Research support for coaches & training professionals who need reliable answers fast

Whether you're building a new signature program, benchmarking your pricing against other executive coaches, or sourcing case studies to anchor your curriculum, research takes hours you don't have. Trusty Oak's US-based assistants handle the digging so you can show up to strategy sessions with data already in hand. This is especially useful when you're launching into a new niche or preparing a proposal for a corporate training contract.

Fractional research support for coaches and trainers

How Trusty Oak handles research for coaches and trainers

A Trusty Oak EA working on research for your coaching or training business starts by getting clear on the deliverable — a competitive landscape doc, a list of podcast guesting opportunities, a roundup of industry statistics for a keynote, or a compiled set of ICF-aligned frameworks for a new workshop module. From there, they work independently using tools like Google Scholar, LinkedIn, SEMrush, Airtable, and standard web research techniques to gather, organize, and summarize findings in a format you can actually use — typically a structured Google Doc or spreadsheet. Your Client Success Manager helps define the scope and output format during onboarding so the EA isn't guessing at what 'done' looks like. Your role is to review the output and flag what needs to go deeper — the EA handles the iteration from there.

What your EA takes off your plate

Before handing off a research task, write down what you'll do with the output — if you're not sure, the brief isn't ready yet. The most common mistake coaches make is assigning research without specifying the format or depth they need, which results in a 20-tab document when they wanted a one-page summary. A quick note like 'I need 8–10 competitors, just their pricing and program names, in a Google Sheet' saves everyone time and gets you something usable on the first pass.

Competitor Coaching Program Analysis

Research 5–10 competing coaches or training providers, documenting their program offerings, pricing tiers, delivery formats, and positioning language in a comparison spreadsheet.

Industry Statistics and Trends Sourcing

Pull current data from sources like ICF, LinkedIn Learning, ATD, or SHRM to support keynote presentations, sales pages, or grant applications with credible, cited figures.

Podcast and Speaking Opportunity Research

Identify relevant podcasts, summits, or conference speaking slots in your niche, including host contact info, submission guidelines, and audience size where available.

Corporate Training Prospect Research

Build a targeted prospect list of HR leaders, L&D managers, or department heads at companies that fit your ideal client profile, sourced via LinkedIn and company websites.

Curriculum and Framework Research

Locate existing models, published frameworks, or academic research relevant to a course or workshop you're developing, summarized with source links and key takeaways.

Tools our team works with

We adapt to your existing stack — no forced migrations.

Apollo.io

Statista

LinkedIn Sales Navigator

SimilarWeb

SEMrush

...and many more!

Trusted by coaches and trainers

Trusty Oak supports coaches and trainers including Coach Wolfgang, Martin Global Leaders, Ruth Calabrese Leadership Coaching, and 1 others — handling everything from research to broader operational support.

What research support costs for coaches and trainers

Drag the sliders to build a monthly plan that fits your workload.

Executive Assistants

~$35/hour

10 hours $350

Specialists

~$50/hour

20 hours $1,000

Fractional Executives

~$95/hour

0 hours $0

Your monthly budget

$1,350

Starting at $1,000/month. One-time $300 onboarding fee includes your Strategic Delegation Plan.

Book a Discovery Call

Frequently Asked Questions

Can an EA research topics I'll use in my actual coaching content or curriculum?

Yes — EAs can gather supporting research, frameworks, and sourced examples that you then synthesize in your own voice. They're doing the information retrieval and organization, not the intellectual interpretation, which keeps your content authentically yours.

How does Trusty Oak handle research that requires access to paid tools or databases?

If a task requires a specific paid tool you already subscribe to, you can share access with your EA through a shared credentials manager like LastPass. For tasks that don't require paid tools, EAs work with publicly available sources and will flag if a deeper database would meaningfully improve the output.

I'm a solo coach — is research support worth it at my stage?

It depends on whether research is regularly blocking your higher-value work. If you're spending two hours finding statistics for a sales page or manually building prospect lists before outreach, that's time with a clear opportunity cost. At $35/hour with hours that roll over, it's a low-risk way to test whether delegation moves the needle for you.

Get research off your plate

Trusty Oak matches you with a US-based assistant who can start handling research tasks within your first month. Your dedicated Client Success Manager will help you build a delegation plan that fits how you actually work.