The Riley Guide: Research & Target Employers

Business & Employer Research

How to Research Employers || What's It Like to Work At....
Business Directories / Corporate Profiles || Business Research Collections
Know the Industry Codes

Many people say to me I can't find any jobs for me online. My first question is Who would hire you? This page helps you not only find the employers that you want to talk to but also learn more about employers who have invited you for interviews.

You may also be interested in Stock Market & Financial Info, Business & Employer Rankings, and News Sources.

How to Research Employers

How to Research Companies Karmen N. T. Crowther (JobWeb.com)

This article covers the employer-research process in 5 parts, outlining what you want to learn and giving suggested resources for finding what you need to know.

Doing Business Research at the University of Pittsburgh

...this series of documents is still useful to those of us who (1) aren't in Pittsburgh and (2) don't have ready access to these libraries. They refer to the print and electronic media which assist in many areas of business research, and link to many Internet resources. Be aware that some things they link to may be restricted to Pitt students/faculty. However, now that you are armed with this guide, feel free to tap your office/career center library, local public library, and local college/university library, most of which are open for public use. My grandmother was a Pitt Alumnus.

Research by Subject: Business--Company Information, Ithaca College Library

...one of several online research guides provided by this academic library. As always, some of the resources are limited to Ithaca students but there are several free public sources and you might find the subscription-based services through your own college or public library.

Researching Companies, JobStar.org

...a 4-step guide to researching employers with links to suggested resources.

Business Research Guide, Rutgers University Libraries

...listings of and links to thousands of business information sources.

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What's It Like to Work At....

Vault.com

...offers insider guides to companies, including many anonymous interviews with current and past employees to find out “what it’s really like in there. College students may be familiar with the company’s print guides. You can review “company snapshots” and some other materials here for free without registering, but the free basic registration also allows you to participate in the message boards. Some additional services and expanded reports are available for a fee that they do not disclose to you until you have filled out the basic membership.

WetFeet.com

...like Vault.com, this company puts together insider guides to companies. There are Company Snapshots (shorter reports), Company Interviews (much longer), and much more for the active job seeker. Some areas may require the free registration, some reports require a fee, but much is free and open to the general user. Nice reports on international job search from GoingGlobal.com

Kelzen Employer Check

...based in Germany, this international website lists reviews of employers from around the world. You can select an employer from the list or target a country and the employers based there. These are reviews submitted anonymously by various registered users, so you should balance these reviews with others.

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Business Directories & Corporate Profiles

Highly Recommended || Then Try These

Use these to create lists of contact organizations. We have a variety of resources here, some which will let you target an industry and find all organizations in that industry, some which will give you industry and company profiles, and some which will only link you to a company's web page or give you their contact information. You can also use Telephone Directories to locate employers by industry and/or location. Industry-specific directories can also be found under the appropriate industry/occupational category in the jobs pages listed under Places that Post Jobs.

Highly Recommended

Business.com

Industry Lists... Developed by a team of industry experts and library scientists, the Business.com directory contains more than 400,000 listings within 25,000 industry, product and service subcategories. You can browse the listings by topic or search by a keyword or company name. This is one of the few free industry list sources you can access.

Hoover's Online

Company Profiles ... over 8000 company listings with profiles, contact names, and links to business news resources. Also includes industry profiles and international listings. Unfortunately the only free resource here is the list of company profiles. You can find companies by keyword company name search or by browsing the alphabetical list. Much of the standard profile information is still free to all views. Any other search, including industry lists, falls under their subscriber services. Still, Hoovers is an excellent resource.

D&B Small Business Solutions

Industry Lists / Company Profiles...Dun & Bradstreet's database allows you to find a business by name, location, D-U-N-S Number, or telephone number from their database of over 13 million U.S. companies. Includes a large number of small businesses. Users can see basic info on each company for free (address, telephone number, URLs, business principal or chief executive officer, and business size), and the initial report is divided into info for those who want to Sell To, Buy From (includes a short list of alternative suppliers), Compete Against (includes short list of competitors in this industry, same list as the alternative suppliers), Collect from, or Map to (yes, a map with driving instructions.) Note that subsidiaries or branches of a larger company will include a link to Headquarters Info. Additional in-depth reports listed under the Quick Tools can be purchased for a fee.

Industrial Quick Search

Industry Lists / Company Profiles...a directory of product and/or service specific vertical directories. The full list of these directories is on the page, if you just want to browse through them, but you can search for various subcategories by product (i.e., paper) or company name. Company listings connect you to that organization's website. And yes, it is fast.

Manta

Industry Lists / Company Profiles. This provider of premium online business information allows visitors to view many of the company profiles in their database for free. "Many profiles on Manta are free of charge; more detailed or specialized reports are available through a simple pay-per-view sales model." From the top of the front page you can select US, US Public, Australia, Canada, UK, or Worldwide, but you can also scroll to the bottom of this page to begin browsing US companies by indusry.

The Thomas Directories

The Thomas directories are known throughout the world for their information and coverage within a given industry.

ThomasNet.com

Industry Lists / Company contact info...the latest iteration of the Thomas Register plus the Thomas Regional guides. Registration is free for this service. You will be able to search the entire contents of the online directory featuring products from over 173,000 companies in the US and Canada. Search by company name, product or service, or brand name, and retrieve a list of all companies supplying that product, the address/phone/fax for their offices, and a list of all products they supply.

Thomas Global Register

Industry Lists / Company contact info...search for over 500,000 industrial suppliers, organized by 10,500 industrial product classifications, in 9 languages, and from 26 countries.

Then Try These

BizWeb

Industry Lists / websites... links to companies based on their goods or services provided

IndustryLink

Industry Lists / websites...a nice directory of links to sites for manufacturing and industry. They list the sites alphabetically, but a nice feature is they tell you what kind of site it it (market place, manufacturing, distribution, service, or resource). IndustryLink also features a career section, but at this time it is very very small. Not the best I've seen, but could be useful. The "Search" feature will be helpful for those who want to target in on specific areas.

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Business Research Collections

Foster Business Library: Business Resources on the Web

... loads of categories including biographical databases, calculators, geographic information, Web tools, and consumer information. This directory is maintained by the University of Washington's Foster Business Library, and many sources are restricted to UW affiliates, but you'll find a lot of useful info and listings here.

Industry Research Desk

... provides tools for researching specific companies, industries, and manufacturing processes. Also includes guides to starting your online research. Service is operated by Polson Enterprises, a product development & market research firm.

Research Guides from the Baker Library, Harvard Business School

This collection of research guides was produced "to help in the use of resources at Baker and beyond for business and career research. The list below includes guides to general business topics, information on specific industries and specific course support projects that may be helpful in other contexts." While outside users will not be able to access everything, many of the subject or industry-specific guides include lists of companies (employers), trade associations (more employers plus jobs), career options, and professionals associations and organizations (networking plus jobs).

Research Guides - Business & Management

...created by the Gelman Library at George Washington University, these guides are "annotated lists of important information sources in specific subject areas." While many of the listings are print materials, they also reference many authoritative Internet sources. If you are stuck trying to find a particular piece of information about a company or organization, these could be very helpful in pointing you in the right direction.

Research & Reference Gateway: Research Guides: Business

Wonderful resource from the Rutgers University Libraries. Puts the top business research sources (both print and online) in one easy-to-use place. They've divided the collection into eighteen sections, including Business News Sources, Job Searching, Market Research, and Financing Your Business. Within each section, there are numerous sites complete with short annotations. The librarians responsible for this site have dated each section so you know the last each was updated.

Yahoo's Business to Business Industry list and their Shopping and Services Industry list

...Yahoo has divided their huge list of companies into these 2 lists (I don't immediately see the difference between the two myself.). Tour these for lists of companies in each industry area as well as ideas on how some industry sectors have grown in terms of specialties and services available.

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Know the Industry Codes

Standard Industrial Classifications (SIC) Codes Index

... find SIC codes for various industries. Searchable by keyword!

NAICS, the North American Industry Classification System

NAICS, a side-bar to NAFTA, will replace the countries' separate classification systems with one uniform system for classifying industries. In the United States, NAICS will replace the Standard Industrial Classification, and in fact is already in use in some sectors of the Government. From this page you will find the implementation schedule and a comparison guide between NAICS and SIC. What does this mean to your business and industry research? You should be aware of this new system but it will be a while yet until it is really integrated into the business information sector.

what

job title, keywords

where

city, state, zip

jobs by

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