Software Review of:
Business Mapping 
2001 Edition 

The strength of Business Mapping is its ability to interface with a database. If you have address data in a compatible format, you can import it to this map software and display it. The company that makes the software, ProCD, specializes in direct marketing. Their main products are CDs chock full of addresses and phone numbers bundled with powerful databases to help you sort and format them. Business Mapping is a sales tool. If that’s what you need, this is a great product for the price. If you need to get around town or plan a vacation there are other software programs that will make you happier.

Business Mapping contains three CDs: East and West United States Business Mapping and Select Phone Business. I’ll discuss the map program first. 

There is no manual – just the CDs with a help file. The program is fairly intuitive so this was not a great handicap.

On a map generated in Business Mapping, there is a little locator map inset in the corner of the screen that shows the area we are looking at. I can label places of a specific type, for example, retail bookstores. This data can be imported into the map software from the Select Phone CD included in the bundle. It looks a little crowded but I can expand or contract the map using the magnifying glass icons on the toolbar. There are mileage ticks across the top and left sides of the map. I can zoom in so that the display is only one mile across and zoom out to see the entire United States.

In the middle of the screen, sort of towards the left side, you might be able to see my cursor near a text box that says Pine Bluff Drive. That’s my street, and I made the street name and block numbers appear by hovering my cursor over the street. There’s another information box on the map which says “view address.” I made this address appear by right clicking on the icon for the bookstore and asking to look at the address. 

You can search for locations by state, county, city or locale, zip code or specific address. The first address I searched for was my own – 3614 Pinebluff. It didn’t find it. I added the Drive (which we never use) and it was still an unknown street. I poked around and finally found it on the map — it had made Pine Bluff two words. My next try was PC Alamode editor Clarke Bird’s street — Hunter’s Run. It was another Bermuda Triangle. I took out the apostrophe and there it was. Zero for two.
Finally, I looked for the peaceCENTER at 127 McCullough. It didn’t exist. Again, some poking around on the map of downtown found the street — they inserted a space between Mc and Cullough. Zero for three. 

For all three places I was able to look at the San Antonio map, center in on the area of the city where I knew the street was located and keep zooming and re-centering until I found it. In the real world, if I knew this much about the location I wouldn’t need the program. Their database needs some proofreading. To be fair, I tried another half-dozen addresses and found all of them with no trouble but the first three scared me off.

There is also a search feature for individual listings, which are databases pre-programmed into the map software. Among the listings available are banks, hospitals, specialty stores, entertainment, restaurants, museums and hotels. It doesn’t list everything, it doesn’t list shopping malls, churches or colleges. It doesn’t list grocery stores or Starbucks. It can tell you where to buy a car but not where to get gas. You can add them to the map one at a time, or display an entire category. 

As I mentioned earlier, you can import your own database into a map. This, I think, is the program's most valuable feature. Your files must be comma delimited text files and can be in one of two formats:

• Latitude/Longitude Format fields include: 
• "latitude"
• "longitude"
• "name"
• "street address"
• "city"
• "state"
• "ZIP code"
• "phone number"

 
• Address Format Fields include: 
• "name" 
• "address" 
• "city" 
• "state" 
• "ZIPcode" 
• "phone"

You can customize the map with symbols, text or lines. Symbols – there are several hundred to choose from – can contain underlying address information. There is a mileage counter that you can roll along the streets to get a distance from one place to another. Maps can be bookmarked so that you can get back to the same place again, or saved, which preserves all of the data you may have added. One thing the program can’t do is generate driving directions, although it does link to the free online services of MapQuest. 

The maps can be printed or saved as a static map image. The default file format is .bmp, which is a HUGE file – more than 1MB. An equivalent GIF or JPEG file would be about 50KB. If you need to e-mail these maps to someone I would recommend converting them to a friendlier file format. 

I take a cavalier attitude towards license agreements but decided to read this one, as I was curious about how these maps could be used. My primary interest was whether I could use them on the Internet. The answer is no. Also no to a wide area network or other intranet, electronic mass media, television, videotape, or public coaxial cable. You may reproduce maps in paper periodicals but no map illustration may be larger than 3 inches by 5 inches and no single issue of such periodical may contain more than two illustrations. You may reproduce paper locator maps in flyers, brochures, reports, appraisals, and catalogs for distribution at no charge, but no distribution may occur in quantities exceeding 500 copies, no single issue may contain more than two illustrations and the publication cannot be sold or contain paid advertising. When you save a map image it includes a MapQuest copyright symbol which must be included.

Also included in the package is Select Phone Business, an easy-to-use CD-ROM reference tool that gives you instant access to millions of business listings from printed phone directories across the U.S. The software lets you search the listings by name, address, city, county, state, ZIP Code, Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) Code or Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA).The SIC codes are searchable; I typed in “book” and the program retrieved a list of every SIC with the word “book” in it. 

You can do a radius search by selecting a “geopoint” or a central address and then asking for a listing of all businesses within a specified radius of that point. You can also view neighbors on the same street, listings that contain the same ZIP/Postal Code, as well as listings that have the same area code and exchange

You can add listings to a work area called the WorkBook to save them for later processing, export data in different formats that are recognized by other programs and can print listings in envelope, galley, or label format. 

The program will automatically dial listings if you have a computer with a modem. Neither fax numbers nor e-mail addresses are included, however – just street addresses and telephone numbers.

There is a limit of 1,000 addresses/profiles that you can print, copy, export or download. When you’ve reached the limit, you must purchase more profiles for the company. You can view all the data for free forever on the screen, but to use it conveniently will cost once you exceed the limit. Additionally, the data is for your use only – you cannot share the raw data with anyone. 

I searched for retail booksellers (SIC 594201) in San Antonio and got 143 hits. I picked Remember the Alibi Mystery Bookstore as an optional geopoint, so all of the distances listed in the eighth column are from that reference point. Some of the entries have a checkmark in the far left column; these are ones I added to my workbook. After I constructed this list, I exported the data and then imported it into the Business Mapping software. This used 143 of my 1,000 free exports.

The system requirements are a Pentium 166 or above running Windows 95B or above. The recommended RAM is 32MB and 20MB of free hard disk space for the program. You will need to use the disks to access the actual data. My computer is a 300 MHz with 128MB of RAM and a 40X CD ROM drive. The map software ran well but the database was very, very slow. 

I’d love to tell you how much this cost but I don’t know. This particular program is not listed on the company’s Web site. I e-mailed them asking for the information but as of my deadline they haven’t replied. The help number was constantly busy. You have to call in to register the Select Phone software and I haven’t been able to get through to that number, either. Looking at their other products, I suspect that this package retails for somewhere between $150 and $200. 

The Company is ProCD, a division of infoUSA.com. You can reach them at 

1020 East 1st St.
Papillion, NE 68046
phone 1-800-284-1679.