Two Systems, Only One Still Live in Current Data
SIC and NAICS get used almost interchangeably in casual conversation among producers, a habit left over from SIC’s own long run as the standard classification system. The two are not interchangeable in the data itself. The government agencies producing new business-registration data today, the Census Bureau among them, run on NAICS.
That distinction is worth stating plainly before building a targeting list around either term, since asking a data source for SIC codes when its underlying system is NAICS-only is a fast way to come up empty.
The 80% Figure That Confirms Which System Runs the Data
The Census Bureau’s own Business Formation Statistics program classifies every filing by NAICS code, and a Census-developed automated industry-coding program assigned NAICS codes to more than 80% of all incoming EIN applications in 2020, with a machine-learning model handling most of the remaining share. That is not a minor administrative detail, it is direct evidence that NAICS is the classification system embedded in how new business data gets processed at the point of filing, not just a system referenced in a database schema somewhere downstream.
NAICS Is Not Just a Census-Specific Standard
OSHA’s own Establishment Search tool is independently indexed by NAICS code as well, alongside establishment name and inspection number. Two separate federal agencies, running two entirely different data programs, organizing their own public records around the same classification standard is confirmation this is a genuine cross-agency convention, not a Census-specific quirk a producer would have to learn twice for two different sources.
What a Code-Based Targeting List Buys a Producer
Building a list around industry code rather than a generic keyword search means a producer can define exactly which businesses belong on a calling list, and exclude everything else, before a single record is pulled. A construction-focused book can target construction-sector codes specifically. A restaurant or hospitality specialist can target food-service-sector codes. The list gets built around the agency’s own real specialization instead of a broad, loosely defined industry label that pulls in businesses outside the agency’s actual appetite.
That precision compounds once a code-based list gets cross-referenced against other public sources, since a formation filing, an OSHA record, and a contractor license lookup are all more useful together when they can be matched on the same underlying industry classification.
Where the Codes Show Up Across This Series
Census Business Formation Statistics classify every new filing by NAICS code from the moment it is processed. OSHA’s Establishment Search tool indexes inspection records by the same system. A producer building a targeting list around industry code is not learning a new classification for each individual public-record source, the same code structure carries across them.
Building the List Once the Codes Are Set
Start from the codes that match an agency’s book, not a generic industry guess. Pull new formation filings in those codes for a target geography, cross-reference against OSHA’s inspection data in the same codes where a safety-record angle applies, and prioritize whichever names show up on more than one source. The code itself is the organizing layer that makes that cross-referencing possible in the first place.
Turning a Coded List Into Booked Meetings
A precise list still needs a real conversation behind it to become a meeting. Human + AI SDRs can work a code-targeted list over SMS, calling the businesses the codes point to instead of a broad, loosely defined industry guess.
What this means for you
- A Census-developed automated program assigned NAICS codes to more than 80% of all incoming EIN applications in 2020, direct evidence NAICS, not the older SIC system, is the classification standard running current business data.
- OSHA’s own Establishment Search tool is independently indexed by NAICS code too, confirming industry-code targeting is a cross-agency federal standard, not a single source’s quirk.
- A code-based targeting list lets a producer define exactly which businesses belong on a calling list before a single record is pulled, and makes cross-referencing against other public sources far more precise.
Sources
The external data in this guide draws on the sources below. Figures described in the text as estimates or industry triangulations are directional and are not attributed to a single dataset.