Conversational marketing platforms
Asked as “conversational marketing platform”, and as “website chat for converting B2B visitors into pipeline”, on behalf of a mid-market B2B software company. 53 first choices recorded across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, six models each. Added to the September 2026 Edition; its answers are read by the distilled judge (ai-indexes-judge-qwen3-14b), not the claude-opus-5 judge of the earlier categories: how the two compare.
Standing · first-choice share
13%
Contested · Intercom 11%
13Tidio11Intercom09Drift66others
13% of first choices, contested.
The standing
Share is the count of first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, over all six models, for a mid-market B2B software company. Ordered by share.
ProductFirst-choice shareNegative rateLabelsQuadrantSince September 2026
05
HubSpot Conversations8%8%25accepted challengernewNew since September 2026: not ranked then, 8% now.
HubSpot Conversations8%8%25accepted challengernewNew since September 2026: not ranked then, 8% now.06
HubSpot Marketing Hub6%15%13accepted challengernewNew since September 2026: not ranked then, 6% now.
HubSpot Marketing Hub6%15%13accepted challengernewNew since September 2026: not ranked then, 6% now.The floor is 12 points of share, measured: how far the models move a leader on their own when the same questions are asked twice with nothing changed. A larger change is movement; a smaller one is noise, and both are shown. How the floor is measured
Bars are the share of first choices, 0 to 100Every product with at least 10 labels here. Every product name links to its product page.
Recommended versus criticized
Every product with at least 10 labels here, on both axes. The 30% line names a quadrant, not the verdict above: that one needs more than 40%.
Criticized challengerCriticized default
Negative label rate →
01
02
03
040506
07
08
09Accepted challengerEndorsed leader
0%First-choice share → · lines at 30% share and 25% negative30%
Key
01Tidio13%
Tidio13%02Intercom11%
Intercom11%03Drift9%
Drift9%04Qualified8%
Qualified8%05HubSpot Conversations8%
HubSpot Conversations8%06HubSpot Marketing Hub6%
HubSpot Marketing Hub6%071mind4%
1mind4%08ManyChat2%
ManyChat2%09Crisp2%
Crisp2%What they warned about
A high negative share on a product with few labels is a warning. A low share on a product with many labels is salience, not sentiment.
Drift53%
29 of 55 labels negative · 12 of 6 models · 15 hard negative
“the main one to be cautious about is **Drift**, because multiple recent sources say it is being **sunset/wound down** after Salesloft's acquisition” Perplexity Sonar, negative prompt
Intercom15%
8 of 54 labels negative · 7 of 6 models · 1 hard negative
“and **Intercom** (unpredictable AI fees)” DeepSeek V4 Flash, negative prompt
ManyChat21%
3 of 14 labels negative · 3 of 6 models
“Cons include "limitations in platform support, reliance on Facebook policies, a learning curve, a pricing structure based on subscribers, and a dependency on Facebook Messenger."” Muse Glimmer 30B, negative prompt
Tidio10%
3 of 31 labels negative · 3 of 6 models
“you should be cautious about relying on Tidio if you plan to scale into complex B2B territory” Qwen 3.7 Flash, negative prompt
What they cite
Citations exist only for the models that return a source list: fourteen of the six in this edition.
Sites the answers cite
78 of 84 answers in this category came back with a source list, from 14 of 6 models: citations where the model returns them, or the search results it consulted. 1072 links across 303 sites, every framing counted. Ranked by the number of answers carrying the site or page.
40 answers · 41 citations · 11 models
vendor site · Guideflow38 answers · 39 citations · 10 models
vendor site · Wonderchat37 answers · 60 citations · 11 models
31 answers · 52 citations · 10 models
29 answers · 31 citations · 11 models
vendor site · Storylane26 answers · 30 citations · 11 models
vendor site · CloudTalk22 answers · 22 citations · 10 models
vendor site · 1mind20 answers · 21 citations · 9 models
vendor site · ZoomInfo19 answers · 37 citations · 10 models
vendor site · Mailmodo19 answers · 19 citations · 8 models
vendor site · Rework16 answers · 22 citations · 8 models
16 answers · 16 citations · 8 models
Pages the answers cite
The ten pages named in the most answers, by full address. A page here is one the models returned with a recommendation, not one the index endorses.
40 answers · 11 models
38 answers · 10 models
27 answers · 10 models
25 answers · 8 models
23 answers · 10 models
22 answers · 10 models
22 answers · 11 models
19 answers · 8 models
18 answers · 8 models
18 answers · 10 models
Search against answers
Each company's standing in the answers beside its site's footprint in Google search, one row a site: the products the models named on it with their shares, and the share they add up to; monthly searches on Google, and DataForSEO's estimate of AI search demand (modeled from search signals, directional, not a count of queries to any assistant), for the most-searched of the company's and its products' names (the name is in each row's hover text); estimated monthly organic visits to the site; and its best position in Google's top ten for “conversational marketing platform”. US estimates from DataForSEO and Google's Ads Transparency Center. A small company's site, or a mid-sized company's site for its flagship, is marked company; a product on a large parent's site (Google, Microsoft) has no site figures. A column with no figures for this category is left out, and an empty cell means none were seen, not none exist. Two measurements side by side: neither is read as the cause of the other.
| Company and products | Share | Own site cited | Name searches, Google | AI search demand, est. | Organic visits | Paid search a month, est. | Google ads, last 30 days | Best Google position |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| HubSpot parent site HubSpot Conversations 8%, HubSpot Marketing Hub 6%, HubSpot Chat 4%, HubSpot Live Chat 4% and 2 more | 25% | 934 | 368,000 | 9,776 | ||||
| Tidio tidio.com | 13% | 228 | 6,600 | 102 | 79,128 | 64 | ||
| Intercom intercom.com | 11% | 441 | 33,100 | 7,165 | 64,348 | $3,304 | 120 | |
| Salesloft drift.com Drift 9% | 9% | 236 | 201,000 | 63,085 | 33,917 | |||
| Qualified qualified.com Qualified 8%, Qualified.com 2% | 9% | 114 | 60,500 | 557,262 | 24,264 | $23 | 17 | 1 |
| tawk.to tawk.to | 6% | 35 | 2,900 | 63 | 13,444 | 7 | ||
| Freshchat | 4% | 1,300 | 38 | |||||
| 1mind 1mind.com | 4% | 44 | 2,400 | 21 | 2,038 | 6 | ||
| ManyChat manychat.com | 2% | 60 | 90,500 | 779 | 187,603 | 73 | ||
| Crisp crisp.chat | 2% | 72 | 60,500 | 36,276 | 29,685 | 2 |
Google's top ten for the one searches hold 9 sites; 2 of them are among the sites the models cited here (g2.com, thecmo.com). The first result for “conversational marketing platform” is qualified.com.
How they answered
Six framings of the same buying question, each sent to every model in a fresh session with search on. One row per model, so a row shows whether it held its answer under rewording, what it named when cost was the constraint, and what it argued against. Computed from the raw judge labels.ShowHide
How they answered
Six framings of the same buying question, each sent to every model in a fresh session with search on. One row per model, so a row shows whether it held its answer under rewording, what it named when cost was the constraint, and what it argued against. Computed from the raw judge labels.
ShowHideModelDirect“What is the best conversational marketing platform for a mid-market B2B company?”Paraphrase“Which website chat for converting B2B visitors into pipeline would you recommend to a mid-sized B2B company?”Comparative“What are the top conversational marketing platforms and how do they differ?”Budget-constrained“What is the best conversational marketing platform for a company with a limited budget?”Scale-constrained“We are a 500 person company evaluating a conversational marketing platform. What should we look at?”Negative“Which conversational marketing platforms should I avoid or be cautious about?”
Claude Opus 5no first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choicenothing named
Claude Opus 4.8no first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choicenothing named
GPT-6 Astrano first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choicenothing named
GPT-5.6 Solno first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choicenothing named
Gemini 3.1 Prono first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choicenothing named
Perplexity Sonar Prono first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choicenothing named
Bold is the first choiceAlternatives are counted; the count opens them.What the answer argued against
The record
One row per call: the version string exactly as returned, whether the model searched, sources cited, and latency. Full answer text is in the free responses file. Download the record
Zero rows: every prompt, every model, every answer.
| Prompt | Model | Version string | Time (UTC) | Searched | Sources | Latency |
|---|
Normalization in this category
Every judgment call made between the raw labels and the numbers above, listed so it is visible and reversible.
ShowHide
Category-scoped readings
Genesys read as Genesys Cloud CX
HubSpot read as HubSpot Conversations
HubSpot (Conversations) read as HubSpot Conversations
HubSpot (Free Tier) read as HubSpot Conversations
HubSpot (Marketing Hub & Chat) read as HubSpot Conversations
HubSpot (Marketing Hub Professional) read as HubSpot Conversations
Zendesk read as Zendesk Chat
Unresolved, counted raw
Anantya.ai
Chatty
Chili Piper Chat
Directful
Freshdesk Freshchat
HubSpot Free Chat
HubSpot Service/Sales Hub Chat
HubSpot paid
HubSpot's Chat and Bots
Knock.ai
RepX
Salesloft AI Chat (with 1mind / Drift technology)
Solutionreach
Spara
UChat
Zoho
Discontinued, still offered
No shut-down product was recommended here.