The United States is the largest and most mature expert-network market, driven by demand from private equity, hedge funds, consulting firms, corporations and market-research teams.
Editorial note: This guide is published by The Insights Desk. TID is presented first to explain our own model clearly; the remaining companies are included based on their established market presence and publicly available service information.
The Insights Desk serves global clients and has a US presence. Its model combines custom recruitment, verified professionals, expert calls and broader research with pay-as-you-go pricing.
Best for: flexible custom sourcing without a mandatory platform subscription.
GLG was founded in New York in 1998 and remains one of the largest expert network companies, reporting approximately 1.2 million experts.
Best for: scale, broad sector coverage and frequent institutional use.
Guidepoint is headquartered in New York and maintains several US offices, including Boston, Phoenix, San Francisco and Honolulu.
Best for: broad US and international expert access.
AlphaSights has offices in New York and San Francisco and uses project-specific custom search to find relevant specialists. Its US clients can access calls, surveys, transcripts and broader research services.
Best for: fast, managed custom expert sourcing.
Third Bridge maintains US offices including New York, Dallas and Los Angeles. Its offer combines custom expert sourcing with a substantial library of existing expert interviews and transcripts.
Best for: investment research where live expert access and existing content are both useful.
The VISASQ/COLEMAN organisation has a significant US footprint alongside its strong Japan and Asia operations. It is particularly relevant to clients running cross-border research between the US and Asia.
Best for: US research with strong cross-border Japan and Asia requirements.
New York-based NewtonX focuses heavily on custom-recruited B2B research. It supports qualitative interviews, B2B surveys and end-to-end research and uses technology to identify and verify specialised professional respondents.
Best for: B2B surveys and difficult-to-reach professional audiences.
Dialectica operates a New York office alongside its international teams. Its service model combines expert access with wider B2B insight and survey capabilities.
Best for: high-touch research projects requiring dedicated project support.
Atheneum maintains a New York office and supports expert calls, research and longer-term expert engagements globally.
Best for: multi-format research projects.
proSapient has a US office alongside its London headquarters. Its offer covers expert calls, surveys, transcripts and technology-enabled expert-network management.
Best for: teams seeking a combination of expert access and research-workflow technology.
US clients have a particularly wide choice. Compare providers based on:
The largest network is not automatically the best match for every individual brief.
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Japan is one of the most distinctive expert-network markets because international providers operate alongside a growing group of domestic networks with strong Japanese-language and local sourcing capabilities.
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Australia has both major global expert networks and specialist providers built specifically around Australia and New Zealand.
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The UK is one of the major centres of the global expert-network industry, particularly because of demand from private equity, consulting, asset management and corporate strategy teams.
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