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Customer Intelligence Blog

Sharing knowledge about gaining and keeping customers

Radius Based Selections not working? Try Drive Time or Primary Market Area (PMA)

October 17 2011 by Troy Monroe

Using a specified radius around your location(s) is a typical method of geographic selection for prospecting.   In many instances this method of selection works without a problem.  In some programs you need more sophistication.  When this happens we move to Drive Time or PMA.

Drive Time

Some stores are in a metropolitan area may only need to go out a couple of blocks, while others are in rural settings your customer may have to travel 5-10 miles.  We have found that using drive time calculations help reduce waste and pinpoint opportunities missed by simple radius pulls. Our technology allows us to pull list by drive time minutes or a straight line radius.  See example below of 5 minutes drive (Yellow) vs 2 Mile radius (Blue).

Drive Time Example

PMA

Beyond radius and drive time is PMA.  I say beyond because PMA takes into account the location of your customers.  In calculating the PMA for a bank branch we use the customers that recently opened an account at that branch to define the area around the branch for prospecting.  PMA’s will also take odd shapes like drive time as this naturally becomes a component based on the customer behavior.  The example below shoes the river as a natural boundary.  You also see that 60% of the customers are inside 5 miles and 80% are well within 10 miles.

Not only are these methodologies great for prospecting they also inform print, outdoor media, radio and TV.  Contact us to learn more.

Troy Blackman
tblackman@altairci.com
www.altairci.com
  • http://www.altairci.com/multiple-locations-which-one-is-best-for-your-customer Multiple Locations, Which One is best for your Customer? | Altair

    [...] Having multiple locations within a customer’s footprint is not a bad thing.  Although, sending a location based message can be challenging.  Sometimes the customer/future customer does not even know they have multiple locations to use.  In many instances you’ll already have your customer assigned to a “home” location but there could be additional locations you want them aware of.  To tackle the location assignment you can do a simple radius search from the home to the nearest locations OR as discussed in a previous blog you could use drive time or a primary market area.  ”Radius Based Selections“ [...]