By population Florence, SC is 232nd of 387 US metropolitan areas, with 199,675 residents. It helps to know the ground before spending a marketing dollar; the numbers below are the ground.
The median home value of $170,800 is 49 percent below the national figure. Households here bring in a median of $54,443, 33 percent below the national figure. For a business that sells to homeowners, that combination sets the ceiling on what a job is worth.
Age and education shape how people search and who answers the phone. Homeownership is 66.6% here, 1 points above the US share; that is the pool of people who hire roofers, plumbers and landscapers rather than calling a landlord. Unemployment 5.9%, about the same as the US share. Education: 23% with a bachelor's or higher, 13 points below the US share. Residents skew older than the national median: 39.8 years, 0.9 years above the national median.
Against the state as a whole, the median income is 21 percent lower than the South Carolina figure, the median home value is 34 percent lower than the South Carolina figure, and the number of businesses per resident is 5 percent thinner than the South Carolina figure; see the South Carolina page for the full figures.
The establishment count for Florence, SC is 4,403. Relative to population, 22.1 per 1,000 residents, 12 percent below the national figure. The single largest category in the table below is restaurants, with 361 locations. The home-services slice is 178 establishments, 4% of the base, about the same as the US share.
| Trade (NAICS) | Count | Per 100,000 | Index vs US |
|---|---|---|---|
| Restaurants and other eating places | 361 | 180.8 | 1.11× |
| Physicians' offices | 111 | 55.6 | 0.97× |
| Grocery and convenience retailers | 92 | 46.1 | 1.75× |
| Legal services | 76 | 38.1 | 0.80× |
| General freight trucking | 76 | 38.1 | 1.23× |
| Dentists | 58 | 29 | 0.81× |
| Landscaping services | 57 | 28.5 | 0.92× |
| Lessors of real estate (all) | 56 | 28 | 0.78× |
| Child day care services | 55 | 27.5 | 1.27× |
| Personal care services (all) | 54 | 27 | 0.64× |
| Plumbing, heating and air-conditioning contractors | 46 | 23 | 0.79× |
| Automobile dealers | 45 | 22.5 | 1.82× |
| General automotive repair | 42 | 21 | 0.94× |
| Other specialty trade contractors (paving, asphalt, fencing) | 35 | 17.5 | 1.55× |
| Electrical contractors | 32 | 16 | 0.73× |
| Beauty salons | 25 | 12.5 | 0.56× |
| Roofing contractors | 5 | 2.5 | 0.37× |
| Self-storage facilities | 4 | 2 | 0.41× |
| Concrete foundation and structure contractors | 3 | 1.5 | 0.24× |
| Highway, street and bridge construction | 3 | 1.5 | 0.62× |
Reading the index: 1.00 matches the national mix, 1.50 means half again as common here, 0.50 half as common.
Florence, SC is dense with automobile dealers, grocery stores, specialty trade contractors and child day care services compared with the US pattern. The sharpest example is automobile dealers: 45 establishments, 1.8 times the share seen nationally. The thin end of the table is concrete contractors, roofing contractors, self-storage operators and beauty salons. Concrete contractors: 3 establishments, about 24% of the national share. Neither crowded nor thin: landscaping services, general automotive repair and physicians' offices.
In absolute numbers restaurants lead with 361, followed by physicians' offices at 111 and grocery stores at 92. Per 100,000 residents: restaurants 180.8, followed by physicians' offices and grocery stores. Sector view: automotive businesses index at 1.2 times the national share, legal services at about 80% of.
In automobile dealers, grocery stores and specialty trade contractors the question is not whether to advertise but how narrowly: the tighter the keywords, the towns and the offer, the less is wasted against the crowd. Where the base is thin (concrete contractors, roofing contractors and self-storage operators), reach beats refinement: cover the service-plus-place searches across the whole area, because there are few competitors to split them with. A median age 0.9 years above the national median means a larger share of customers who still start with a Google search and read reviews before calling, so the search-plus-reviews stack earns its keep. Incomes 33 percent below the national figure mean value and clarity carry the message; offers should be plain and the path to a call short.
Services for a business advertising in Florence, SC, picked from the full list.
A fast site with the services, the area served and a clear way to call or book.
Follow-up sequences that turn past customers into repeat ones.
Review generation and monitoring across Google and the other places people check.
Google search ads for the exact services and towns, tracked to the phone call.
Listing management for the map results that most local searches start and end with.
Ranking for the service-and-town searches without paying per click.
Florence, SC has 199,675 residents (US Census Bureau ACS 2024 5-year estimate), ranking 232nd of 387 metropolitan areas.
The median household income in Florence, SC is $54,443 (ACS 2024 5-year), below the US median of $80,734.
The Census Bureau counts 4,403 employer establishments in Florence, SC (County Business Patterns 2023), or 22.1 businesses per 1,000 residents.
The median home value in Florence, SC is $170,800, and 66.6% of homes are owner-occupied (ACS 2024 5-year).
Measured against the US business mix (County Business Patterns 2023), automobile dealers, grocery stores and specialty trade contractors have more establishments per resident than the US average; concrete contractors, roofing contractors and self-storage operators have fewer in Florence, SC.
One conversation about your trade, your area and your goals; then a written plan.
Data: US Census Bureau ACS 2024 5-year estimates and County Business Patterns 2023. Updated 2026-09-29.