The SBA has introduced a free tool that aims to help smallbusinesses identify new customers and compare their performanceagainst other businesses in their industry with data collected fromhundreds of private and public sources.

The SizeUp tool can be found at www.sba.gov/sizeup. It analyzes a business incomparison to other similar businesses in the same trade andprovides geographic information on the marketplace, areasrecommended for advertising, and prospective customers, accordingto the SBA.

The SizeUp tool also provides data analysis in three ways:

• Benchmarking an existing business to see how it sizes upby comparing performance to all other competitors in the sameindustry;
• A mapping feature to see where customers and suppliers arelocated;
• Finding the best places to advertise by choosingfrom pre-set reports to find areas with the highest industryrevenue and the most-underserved markets. Custom demographicreports can also be created.

“Market research and analysis is critical for the success of anysmallbusiness owner or entrepreneur,” said SBA Administrator KarenMills. “In today's challenging economic environment where smallbusinesses create nearly all net new jobs in the U.S., help forsmall businesses is more important than ever before.”

GIS Planning Inc., the company that created SizeUp, has licensedthe tool to SBA for one year, the agency said, adding itsacceptance of the product is not an endorsement of the firm'sopinions, products or services.