What data should I be looking for to decide on a location?

[Julia Fair]

I'm in North Atlanta and wanting to look up to 2 hours North of me for investing. We can commit to the time for the research/reno phase to take trips, but we do plan on getting a property manager once everything is settled. 

I've seen people mention looking at employment rates and projected employment rates, population growth/decline and things of that nature. Where would I find that data? I know I could just google each thing, but I'm assuming there's a specific resource out there that will have a good chunk of what I'm looking for. What resources do you utilize to start your resource? I'm open to both free and paid resources. 

Also, in addition to what I mentioned above, what other data do you look at for deciding where to start analyzing deals?