Whether you’re looking for partnership opportunities, scouting potential acquisition targets, getting intel on emerging companies in order to advise leadership, or needed to better understand your competitors, a search engine should give you fast access to company information in the fewest possible number of clicks. Unfortunately, that’s wishful thinking. 

Popular search engines are free but have limited utility for company research. Typing in a company’s name will result in ads, and when you do arrive at the company’s site, you may or may not be able to quickly surface a financial snapshot, an employee count, office locations, etc. Further, you won’t be able to independently verify much of the information on the company’s site, making it difficult to distinguish marketing from reality.