Places vary in their capacity to support small businesses and entrepreneurs. Some consistently incubate successful new businesses, while others struggle for reasons related to capital access, peer networking, the availability of support resources, and local government engagement, among others.
To help local stakeholders assess their city or county’s ability to support small business starts and expansions, we designed the Small Business Landscape Diagnostic.
This diagnostic enables local stakeholders to assess cities and counties relative to their peers. It allows users to assess the combined influence of 20 indicators that shape entrepreneurial outcomes across 5 key areas:
- small business presence
- lending and access to capital
- small business development support system
- private associations of businesses
- local government support
How to Use This Tool
Use the blank diagnostic tool and accompanying data to assess how your city or county compares with others nationally. Detailed instructions on how to fill out the tool are available in the blank diagnostic tool. The example diagnostic tool demonstrates what a completed tool would look like for a fictional place.
Using the blank version, fill in the first nine indicators using the linked data. Fill in the remaining indicators (10 to 20) using the suggested guidance on locally available data. Currently, data are available for the 100 largest cities and counties by population.
Please consider sending a copy of your completed diagnostic tool and comments on how you've used it locally to [email protected].
Resources
Small Business Landscape Diagnostic – Blank version [PDF]
Small Business Landscape Diagnostic – Example completed tool [PDF]
Download the city- and county-level data
About This Project
This project is supported by the Black Wealth Data Center, which has collaborated with Urban to research strategies cities can use to promote shared prosperity, particularly strategies involving Black-owned businesses.
