The Intelligence Report
A complete intelligence read on one market and the operators competing in it.
An SEO firm sees keywords. An M&A advisor sees deals. A research firm sees a category. Nobody maps the whole board for a single market. The Echelon Intelligence Report does: who owns the demand, where it is heading, who is winning the search, the reviews, and the AI answers, where the opening is, and how the operators in that market sit in the consolidation wave reshaping their industry.
It is built to order, for one market, from the Echelon database, registry and permit records, demand archives, a live visibility panel, and verified public filings. Not a template. Not an audit with a logo on it.
What is inside
Ten sections, each one answering a question that decides whether an operator grows, gets bought, or gets passed by. Every section is built to executive standard: findings first, judgments graded, recommendations consolidated once.
Executive summary and decision matrix
The thesis in three sentences, the top three strategic openings, and one table pairing each finding with its evidence, its financial implication, the action it calls for, and its priority. If a reader gets one page, this is the page.
Key judgments, graded
Numbered judgments, each one sentence, each carrying an explicit confidence grade and the basis for it. High means direct measurement supports it. Moderate means measured indicators plus inference, with the inference stated. An assessment that will not grade itself is an opinion.
The demand map
Where the work is, what it is worth, and where it is heading, measured per keyword per city from stored search archives and read against permit activity where permits are collectable. In residential trades markets it is anchored to the Echelon Residential Demand Index. The size and shape of the opportunity, not a guess.
The adversary file
Every named competitor that matters, profiled: base of operations, positions held, positions held at number one, review equity, rating, site posture, structured data, and an assessment of what it would take to move them. Not a leaderboard. A file on each one, including the ones that are hard.
The visibility gap
Exactly where a given operator is invisible, measured across a live panel of keyword and city pairs, what it is costing in missed work, and which competitors are capturing the jobs that should be theirs. The audit a search firm sells, as one section of ten.
The answer layer
Where AI answers fire across the panel, who they cite, who holds the knowledge panel, and which operators carry the markup that gets them quoted. Most markets have not yet noticed they are being scored by machines that never visit a homepage.
Capacity and succession
Who can actually staff the work in this market, and who is running out of time to. Built from registry records where a public registry exists: tenure cohorts, the thirty-year bench, entry velocity by year, lapses, and enforcement flags. The constraint that decides which growth plans are real.
The M&A position
Where this market and this operator sit in the consolidation wave: who is buying, what structures they are using, what they look for, and what a firm would need to command the multiple. The read that matters whether you are buying, selling, or staying.
Tiers, roadmap, and execution matrix
Every city or submarket tiered seize, contest, or siege, the specific opening against each incumbent, and the order of moves. Then the phased execution matrix with target metrics, a model printed as downside, base, and upside rather than a single number, a risk register naming the indicator that would reveal each risk, and the falsifiers: what would prove the thesis wrong, in either direction.
Sources, methodology, and snapshot dates
Every hard fact traced to a license or registration number, a filing, or a measured pull, with the date of every pull stated. Estimates labeled as estimates. Interpretation labeled as interpretation. You see exactly where each figure came from.
What you receive
The Deliverable
- A designed PDF intelligence brief, typeset and produced to a fixed house standard, not a slide deck and not a spreadsheet export.
- Numbered exhibits, each carrying a section’s sharpest fact, each computed from the source data at build time and listed in the front matter.
- A contents page and a bookmarked navigation panel, so a twenty page confidential document is navigable on screen and in print.
- A classification and distribution line, a version and date block, and a snapshot dates table, so everyone reading it knows what it is and when it was true.
- An appendix on paid engagements: the entity record with licenses and expirations, the coverage statement, sources and verification standard, methodology, and definitions.
The evidence layers
A report is only as good as what sits under it. Every layer below is pulled and stored raw before a word is written, which is what makes a figure reproducible a year later and a re-pull comparable to the first one.
| Registry and license layer | State licensing and registration rosters. Held in the Echelon database for the trades, more than 2 million records from across the United States, rebuilt weekly, or pulled to order for another regulated market. Yields the active census, tenure and succession cohorts, entry velocity, lapses, enforcement flags, and contact fill rates. |
| Demand layer | Search volume per keyword per city, stored raw so the monthly history behind each average is available and every later pull compounds into trend rather than replacing it. |
| Visibility layer | A live panel of keyword and city pairs, position by position, exported and archived. Re-pulls derive their pairs from the prior panel, never from a retyped list, so quarterly movement is measured on identical ground. |
| Answer layer | AI overview fire rate across the panel, the citations behind those answers, knowledge panel ownership, and per operator answer markup. |
| Listings and review layer | A commercial listings pull per market per category ordered by review count, reconciled against live profiles by screenshot, because the commercial index lags live results and the two are never mixed into one figure. |
| Entity and ownership layer | Secretary of State filings, ownership and platform records, and the SEC filing trail where an acquirer funds through per deal vehicles. Ownership facts are stated neutrally and verified before they print. |
| Site technical layer | A direct fetch of your domain and every named competitor domain: redirect behavior, structured data blocks and types, answer markup, page depth, and certificate health. Frequently the sharpest differentiator in the file. |
| Human verification | Screenshots of live results and live profiles, and human classification of lead generation properties and non operator domains. Classification is never left to automation alone, because automation cannot tell a real shop from an inventory page. |
The markets covered
Coverage runs deepest where the public record runs deepest. That is stated plainly here, and it is stated again inside every report.
Deepest coverage
The trades: residential, commercial, industrial
More than 2 million licensing and registration records in the Echelon database, drawn from across the United States and rebuilt on a weekly cycle so the history compounds instead of resetting. HVAC, plumbing, electrical, roofing, and general contracting, with permit records added where a municipal portal allows collection. This is the coverage no competitor can buy back, because it is built out of time.
Built to order
Licensed professions, including law firms
Any market where practitioners and firms sit on a public registry. The registry method that built the contractor database applies directly: the active roster, the tenure cohorts, entry velocity, standing and disciplinary record, and the succession picture, pulled for your market as part of the engagement rather than assumed from a category report.
Also covered
Every other local and regional business
Where no public registry exists, the registry layer drops out and the report says so in one plain sentence. Demand, visibility, the answer layer, review equity, entity and ownership, and site posture carry the analysis, and they are the layers that decide most local markets anyway.
Scope is confirmed on the call, before any payment. If a market cannot be measured to the standard described on this page, you hear that on the call rather than discovering it in the report. Record counts include licenses, registrations, and the individually licensed tradesmen that states track alongside contracting businesses.
Who it is for
The Operator
One location or a regional leader, the question is the same: who really owns your market, where are you losing work you cannot see, and what would it take to own it. The report tells you, and it tells you what your business looks like to the buyers circling your industry.
The Acquirer
An independent read on a market or a target before you move: real demand, the true competitive order, the capacity and succession picture, and where a firm sits on the one thing hardest to fix and easiest to miss. Diligence on the metrics the data room will not show you.
The Advisor
Agencies, brokers, lenders, and consultants who need a sourced, independent read on a client’s market before building a plan or a valuation on top of it. Every figure carries its source and its date, so your recommendation rests on measured ground rather than a category assumption.
How it is built
Every report draws on the Echelon database of licensing and market activity, registry and permit records, the Echelon Residential Demand Index where the market is residential, a live visibility panel, and verified state and public filings, assembled for one specific market. See how the index is built
How it is verified
A report that cannot be checked is marketing. Before any Intelligence Report is delivered it passes a fixed set of verification gates:
- Every trend or comparison claim is recomputable from a stored file, and a single window of data is never presented as a year over year change.
- Every superlative and every absolute, any largest, only, first, all, or none, is checked against the full dataset by script rather than against the working note that inspired it.
- Every chart is computed fresh from the source files at build time, never hand carried from the draft.
- Working hypotheses are tested and killed in the data before they reach the page, and a failed hypothesis is reported as a finding rather than quietly dropped.
- Your own live profile is verified by screenshot and reconciled against the commercial index, with both sources dated separately.
- Hard facts trace to a record number, a filing, or a measured pull. Reads are labeled as reads, at the point they appear.
A complete, built to order intelligence read on one market: demand, visibility, the answer layer, capacity, the acquisition position, and a full adversary file on your primary and emerging competitors. Delivered as a designed PDF brief with every source and snapshot date documented. Final scope and price are set on the call, and depend on the market’s size and how much of its record is public.
It starts with a 15 minute call. You tell me the market, I confirm scope and answer your questions, and if you decide to move forward I take payment securely by card on that same call. No invoicing back and forth, no waiting. Monthly and quarterly monitoring is available for any market we have mapped, so the picture stays current after the report ships.
Request your 15-minute consultation
Or connect with Mike Warner on LinkedIn.
Questions
How is this different from an SEO audit?
An audit looks at one website’s search health. The Intelligence Report maps an entire market: demand, the competitive field, the visibility gap, the AI answer layer, capacity and succession, the M&A position, and the plan to take the market. The search read is one section of ten, not the whole product.
Do you cover markets outside the trades?
Yes. The trades carry the deepest coverage because the Echelon database holds more than 2 million licensing records from across the United States, rebuilt weekly. For law firms and other licensed professions, the registry layer is pulled to order where a public registry exists. The demand, visibility, answer, listings, entity, and site layers apply to any market. Scope is confirmed on the call before payment.
What if my market has no public license or registry record?
Then the report says so in plain terms and stands on the layers that do exist: demand, visibility, the answer layer, review equity, entity and ownership, and site posture. A partial map presented as a complete one produces bad decisions, so the boundary of the analysis is stated rather than hidden.
Who is it for?
Operators of any size who need to know where they truly stand in their market, acquirers evaluating a market or a target before they commit, and advisors who need an independent sourced read before building a plan around a market.
What does it cost?
Each report is customized for the clients needs. The price is established prior to the work starting. It begins with a short consultation call, and if you move forward, payment is taken securely by card on that call.
How is it delivered?
As a designed and classified PDF intelligence brief with numbered exhibits, a bookmarked contents panel, and the data sources and snapshot dates documented throughout. Scope and timing are confirmed when you request it.
What markets do you cover?
Any U.S. metro. Each report is assembled for one specific market from the Echelon database, registry and permit records, demand archives, a live visibility panel, and public filings.
Can I keep the picture current after the report ships?
Yes. Monthly and quarterly monitoring is available for any market that has been mapped, so movement in the competitive field is measured against the original panel rather than re-estimated.
Know who owns your market
Find out where the work is going, who is capturing it, and what it would take to lead the market yourself.
Request your 15-minute consultation
A 15 minute call to confirm scope. Payment is taken by card on the call if you move forward.
Echelon Reports · Due Diligence
Does the business survive the sale or transfer?
The Quality of License Report is the government records counterpart to a Quality of Earnings: license integrity, qualifier risk, entity standing, liens, litigation, and regulatory record on a single acquisition target.
Request your 15-minute consultation
Tell me the market and the question you need answered. I reply the same day with scope, timing, and price, and we set the call.
mike@echelonreports.com | linkedin.com/in/jmichaelwarner | x.com/_Mike_Warner
Echelon Reports produces public records intelligence. It is not accounting, legal, or investment advice.