> Source: https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/glossary/ > Updated: 2026-11-09 Geomarketing · Glossary # What do the main geomarketing terms mean? Sixty terms you meet when you analyse a location, explained without jargon, with the way K-Stra uses each one where it matters. In short Geomarketing has its own vocabulary: catchment areas and isochrones describe who can reach a place, demand, opportunity and market gap describe the market, and SA1 areas, postcodes and councils are the Australian boundaries the numbers come in. This glossary defines sixty of those terms in plain English, each with a link to a fuller explanation. [See the terms on a map](https://www.k-stra.com/a/?src=geomarketing-glossary) A to Z ## Which term are you looking for? A B C D E G H I L M N O P Q R S T V W ### A Address point The map position of a single street address. K-Stra holds 14.5 million address points for Australia, about 8.9 million of them homes, and spreads residents onto them so that a catchment counts the people inside its exact border. [Territory data](https://www.k-stra.com/product/data/territory/) Administrative area An official boundary used to publish statistics or run local government, such as a state, a council or a postcode. K-Stra uses nine levels for Australia, from the whole country down to 61,844 SA1 areas (ASGS Edition 3, 2021). [Australian geography levels](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/australian-geography-levels/) ### B Balanced territories Sales or franchise territories built from whole areas so that each holds a similar amount of the chosen measure — clients, prospects, residents or families — within a set tolerance, usually with a cap on drive time and every territory in one piece. [Sales territory mapping](https://www.k-stra.com/solutions/sales-territory-mapping/) Best locations In K-Stra, the five points of a sector analysis with the highest opportunity, kept at least 500 metres apart, each described by the building or land found there. They are places to look at first, not a ranking of sales. [Retail site selection](https://www.k-stra.com/solutions/retail-site-selection/) ### C Cannibalisation What happens when a new store of a network takes customers from the network’s own existing stores instead of from competitors. It is measured as the residents two stores share within their catchments, or as the spending one would take from the other. [Cannibalisation](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/cannibalisation/) Captured spending(Spend captured) The share of the catchment residents’ yearly spending on a category that a model assigns to one store, given its competitors and their distance. It is a modelled order of magnitude for comparing sites, not sales: visitors, workers and online orders are not in it. [Retail site selection](https://www.k-stra.com/solutions/retail-site-selection/) Catchment area(Trade area) The area from which a store, a service or a site draws most of its customers. “Catchment area” and “trade area” mean the same thing: retail planners say trade area, geographers and public services say catchment area. It is best drawn as the time people would travel along the road network, and split into primary, secondary and tertiary zones by how much custom each sends. [What is a catchment area?](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/catchment-area/) Census The ABS Census of Population and Housing, taken every five years, which counts every household in Australia. K-Stra uses the 2021 Census, the most recent with published results, for families, housing, education and employment. [Population data](https://www.k-stra.com/product/data/population/) Choropleth map A map that colours each area by the value of one indicator, such as residents per square kilometre or average income, with a legend that explains the classes. How the classes are cut changes what the map seems to say. [Maps and thematics](https://www.k-stra.com/product/maps-and-thematics/) Closure plan An ordering of a network’s stores by how few residents would be left with no store of the network in reach if each closed, recalculated after every closure. It shows which stores matter least to coverage, not which ones earn least. [Store network planning](https://www.k-stra.com/solutions/store-network-planning/) Competition(Competition index) In K-Stra, the pull that existing stores of a sector exert on each point, weighted by their distance. It is an index, not a share: 0 means no competitor reaches the point, and the highest values sit where several strong stores overlap. [Demand, supply and opportunity](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/demand-supply-opportunity/) Consumption index An index of how much residents of an area spend per head compared with the Australian average, set at 100. In K-Stra it is derived from the income index, because household spending is not measured below state level. [Income and consumption indices](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/income-and-consumption-indices/) Contested territory The residents who can reach both one of your stores and at least one competitor within the catchment time. It is the part of a market where customers have a real choice, and where location and service decide. [Cannibalisation analysis](https://www.k-stra.com/solutions/cannibalisation-analysis/) Coverage The residents a network of stores reaches within a given travel time, counted once even when two catchments overlap. In K-Stra it is also the name of the analysis that maps every store, competitor and planned site with its catchment. [Store network planning](https://www.k-stra.com/solutions/store-network-planning/) ### D Demand In K-Stra, the yearly spending on a sector that can be reached from each point within the sector’s travel time. It is a property of the place, so the demand of neighbouring points overlaps and does not add up. [Demand, supply and opportunity](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/demand-supply-opportunity/) Demographic profile A description of the people who live in an area: how many, their age, households, origin, education, work, income and housing. It is the first thing to read about any catchment, because every market starts with residents. [Demographic analysis](https://www.k-stra.com/solutions/demographic-analysis/) Density per 10,000 residents The number of businesses of a sector for every 10,000 people living in an area. Set against the same figure for the council, the state and Australia, it shows whether an area is crowded or short of a type of business. [Competitor analysis](https://www.k-stra.com/solutions/competitor-analysis/) Distance decay The fall in the chance that people use a store as the travel time to reach it grows. It is the reason a catchment thins out towards its edge, and why every gravity model divides attraction by some power of distance or time. [What is geomarketing?](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/what-is-geomarketing/) Drive time The minutes needed to reach a place by car along the road network, at the speeds roads allow and, if chosen, with average or heavy traffic. A drive-time area around an address is an isochrone. [How the engine works](https://www.k-stra.com/product/how-it-works/) ### E Estimated annual sales In K-Stra, a band of yearly sales for an existing retail store, such as A$1–2 million, shown with its confidence (high, medium or low) and never for services. Built from chain accounts, ABS retail totals, store size and, for independents, rougher evidence, it is an estimate, not a reported figure. [Competitor analysis](https://www.k-stra.com/solutions/competitor-analysis/) Estimated Resident Population(ERP) The official ABS estimate of the people who usually live in an area, with a new estimate for each 30 June. K-Stra uses the estimate at 30 June 2025: 27,613,654 residents for Australia. [Population data](https://www.k-stra.com/product/data/population/) ### G Geocoding Turning a written address into map coordinates, with a measure of how precise the match is. It is the step that lets a list of stores or customers appear on the map. [Your own data](https://www.k-stra.com/product/my-data/) Geomarketing The use of location data — where people live, what they spend and where businesses stand — to make commercial decisions such as where to open, how to draw territories or where to aim a campaign. [What is geomarketing?](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/what-is-geomarketing/) GIS(Geographic information system) Software for storing, analysing and mapping geographic data. Traditional GIS tools can do almost anything with a map but expect the user to find the data and build each analysis; geomarketing tools package both for business questions. [Location intelligence vs geomarketing](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/location-intelligence/) Gravity model A family of models that estimate how shoppers divide between places by comparing each place’s attraction with the distance or time needed to reach it, by analogy with gravity. Reilly’s law and the Huff model are the best known. [What is geomarketing?](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/what-is-geomarketing/) Gross yield A property’s yearly rent divided by its price, before costs, as a percentage. Calculated from asking rents and asking prices in an area, it is a first measure of how the rental market pays against the sale market. [Real estate data](https://www.k-stra.com/product/data/real-estate/) ### H Heatmap A map that shows where points are concentrated as a smooth colour surface, without area borders. It suits large numbers of points, such as customers or businesses, where individual pins would overlap. [Maps and thematics](https://www.k-stra.com/product/maps-and-thematics/) Household spending(Household final consumption expenditure) What households spend on goods and services in a year, published by the ABS in the national accounts by category. Shared out by area and by sector, it is the base of every demand figure in K-Stra. [Work, income and spending](https://www.k-stra.com/product/data/work-and-income/) Huff model A gravity model proposed by David Huff in 1963 that gives every home a probability of choosing each store, rising with the store’s attraction and falling with travel time. K-Stra uses this approach to split residents’ spending among stores. [What is geomarketing?](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/what-is-geomarketing/) ### I Income index An index of the income per head of an area’s residents against the Australian average, set at 100. K-Stra builds it from ABS personal income data where measured and estimates it elsewhere. [Income and consumption indices](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/income-and-consumption-indices/) Isochrone The area that can be reached from a point within a given travel time, by car or on foot, along the road network. Unlike a circle, it follows roads, bridges and barriers, so it matches where people can actually come from. [Isochrone vs isodistance](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/isochrone-vs-isodistance/) Isodistance The area within a given distance of a point measured along the road network rather than in a straight line. It suits trips where distance matters more than time, such as deliveries priced by the kilometre. [Isochrone vs isodistance](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/isochrone-vs-isodistance/) ### L Local government area(LGA, Council) The area of a council, the third tier of government in Australia. The 2025 list that K-Stra uses has 566 council codes, 548 of them with residents, and councils are the smallest areas with a population estimate for every year since 2019. [Australian geography levels](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/australian-geography-levels/) Location intelligence The wider practice of drawing business insight from location data, in any department from logistics to risk. Geomarketing is its commercial branch: markets, customers, stores and territories. [Location intelligence vs geomarketing](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/location-intelligence/) ### M Market gap In K-Stra, the spending within reach of a point for each unit of competition already there, scaled so that 100 is the typical spot in the analysis. Above 200 there is a market and few competitors. [Demand, supply and opportunity](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/demand-supply-opportunity/) Market potential What the residents of an area spend in a year on a category of goods or services, whoever they buy from. It is the size of the cake that every business of that category in the area shares. [Market potential analysis](https://www.k-stra.com/solutions/market-potential-analysis/) Market share A business’s sales in an area divided by the market potential of that area. Measured with loyalty card data, it covers card holders only and is therefore a floor. [Market share and penetration](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/market-share-and-penetration/) Mesh block The smallest area of the ABS geography, most holding 30 to 60 dwellings, used as the building block of every larger statistical area. Census counts at this level are limited to people and dwellings. [Australian geography levels](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/australian-geography-levels/) ### N Natural breaks A way of cutting map classes where the values naturally jump, so that similar areas share a colour. It shows the shape of the data well but makes two maps hard to compare, because the class limits change. [Maps and thematics](https://www.k-stra.com/product/maps-and-thematics/) ### O Opportunity In K-Stra, a measure of where a sector’s demand within reach outweighs the pull of the stores already there. It points to places where a new business would face the least competition for the spending around it. [Demand, supply and opportunity](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/demand-supply-opportunity/) ### P Penetration The share of households in an area that are customers of a business, for example card holders as a percentage of families in each postcode. It shows where a store is well known and where it is not. [Market share and penetration](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/market-share-and-penetration/) Postcode(Postal Area, POA) The ABS version of Australia Post postcodes, built from mesh blocks so that statistics can be published for it. There are 2,643 Postal Areas in ASGS Edition 3 (2021); they follow delivery rounds, not travel times. [Australian geography levels](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/australian-geography-levels/) Primary catchment The inner zone of a catchment, closest to the store, from which most of its customers come. Secondary and tertiary zones lie further out and send fewer customers each. [What is a catchment area?](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/catchment-area/) Prospect A potential customer not yet buying, often a business in a sales file. Prospects can be mapped beside clients to show where a sales team has untapped ground. [Sales territory mapping](https://www.k-stra.com/solutions/sales-territory-mapping/) ### Q Quantiles(Even bands) A way of cutting map classes so that each holds the same number of areas. Every colour appears equally often, which helps compare areas but can split close values or join distant ones. [Maps and thematics](https://www.k-stra.com/product/maps-and-thematics/) ### R Radius(Buffer) A circle of fixed distance around a point. It is quick to draw but ignores roads, rivers and motorways, so it counts people who cannot easily reach the site and misses some who can. [Isochrone vs isodistance](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/isochrone-vs-isodistance/) Reilly’s law of retail gravitation A rule published by William Reilly in 1931: a town attracts shoppers in proportion to its size and in inverse proportion to the square of the distance. It started the gravity models still used in retail. [What is geomarketing?](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/what-is-geomarketing/) Road network The graph of streets and roads, with their direction and speed, along which travel times are calculated. K-Stra uses it for car and walking times, so a catchment stops at a river unless there is a bridge. [How the engine works](https://www.k-stra.com/product/how-it-works/) ### S Session-only dataset In K-Stra, a dataset you upload marked to be deleted automatically 24 hours after it was loaded. It suits one-off analyses of figures you would rather not keep on any server. [Your own data](https://www.k-stra.com/product/my-data/) Shared residents The residents who live inside the catchments of two or more stores at once. The share a store holds in common with others is the simplest measure of overlap within a network. [Cannibalisation](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/cannibalisation/) Site selection The process of choosing a location for a new store or service: defining the catchment, measuring residents and spending, counting competitors and comparing candidate sites on the same numbers. [Site selection scorecard](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/site-selection-guide/) Statistical Area Level 1(SA1) The smallest ABS area for which most Census data is published, generally home to 200 to 800 people. Australia has 61,844 in ASGS Edition 3 (2021), the edition K-Stra uses. [Australian geography levels](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/australian-geography-levels/) Statistical Area Level 2(SA2) An ABS area that usually matches a suburb or a small community, generally with 3,000 to 25,000 residents. There are 2,472 in ASGS Edition 3 (2021), and they are the smallest areas with yearly ABS income data. [Australian geography levels](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/australian-geography-levels/) Statistical Areas Levels 3 and 4(SA3, SA4) Larger ABS regions built from SA2 areas: 358 SA3 areas, often a group of suburbs or a regional city, and 107 SA4 areas, designed for labour market statistics (ASGS Edition 3, 2021). [Australian geography levels](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/australian-geography-levels/) Suburb(Suburbs and localities, SAL) The ABS version of the named suburbs and localities people use in addresses. There are 15,352 in ASGS Edition 3 (2021); their borders follow history and naming, not statistics. [Australian geography levels](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/australian-geography-levels/) ### T Thematic map Any map that shows one theme on top of a base map: areas coloured by value, symbols sized by quantity, categories or a heatmap. A legend and a source note are what make it readable and checkable. [Maps and thematics](https://www.k-stra.com/product/maps-and-thematics/) Trade area analysis The study of what lies inside the trade area of a store or shopping street: who lives there, what they spend, who competes for them and how far customers travel. “Trade area” and “catchment area” mean the same thing; retail planners say trade area, geographers and public services say catchment area. [Catchment and trade area analysis](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/catchment-area/) ### V Voronoi polygons(Thiessen polygons) A division of a map into cells, each holding the area closer to one point than to any other. In K-Stra the cells of the road network are coloured by the value of their point, such as demand or opportunity. [Maps and thematics](https://www.k-stra.com/product/maps-and-thematics/) ### W Walking catchment The area people can reach on foot within a few minutes, along footpaths and streets. It is the right catchment for businesses bought on impulse or on the way, such as cafés and ice cream shops. [Restaurants and cafés](https://www.k-stra.com/industries/restaurants-and-cafes/) Whitespace analysis(Gap analysis) Looking for areas where the market for a category is strong and a brand or network has no store within reach. It is the starting point of most network expansion plans. [Store network planning](https://www.k-stra.com/solutions/store-network-planning/) Using the terms ## Which terms matter most when choosing a location? Three ideas carry most location decisions. The catchment area says who can reach the site; the market potential says what those people spend; the density of competitors says how many businesses already share it. The rest refine them: an isochrone draws the catchment better than a radius, the Huff model splits the spending among stores, and the market gap points to where competition is thinnest for the demand around it. FAQ ## What else do people ask about geomarketing terms? ### What is the difference between geomarketing and location intelligence? Geomarketing is the commercial branch of location intelligence, the wider practice of using location data in any part of a business. The comparison is in [location intelligence vs geomarketing](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/location-intelligence/) . ### Is a catchment area the same as a trade area? They mean the same thing: the area a store or centre draws most of its customers from. Retail planners and shopping centre owners tend to say “trade area”; geographers and public services say “catchment area”. How to draw it, and what to read inside it, is in [what is a catchment area?](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/catchment-area/) ### Which Australian boundaries should I use for a market analysis? For the market itself, a drive-time or walking catchment around the site; for reporting, the level that matches your data. [Australian geography levels](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/australian-geography-levels/) compares SA2 areas, suburbs, postcodes and councils. ### Can I link to a single definition? Yes. Every term has its own anchor: add the term’s name with hyphens after a hash to this page’s address, for example #catchment-area or #market-gap. Related pages - [All geomarketing guides](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/) - [What is geomarketing?](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/what-is-geomarketing/) - [What is a catchment area?](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/catchment-area/) - [Isochrone vs isodistance](https://www.k-stra.com/geomarketing/isochrone-vs-isodistance/) - [Territory data](https://www.k-stra.com/product/data/territory/) - [Who K-Stra is for](https://www.k-stra.com/for/) Your turn ## From the words to the map. Draw an isochrone, count residents and read demand and market gap for any address in Australia. [Open the app — free to explore](https://www.k-stra.com/a/?src=geomarketing-glossary) Exploring the map is free; you pay only for the analyses you run