers.
On the other hand, what if young professionals or retirees are your target? The Detailed Age Profile also has data on adults, sorted into five-year increments for ages 20 to 84 and a separate category for 85 and above.
The report can be customized to pinpoint a specific geographic area, such as a radius or drive time around a specific address. We can also generate reports for cities and counties or other standard geographic areas.
The examples cited above reflect real cases where small businesses in Arkansas utilized ASBTDC’s Detailed Age Profile reports.
- A central Arkansas pediatric clinic used this detailed demographic data to help identify the most desirable place for a second location.
- A dance/gymnastics studio in southern Arkansas used these population counts to calculate market potential and determine the ideal facility size.
- A day care center in northeast Arkansas used population projections to plan for future growth and make decisions ranging from optimum staffing levels to number of classrooms and square footage.
The Detailed Age Profile is just one example of the demographic data available to ASBTDC clients. Our market research experts and experienced business consultants equip clients with data and insights to help them understand local consumers so they can make better business decisions.
Talk to your ASBTDC consultant about how demographic data can benefit you.
Preview a sample Detailed Age Profile for the State of Arkansas