The Small Business Administration is providing free web tools to Big Island small businesses to help them identify new customers and grow in a competitive market.

The free online tool, called Sizeup, enables business owners to identify new customers and compare their company’s performance against similar companies in the same industry. The tool can be found at www.sba.gov/sizeup.

SizeUp helps you manage and grow your business by benchmarking it against competitors, mapping your customers, competitors and suppliers, and locating the best places to advertise.

The tool does not recommend specific places to advertise, such as print, radio, or online, rather it shows the geographic area.

The useful tech tool delivers market data directly to business owners to help them make better business decisions based on competitive research analysis.

The SizeUp tool provides data analysis in three key ways:

Benchmarking an existing business to see how it sizes up by comparing performance to all other competitors in the same industry;

A mapping feature to see where customers and suppliers are located; and

Finding the best places to advertise by choosing from pre-set reports to find areas with the highest industry revenue and the most underserved markets. Custom demographic reports can also be created.

There are short video tutorials to show you how to get the most out of the site.

For example, say you are considering opening an automotive repair shop in Kailua-Kona. A search on SizeUp of the automobile repairing & service industry in Kailua-Kona showed 135 search results.

Under the advertising tool, SizeUp showed that the population of Kaliua-Kona is 30,387 people, with total annual revenue of $7,705,000 while nearby Kealakekua has a population of 3,541 with a total annual revenue of $1,955,000.

The location map showed that the majority of automotive repair businesses are centered in Kailua-Kona with fewer shops south Kealakekua or north near Honokohau. Such information may impact where you decide to open your business.

GIS Planning, Inc., the company that created SizeUp, has licensed the tool to SBA for one year. However, SBA’s acceptance of this product is not an endorsement of the opinions, products or services of GIS Planning, Inc.