Albany, NY: a market profile for local advertisers

Income, homes and households

Officially the Albany-Schenectady-Troy, NY metropolitan statistical area, it takes in Albany, Schenectady and Troy.

Owner-occupied homes carry a median value of $285,900, 14 percent below the national figure; the national comparison point is $332,700. The median household in Albany, NY earns $88,074 a year, 9 percent above the national figure (the US median is $80,734).

Who lives here matters as much as how many. Homeownership is 64.2% here, 1 points below the US share; that is the pool of people who hire roofers, plumbers and landscapers rather than calling a landlord. Age first: the median is 40.5, 1.6 years above the national median. Of 478,685 people in the labor force, 4.7% are unemployed, about the same as the US share. Among adults 25 and over, 42.1% have at least a bachelor's degree, 6 points above the US share.

How does that compare with the state as a whole? Income in Albany, NY is about the same as the New York figure, the median home value is 33 percent lower than the New York figure, and business density is 14 percent thinner than the New York figure; the full numbers are on the New York page.

The local business base

Start with the count: 21,425 establishments with payroll. Density runs 23.6 businesses for every 1,000 residents, 6 percent below the national figure. Home-services trades account for 1,146 of them (5.3% of all establishments, about the same as the US share). The most numerous category on this page is restaurants at 1,826.

Ratio above 1.00: the trade holds a bigger share of the local business base than it does nationally; below 1.00, a smaller one.

More common here than nationally: road and paving contractors, specialty trade contractors, grocery stores and child day care services. Road and paving contractors are the clearest case: 40 establishments, 1.7 times the share they hold nationally. On the other side, general freight trucking, roofing contractors, concrete contractors and physicians' offices are thin: fewer establishments per resident than the US pattern. General freight trucking: 120 establishments, about 40% of the national share. In line with the country: plumbing and HVAC contractors, electrical contractors and automobile dealers.

By raw count the largest categories here are restaurants (1,826), legal services (478) and physicians' offices (468). Relative to population the leaders are restaurants (201.5 per 100,000 residents), legal services and physicians' offices. Sector view: automotive businesses index at 1.2 times the national share, trucking, storage, real estate and road construction at about 78% of.

What this means for advertising here

Advertisers in road and paving contractors, specialty trade contractors and grocery stores should assume high competition on Google Ads and put equal weight on the free real estate: an accurate Business Profile, steady new reviews, and pages that match the local searches word for word. With general freight trucking, roofing contractors and concrete contractors in short supply, the map pack often has room; a complete listing and a handful of recent reviews can put a business in it. Residents here are older than the US median (1.6 years above the national median); they search, read reviews and call, which puts the weight on search, the listing and the phone.