Expansion Planning Using Heat Maps

Problem: Need to Transform New Product Success into New Market Opportunities

ABC Furniture manufacturing manufactures and distributes furniture through show rooms across the Eastern USA. The ABC reclining chair profits have proved to be significant and the company is interested in developing the market further. The best way to accomplish this is to either build showrooms or partner with showrooms in underserved areas.

Solution: Visualize Sales with MBO Heat Map - Find ZIP Codes for Growth

ABC uses MapBusinessOnline to graphically display where sales most often occur, and by omission, where they do not occur at all. The MBO ZIP code layer is turned on and color coded to reflect ZIP codes with the highest Median Income per Population, a ratio calculation. These rust red colored ZIP codes should be the best target areas for growth.

Next, a dataset of 2016 recliner sales by outlet address is imported into MBO and turned into a Heat Map layer. The brighter blue hot spots reflect areas of intense sales, the cooler darker spots show less sales, and again by omission, reflect areas with no sales that are under consideration for better representation.

How to Create a Retail Sales Heat Map

  1. Make sure your data records have at least two columns. One column for location and a second column with numeric data describing your subject – in this case, sales of recliners
  2. Import your location or address based dataset into MapBusinessOnline
  3. Click the Heat Map Button on the Master Toolbar
  4. Select your target data set and make sure the numeric data column is selected
  5. Choose an appropriate color scheme and an intensity setting
  6. Process your heat map

To display the heat map against a demographic scheme:

  1. Turn on the ZIP code layer
  2. In Map & Data, hover over the ZIP code layer and click the Edit Gear. Choose Manage Calculated Data Columns. Add a Data Column, name it, and pick the operation parameters – Overall Population/High Med Income
  3. Use the Color Code Map button, accessing your Calculated Data option (from 2) and color code ZIP codes to best reflect your target market

Your best ZIP codes for new showrooms supporting new sales opportunities will be ZIP codes with optimum demographics and no sales activity, and nearby ZIP codes with optimum demographics close to areas with maximum sales activity, perhaps within a specific drive time distance of existing stores – for example an hour’s drive away.

Learn How Our Customers are Succeeding with MapBusinessOnline

"MapBusinessOnline Business Listings has been my go-to platform for the preliminary work necessary to develop growth strategies in the Restaurant Industry. I’ve found this platform to be intuitive, easy to navigate, and the data plentiful. Whether you are looking to expand using an adjacency strategy or make a large geographical leap, I’d suggest you start with MapBusinessOnline Business Listings."

Paul G. Tuennerman
Executive Vice-President
Sticky’s Holdings, LLC


This leading national footwear brand manufacturer uses MapBusinessOnline to conduct retail coverage assessments nationwide. They loved MBO’s ability to provide both street level detail and USA wide high level views of points-of-sale. Importing location enabled address databases for symbolization and color shading is easy. New and planned stores can be added to the map market analysis as products are launched and mature.

"Importing location enabled address databases for symbolization and color shading is easy."

Todd Eichelberger
Sales Director
Adidas


"MapBusinessOnline helps me identify our most promising markets and define exactly those contacts I’m going to market to. It's the best product I've found that lets me 'visualize' my data."

Tom Jans
Director of Marketing
Swing Surgeon Golf Management

Popular MapBusinessOnline features

Emphasize customers density with heat maps

Highlight market areas that generate more business. Visually compare map areas for business potential. Select from a variety of heat map colors and options.

Color code maps by ZIP code, county, or state

Import business data by ZIP code to show it geographically. Create colorful maps for business analysis that connect real Census data to locations on the ground.

Display business data against demographic maps

Categorize geographic areas by population or household income. Explore new markets, business patterns, or social trends against color coded Census maps for business and competitor analysis.

Share business maps

Create interactive maps and share with friends, colleagues, dealers, customers, prospects or vendors. Share territory maps. Email saved JPEG and PNG files or embed map files in PowerPoint presentations. Includes PDF export for larger print formats.