Numbers at your fingertips: Introducing Statista for SFU researchers!

We've all been there... that moment in a research project when you just need one key number to cement the last piece of your argument.

For instance, you might desperately need to know...

• the main things considered by Canadian Millennials when buying cars, or  
    
• the media consumption habits of Canadian commuters, or 
    
• a detailed statistical overview of Canada's oil & gas industry?

  

You know, of course, that you could go through the exercise of brainstorming about the Likely Publishers, etc., but time is tight. In fact, time is so tight that you would be overjoyed if you could skip a step or two and go straight to a presentation-ready bar chart complete with a source citation that you could drop right into your slide deck.

Sound familiar? Then you really should get to know the newest database available via the SFU Library: Statista

Statista is a statistics portal that integrates statistics from thousands of sources and provides simple exports of both data and charts in multiple formats. 

It seems fitting to describe a statistics resource with a bunch of statistics: 

1.5 million = the number of statistics currently in Statista (and it's growing quickly!)

80,000 = the number of topics covered, from Aboriginal crime and justice in Canada  to  Zinc

18,000 = the number of private and public sources consulted from North America, Europe and Asia (statistics include hyperlinks back to original sources)

3000 = the number of regularly-updated statistical dossiers -- compilations of statistics on a given topic (e.g., Residential Housing in Canada) that can be downloaded as a single PowerPoint or PDF document.

60 = the number of (largely US-focused) industry reports, such as Educational Services and Data Hosting & Computing

Statista isn't just about data produced by other organizations: they  also produce Digital Market Outlook reports  on topics such as Smart Homes in which they mix their own primary research results with external data sources, enrich them with relevant statistical context & detailed explanations, then derive their own market forecasts (with full methodology provided). 

Note: Our pilot subscription to Statista will expire on Dec. 31, 2017.  That gives you more than 12 months to explore and test this new resource.   We will evaluate the usage and impact of this resource before deciding whether to renew it. Your feedback (positive or negative) is very important, especially if you have stories to share about the impact of this resource on the work you do!  Please email me. 

** [Update: Following high usage and strongly positive feedback, an ongoing subscription was initiated at the end of the pilot period.  Thank you for your input!]

-- MarkB
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Mark Bodnar
Business & Economics Librarian
mbodnar@sfu.ca

P.S.: The best way to learn about Statista is to dive in and browse through it, but if you'd like more details first, start with this flyer.