Ask HN: Where do you find hard data for your industry?

[thewordpainter]

In order to convey the size of the market, what resources do you use? For example, if we're saying we can garner _% market share ---> Is there a definitive resource that covers the scope of all industries?

I feel like Google searches will only go so far, and it's tough to find hard data online (esp when you're a bootstrapped entrepreneur looking for what's available for free).

[johndlafayette]

Depends what you're looking for. Industry information is covered by the NAICS. http://www.census.gov/eos/www/naics/ Since that's put out by the govt, it should be recognized as accurate by anyone you're working with.

If it's a smaller industry or industry subset, I'd recommend doing a Fermi estimate of the industry size: https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Fermi_problem

You can also do this by looking at a company in the market and estimate up from there. You can often find press releases from companies that say things like 'we've captured 35% of x market'- then if you compare that to their sales you can quickly figure out the size of the market. Alternatively, add up the sales of the biggest companies in the market and assume that they account for a set % of the total, and figure it out that way.