Advertising services for Worcester, MA

The market's people

This is the Worcester metropolitan area in Massachusetts.

The typical household income is $95,939, 19 percent above the national figure. Home values tell their own story; here the median is $423,700, 27 percent above the national figure. For a business that sells to homeowners, that combination sets the ceiling on what a job is worth.

Three quick reads on the people of Worcester, MA. Unemployment 5.3%, about the same as the US share. Residents skew older than the national median: 40.2 years, 1.3 years above the national median. Education: 39.7% with a bachelor's or higher, 4 points above the US share. Owner-occupied housing 65.8%, about the same as the US share, which is the figure home-service advertisers should watch.

How does that compare with the state as a whole? Income in Worcester, MA is 8 percent lower than the Massachusetts figure, the median home value is 25 percent lower than the Massachusetts figure, and business density is 15 percent thinner than the Massachusetts figure; the full numbers are on the Massachusetts page.

The business landscape

How crowded is the market overall? Worcester, MA has 19,181 employer establishments. Relative to population, 22.1 per 1,000 residents, 12 percent below the national figure. The home-services slice is 1,409 establishments, 7.3% of the base, 2 points above the US share.

The last column divides the local share of establishments by the national share (1.00 = the same mix as the US).

Relative to the national mix, landscaping services, electrical contractors, automobile dealers and general automotive repair take up an outsized slice of the Worcester, MA business base. At the top of that list, landscaping services number 514, 1.9 times the US share. Under-represented categories: general freight trucking, physicians' offices, real estate lessors and legal services. General freight trucking show the largest gap, 175 locations, about 65% of what the national mix would give. Close to the national mix: roofing contractors, concrete contractors and dentists.

Restaurants (1,463), landscaping services (514) and personal care services (415) are the biggest categories by establishment count. Adjusted for population, restaurants are the thickest on the ground (168.6 per 100,000), with landscaping services and personal care services next. Taken as groups, the strongest relative to the US mix are the home-services trades (1.5 times the national share) and the weakest are trucking, storage, real estate and road construction (about 74% of).

Implications for a local business

Many competitors in landscaping services, electrical contractors and automobile dealers means the auction is expensive and the map pack is crowded; the winners are the profiles with the freshest reviews and the pages that answer the search precisely. Where the base is thin (general freight trucking, physicians' offices and real estate lessors), reach beats refinement: cover the service-plus-place searches across the whole area, because there are few competitors to split them with. With income 19 percent above the national figure, the message can lead on quality, warranty and speed rather than the lowest price. With a median age 1.3 years above the national median, the classic path of search, reviews and a phone call still carries most of the business.