Welcome to the CDXZipStream August 2014 Newsletter

Bing Maps as a Possible Replacement for MapPoint

 As covered in our last newsletter, Microsoft announced that they will stop selling MapPoint (both North American and European versions) at the end of this year. Mainstream support end dates are 7-14-2015 for MapPoint North America and 1-12-2016 for MapPoint Europe. 

The retirement of Mappoint will not affect software already installed.  You can indefinitely continue to use Microsoft MapPoint as a stand-alone software and in conjunction with our Excel add-in CDXZipStream. Versions of CDXZipStream that do not use MapPoint are also unaffected.

We have not yet made any final decision regarding the replacement for MapPoint for those CDXZipStream versions that do geocoding, routing, or route optimization.  But we are currently considering using the on-line Bing mapping service for future versions of CDXZipStream.  This would be a pay-as-you go system where users would purchase a license (through a certified Microsoft software reseller) that would provide data requests up to a maximum limit, depending on the license type.  Use of a Microsoft Bing acount key would track the number of transactions, such as a request to geocode an address.   Pricing per transaction is not available as yet since there are ways to minimize transaction count programmatically, which we need to test.

 

The big advantage of using Bing maps is the ready availability of world-wide, continually updated map data.  It is also compatible with both 32 and 64-bit Excel.  The possible downside is the ongoing cost, which in the case of using a desktop software like MapPoint was fixed regardless of the volume of data requests.  We would appreciate your feedback on the possible use of Bing maps, especially if you have previous experience in using on-line mapping services in general, or Bing maps in particular. You can reply directly to this email or send us a note at support@cdxtech.com.      

Census Tract Demographics as Market Research Tool

The CDXZipStream data feed CDXTract offers an extensive range of demographics data such as individual earnings, household income and size, marital status, educational attainment, school enrollment, race, gender, population, and age. Our ZIP code feeds offer the same data, but census tracts offers a significant advantage since they are on average about half the population of zip code areas, and the smaller size provides a more accurate demographic snapshot.  Census tracts are the smallest geography that can provide statistically significant data from the U.S. Census American Community Survey.

 But if you have a list of potential customers, for example, how do you identify the census tracts for their addresses and link them to their respective demographics?  Each census tract is identified by a unique U.S. Census FIPS code, and we offer a free, downloadable Excel template that first geocodes each address (using CDXZipStream and Microsoft MapPoint) and then uses an FCC on-line resource to find the FIPS.  The codes are then used as the input to CDXTract, as shown in the short tutorial below:

 

 

So how do you use this data as part of your marketing plan?  There are a lot of marketing resources available on the web and through trade organizations; here are a few good articles to get you started:

 

- How to Use Demographics to Drive Business Leads

- The Importance of Demographics to Marketing

- Know Your Target Market

- Conducting Market Research

- How to Find Content Ideas in Demographic Data

The CDXTract feed costs $199.95, and the Excel template for obtaining FIPS codes is a free download from our links page.   If you already own a demographics version of CDXZipStream, you can login to your on-line account on CDXTech.com and under My Account and Product Management, select "Buy Data Update" to obtain CDXTract.   If you would like to upgrade your license to any of the demographic versions to use CDXTract, select "Upgrade License" from your account area and follow the purchasing process.    

Latest Data Updates

 

Canadian and U.S. data feeds were updated as of August 26.  There were 25 changes made to the U.S. database this month.  If you would like to update your database to reflect these changes, click on the "License Information and Software Updates" icon on the CDXZipStream toolbar, and select "Data Updates" to login to your account.

 

We hope you find the information here helpful for you and your organization.  Please contact us with your feedback and suggestions by replying to this email.

 

The Team at CDX Technologies