When the renewals for Ward’s Business Directory and Hoover’s Handbooks of [Emerging, Private, World and American] Companies came around this Spring, I had to decline. The print editions just aren’t getting enough usage to justify the price. As a consequence, the library is looking to round out its online access to quality US and global business information. Let us know what you think of one of the top contenders, ReferenceUSA.
We have an extended trial to ReferenceUSA an outstanding source for US public and private businesses. Their enhanced records are verified by phone and include credit score, proximate businesses, estimated sales and expenses and public filings. OneSource, their global company directory, offers much, much, more then a online company database. It supports ranking by sales, assets, employees and market value. It has one of the easiest interfaces I’ve encountered for searching by SIC, NAIC or local controlled vocabulary. And a feature, I’m sure students will love is the quick and simple aggregation of industry reports from Datamonitor, Business Monitor International, Freedonia, and STAT-USA all in one place.
You can access ReferenceUSA from the Marketing, Managment, Accounting and Finance pages in the Company and Industry Tabs. Let me know what you think.