Identifying an Industry
Most industries are officially classified according to the North American Industrial Classification System (NAICS). Identifying a NAICS code can significantly help you identify appropriate resources for that industry.
You can do this a few different ways; head to the NAICS web site and sift through industry descriptions until you find what seems like a likely match; or, look up the name of your company in Mergent Online and find the NAICS code in the company overview.
NAICS codes are 6 digit numbers, where each digit indicates a slightly more specific industry.
For example:
62 = Health Care and Social Assistance
621 = Ambulatory Health Care Services
6214 = Outpatient Care Centers
621410 = Family Planning Centers
These codes help you to identify competitors, and can help you find resources that will tell you more about your company's industry. Many of the resources that you use for this project will allow you to use NAICS codes.
Many companies will be part of multiple industries, and as a result will have several NAICS codes. Look at the main company profile page in Hoover's to get an idea of what your company's primary Industry (and primary NAICS code) is.
Industry Research
- IBISWorldIBISWorld provides industry research reports and profiles for over 700 United States industries as well as a wide range of industries in China. Business reports for five categories: industry market research, industry risk ratings, company research, global industry research, and economic and demographic data. Each report provides key statistics, market characteristics and segmentation, industry conditions, leading competitors, industry performance analysis and future outlook.
- ABI/InformABI/Inform, an extensive international business and management database, contains bibliographic citations, abstracts, and full text of articles appearing in professional publications, academic journals, and trade magazines published worldwide. ABI/Inform covers the areas of accounting, banking, computers, economics, engineering management, communications, finance, health care, human resources, insurance, international trends, law, management, marketing, public administration, real estate, taxation, transportation.
- Business Source CompleteBusiness Source Complete provides full text for scholarly business journals and other sources, including full text for more than 1,800 peer-reviewed business publications. Coverage includes virtually all subject areas related to business. This database provides full text (PDF) for top scholarly journals, including the Harvard Business Review. It also includes industry and country reports from Euromonitor and company and industry reports from Datamonitor.
- Mergent IntellectMergent Intellect is a highly flexible web-based application that features a deep collection of worldwide business information that enables companies to generate insightful business intelligence. Coupling Mergent's expertise in developing products for the reference marketplace with D&B's private company database, Mergent Intellect offers new and existing clients a unique opportunity to access private and public U.S and international business data, industry news, facts and figures, executive contact information, the ability to access industry profiles and much more.