If you are selling to businesses, do you know the potential size of your market?

In September, INEGI published the final results for 2009 Economic Census. This shows us the total number and characteristics of the economic units in the country (organizations, businesses or entities with one kind of permanent activity, with profit or non-profit purposes).

The following analysis considers the economic units (EU) that:

·         Had activity the whole 2008.

·         Were considered for the census by direct counting (in rural zones, EU were considered by sampling).

·         Belong to private sector and “paraestatales” (those that offer public services but are not part of public administration).

The total of EU of with this profile is 3,724,019. These EU bought almost $6 trillion pesos in services and products for the development of their activities.

Now that we know the size of the market, let’s understand how it is distributed. We will analyze it by three perspectives: location, economic activity, and size.

Considering location, the six first places are:

·         Distrito Federal (Mexico City), which concentrates the 17% of the total consumption of goods and services for EU.

·         Nuevo León, with 9.4%

·         Estado de México, with 9%

·         Veracruz, with 5.7%

·         Jalisco, 5.4%

·         Coahuila, 5.1%

These 6 states concentrate half of the total purchases made by EU for their activities.

Now, if we analyze from the economic activity perspective, the most dominant sector is manufacturing, with 57% of the total consumption of goods and services. Within this sector, the main economic branches are transportation equipment, chemical industry, and production of oil and carbon products, representing almost the half of the sector.

Now, considering the last perspective, the size of the EU, 95% of them have less than 10 people! On the other hand, only 0.2% has more than 250 people, but they represent 66% of the total consumption of goods and services.

Undoubtedly, if you can assess the size of the total “business cake” that you have for an activity or a region, as well as understand the characteristics of the businesses or organizations and their level of concentration, you will be able to make more efficient decisions to exploit your current competitive position and to discover new horizons and opportunities. So… of this “cake” of $6 trillion pesos, ¿how big can your chunk be?