Kalibrate’s Q2 release introduces new tools and enhancements designed to help market planning, real estate, and location strategy teams work more efficiently and make more informed decisions for new growth opportunities and their existing portfolio.
Highlights include the new Hotspot Analysis tool for identifying high-potential markets, a complete rebuild of our AI experience with the introduction of the k.ai Companion, a refreshed mobile app experience, and other enhancements.
Together, these updates make it easier to uncover opportunity, analyze markets with confidence, and access the information you need – whether you’re working in the office or on the go.
This article previews KLI updates available in the coming days.
Hotspot Analysis
Finding the right markets for growth often means evaluating dozens of different factors, from population and income levels to customer behaviors, lifestyle characteristics, and competitive activity. Looking at each of those factors separately can make it difficult to see where the strongest opportunities really exist.
The Hotspot Analysis tool brings those data points together into a single view. Users can build a formula based on the characteristics that matter most to their business and quickly identify the areas that best match their ideal customer profile, expansion strategy, or site selection criteria.
To create this view, users follow three easy steps:
- Select the variables that matter most. Choose the demographic, psychographic, and custom factors to include. Then choose its importance and if it has a positive or negative impact.
- Define your area of analysis. Should KLI analyze a specific market, user defined region, or should it be based on the map view?
- Choose how to visualize results. Display the hotspots for census geographies like block groups, or display the hotspots by h3 hexagonal grid, or a heatmap.
What makes Hotspot Analysis especially valuable is that the models can be saved, reused, and redefined over time. Instead of recreating analyses for every project, teams can establish a consistent approach to evaluating markets and apply it across different regions.
Results are consistent and transparent, giving users greater confidence in the insights they use to support market planning, site selection, and expansion decisions. Analyses can also be shared and revisited, helping teams collaborate around a common view of opportunity.
Meet the new k.ai Companion
This release introduces the new k.ai Companion, a significant evolution of Kalibrate’s AI experience. Moving beyond a traditional help chatbot, the k.ai Companion acts as a conversational assistant that helps users explore reports, uncover patterns, and gain deeper value from the analyses already available within KLI.
Users can ask follow-up questions, compare reports, and investigate trends across Market Summaries, Revenue Forecast reports, and Competitive Insights. Instead of searching through multiple reports for answers, they can engage in a natural conversation to better the factors driving market performance.
The k.ai Companion also introduces a persistent workspace, allowing users to return to previous conversations and continue their analysis over time. Combined with integrations across tools such as Find Locations and Portfolio Analyzer, it creates a more connected and intuitive way to work within KLI.
Importantly, k.ai remains focused on assisting – not replacing – decision-making. The companion helps users identify patterns, compare results, and surface insights based on the data provided, giving market planning and real estate teams a faster path from analysis to action.
KLI app: A fresh look for mobile
This release brings a refreshed mobile experience to KLI, featuring updated branding, improved usability, and a cleaner interface that makes key information easier to access in the field.
Behind the scenes, we’ve also made performance, security, and reliability improvements to support a more consistent experience across devices.
Additional platform enhancements
In addition to the major updates featured in this release, we’ve made several improvements across KLI to enhance usability, workflow efficiency, and platform reliability.
- Market Optimizer improvements – Select, sort, and search columns within Market Optimizer results to review and compare opportunities more effciently.
- Bulk Info workflow enhancements – Generate trade area shapes from filtered subsets of locations to visualize and analyze results more effectively.
- Enhanced Point Detail reports – Include counts, averages, and calculated values in aggregate reporting outputs.
- Geofeeds and geocoding updates – Use geofeeds in saved maps and benefit from improved ad hoc geocoding accuracy.
- Bulk drive time configuration – Define alternate drive time engines and speed specifications for bulk analyses.
Looking ahead
From Hotspot Analysis and the k.ai Companion to improvements across the KLI platform, the Q2 release delivers new ways to evaluate markets, explore data, and work more efficiently.
Want to see a demo of these new features? Request a 30-minute demo meeting and we’ll give you a preview.
