Hire an Executive Research Assistant

Verified Research, Delivered as One-Page Briefs

Hire a remote executive research assistant from the Philippines or South Africa. Your assistant conducts market research, benchmarks competitors, enriches your CRM and prepares due diligence files. You get the answer, the sources and your time back.

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• Fee$1,997 USDFlat recruitment fee
• Speed7 to 10 daysTo a vetted shortlist
• Protection3 monthsReplacement guarantee
• Track record1,000+Businesses served since 2014

What Your Executive Research Assistant Handles

• Secondary market research

  Your assistant conducts secondary market research on market size, growth rates and customer segments, using the US Census Bureau, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), Federal Reserve Economic Data (FRED), Gartner and Forrester reports you license, and industry associations.

• Competitor benchmarking

  Your assistant benchmarks competitors on pricing, features, positioning, hiring trends and customer reviews, then updates the comparison every quarter.

• CRM data enrichment

  Your assistant enriches prospect and account records in HubSpot, Salesforce or Pipedrive with company size, decision-makers, recent news and buying signals from LinkedIn Sales Navigator, ZoomInfo or Apollo.io.

• Financial and company due diligence

  Your assistant compiles due diligence files from SEC EDGAR filings (Form 10-K, 10-Q and 8-K), S&P Capital IQ, PitchBook or Crunchbase, state business registries, PACER court records and press coverage.

• Executive meeting briefs

  Your assistant prepares one-page briefs on every person and company before a meeting, board session, investor pitch or conference, using the same meeting preparation system.

• Investor and board research

  Your assistant profiles funds, partners, portfolio companies and recent deals before a fundraise or board meeting. See how an executive assistant at a VC firm supports investors.

• Vendor and supplier evaluation

  Your assistant compares vendors on pricing, certifications, contract terms, reviews and references, following the same process an EA uses for expense and supplier management.

• Regulatory monitoring

  Your assistant tracks new rules, agency announcements and filing deadlines in your industry and sends a weekly digest.

Pricing

One-time recruitment fee

$1,997 USD

Paid once

• Sourcing and screening
• A paid research test
• Your shortlist
• The replacement guarantee

You then pay your assistant’s monthly salary directly, with no agency markup and no long-term contract.

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Monthly salaries

Typical 2026 full-time salaries for remote research assistants (USD)

Level	Philippines	South Africa
Mid-level	$1,000 to $1,500 a month	$1,330 to $2,300 a month
Senior	$1,500 to $2,000+ a month	$2,300 to $3,300+ a month

Senior research assistants bring industry experience, paid database skills or a research degree. See every level on our pricing page, or compare rates in our salary and cost guide by country.

How Your Research Assistant Works

Every request follows one process:

1. You briefThe question, the deadline and how you will use the answer.
2. They planYour assistant lists the sources and flags any paid databases they need.
3. They collectTargeted searches with Boolean operators, site filters and database queries.
4. They verifyEvery key fact in two independent sources, checked for date, authority and accuracy.
5. They deliverThe answer first, then the evidence, with a linked source for every claim.
6. They fileEach brief in your research library in Notion, Google Drive or SharePoint.

What you receive

Deliverable	Best for
One-page brief	Decisions and meeting prep
Comparison table	Competitors, vendors and options
Enriched CRM records	Prospect lists and sales outreach
Structured dataset	Market sizing and analysis
Weekly digest	Markets, rules and competitors

AI speeds the search. Your assistant checks the facts.Stanford RegLab and Stanford HAI found in 2024 that leading AI legal research tools gave incorrect information in more than 17% to more than 34% of test queries. Your assistant uses the business tiers of ChatGPT, Claude and Perplexity for first drafts, then verifies every data point against the original source. Read more about AI and the executive assistant role.

How You Work Together

Here is what working with a remote research assistant looks like week to week. For more tips, see our guide to managing a remote executive assistant.

• Hours

  Full-time, 40 hours a week, dedicated to you

• Time zone

  Your business hours or an agreed overlap window. South Africa sits six to seven hours ahead of New York. Philippine assistants often work US hours.

• Communication

  Slack, Microsoft Teams, email or WhatsApp

• Tasking

  Asana, ClickUp, Trello or Notion, or a short Loom video brief

• Check-ins

  A 15-minute weekly call to set research priorities

• Your time

  About 30 minutes a week to brief, review and redirect

Who You Hire

Your shortlist includes candidates who:

• hold a university degree in business, finance, economics, journalism, data or a social science
• have two or more years of research, analyst or executive support experience
• pass our written and spoken English assessment
• build clean spreadsheets in Excel or Google Sheets, including pivot tables and lookups
• write briefs that lead with the answer
• understand primary and secondary sources and date every figure

Research Tools and Databases

• Company and financial data

  • SEC EDGAR
  • S&P Capital IQ
  • Bloomberg Terminal
  • PitchBook
  • Crunchbase
  • OpenCorporates

• Prospect and contact data

  • LinkedIn Sales Navigator
  • ZoomInfo
  • Apollo.io

• Market and economic data

  • US Census Bureau
  • BLS
  • FRED
  • Statista
  • Gartner
  • Forrester
  • Google Dataset Search

• Legal and public records

  • PACER
  • State court portals
  • LexisNexis
  • Secretary of State registries

• News and media

  • Google News
  • Factiva
  • Trade publications

• AI research

  • ChatGPT
  • Claude
  • Perplexity
  • Notion AI

• Workflow and documentation

  • Notion
  • Airtable
  • Google Sheets
  • Excel
  • Zotero
  • Loom
  • Scribe
  • Zapier

Your assistant works inside paid databases under your firm’s own licenses and follows each provider’s terms of use. See how we set up secure access and NDAs for remote assistants.

How We Vet Executive Research Assistants

1. Paid research test: a real-world question, scored for accuracy, sources, and clarity.
2. Source review: candidates rank a set of sources and spot the weak or outdated ones.
3. Writing sample: a one-page brief that must lead with the answer.
4. Confidentiality interview: NDAs, data handling, and AI use.

You interview the finalists and choose your hire. Your assistant signs an NDA and works only inside your approved systems with two-factor authentication. See how we set up vetting, NDAs, and data security.

What Stays Outside the Role

Clear limits protect you and your assistant.

Task	Owner
Final decisions	You
Legal, tax or investment advice	Your licensed advisors
Background checks for hiring, tenant or credit decisions	An FCRA-compliant consumer reporting agency
Trading on confidential deal information	Nobody. Your assistant follows your insider trading policy. If your firm registers with the SEC, check whether your assistant counts as an access person.

Who Hires an Executive Research Assistant

• Startup founders and CEOs researching markets, competitors, and investors. See our page for startup founders and CEOs.
• Private equity and venture capital firms screening deals and preparing diligence. See what an executive assistant at a VC firm handles.
• Financial advisors preparing client review packets. See our page for financial advisors.
• Law firms gathering public records and company facts for attorney review. See our page for law firms.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I hire a part-time research assistant?

Full-time assistants deliver the most consistent results. If your research load runs under 20 hours a week, ask about a shared or fractional arrangement on your call.

Will my research assistant work in my time zone?

Yes. Your assistant works your business hours or an agreed overlap window, so briefs land when you need them. See how time zones work with assistants in the Philippines and South Africa.

Can my research assistant use my paid databases?

Yes. Your assistant can use tools such as S&P Capital IQ, PitchBook, ZoomInfo or LexisNexis under your firm’s license, following each provider’s terms. See the full list of research tools and databases.

How do I keep confidential projects safe?

Your assistant signs an NDA, uses only your approved systems and works with two-factor authentication. You control which folders and databases they can access. Our guide on vetting, NDAs and data security covers the setup.

How is a research assistant different from a virtual executive assistant?

A virtual executive assistant runs calendars, inboxes and travel. A research assistant focuses on finding, checking and summarizing information. Many executives hire one assistant who covers both.

Get Your Research Assistant in 7 to 10 Days

Tell us what you research and how you use the answers. We send a shortlist of vetted candidates who fit your industry, your tools and your hours.

Book a free discovery call

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