Systems and methods for recommending merchants

A computer-implemented method of recommending at least one merchant of a plurality of merchants to a candidate consumer using a merchant analytic (MA) computer system, wherein the MA computer system is in communication with a memory device, said method comprising:

• collecting transaction information for transactions between a plurality of payment cardholders and the plurality of merchants over a predetermined time period, the transaction information including a merchant identifier associated with each transaction;
• generating a list of cardholders based on the transaction information, the cardholder list including an inferred residential zip code associated with each cardholder;
• determining a number of unique cardholders for each inferred residential zip code associated with each merchant identifier based, at least in part, on the transaction information and the cardholder inferred residential zip codes;
• calculating a local popularity score for each merchant based, at least in part, on the number of unique cardholders and cardholder inferred residential zip codes;
• and
• generating a list of merchants based on the local popularity score.

One or more computer-readable storage media having computer-executable instructions embodied thereon for recommending at least one merchant of a plurality of merchants to a candidate consumer, wherein when executed by at least one processor, the computer-executable instructions cause the processor to:

• collect transaction information for transactions between a plurality of payment cardholders and a plurality of merchants over a predetermined time period, the transaction information including a merchant identifier associated with each transaction;
• generate a list of cardholders based on the transaction information, the cardholder list including an inferred residential zip code associated with each cardholder;
• determine a number of unique cardholders for each inferred residential zip code associated with each merchant identifier based, at least in part, on the transaction information and the cardholder inferred residential zip codes;
• calculate a local popularity score for each merchant based, at least in part, on the number of unique cardholders and cardholder inferred residential zip codes;
• and
• generate a list of merchants based on the local popularity score.