The ability to search for data geographically is the essence of business mapping. Neanderthal man struggled to express himself verbally, but he was able to draw a rudimentary map in the dirt to explain where water was located or where the best elk hunting was to be expected over the next couple of moon phases.
But what primitive man couldn’t achieve was a simple radius search of that roughly mapped-out area in the dirt. A radius search might have returned a list of the three top hunting locations based on multiple criteria. But such a geographic search was not doable 50,000 years ago. Thus, there were many early-man afternoons spent wistfully waiting for elk herds that never appeared. And believe me, Neanderthal woman didn’t think much of that. So, from the humble beginning of a hairy toe in the dirt, began the slow evolution of location intelligence software.
Fast forward to the present and behold the advent of business mapping software. Today, no man or woman in business has to live without the ability to conduct geographic searches of their business data – elk-related or otherwise. The tools are available online as a cloud service and are much more affordable than elk meat, or even elk horns for that matter.
Geographic searches can be conducted in a variety of ways, from a simple radius search to a complex assessment of hundreds of circles at one time. A geographic search of client address data can be explored over an area encompassed by a circle or over the area not encompassed by that same circle. From elk visualization to customer visualization, geographic search tools are a critical business assist.
A Primitive Map Geek
Map Business Online offers multiple geographic search options:
Spatial Search –A search of data conducted within the area of a map object such as a polygon, circle, or designated area of interest.
An Inverse Spatial Search – Using the same map object as noted above as a spatial search, an inverse spatial search searches the area located outside of that map object.
Radius Search – A spatial search conducted around a point at a specified radius distance. It is essentially the search of an area inside of a circle. And, without being too redundant, one can search for data outside of the same circle – another inverse search.
Polygon Search – A spatial search within an area that is a non-circle or free-form shape.
A Drive Time Search – A spatial search of an object defined by a drive time polygon described by the distance driven along the road network from a central point in all directions, over a given period of time. The area is how far you can drive along the road network from Point X, in all directions, in ten minutes.
A Driving Distance Search – A spatial search of an object defined by a specified driving distance, driven in all directions around a central point. Similar to drive time but focused on distance, not time.
A Territory Search – A spatial search of a polygon defined by a business territory. Territories can be made up of administrative districts like ZIP codes, states, counties, or Census tracts.
Whether you’re in the business on hunting elk or of hunting clients and prospects, a geographic search will improve your success rate by providing new perspectives on your hunting grounds, or by exposing new places to hunt using your tried and true methodologies.
I’ve got to believe there was a primitive map geek tracking the number of elk killed at each grazing spot each season. It may have been tracked by notching a stick, but he or she tracked it. And perhaps that particular group survived a little easier than the average cave bear, back in the day.
How many cave people does it take to screw in a light bulb?
Three – Once to screw in the bulb and two to hold torches so you can see what the hell your doing.
Win a $20 Gift Card! Refer a business associate to Map Business Online in exchange for a $20 Amazon Gift Card!
Find out why over 25,000 business users log into www.MapBusinessOnline.com for their business mapping software and advanced sales territory mapping solution. The best replacement for Microsoft MapPoint happens to be the most affordable.
Contact: Geoffrey Ives geoffives@spatialteq.com or Jason Henderson jhenderson@spatialteq.com
