AI Indexes
GTM AI Index
September 2026 Edition, published September 15, 2026 · The permanent record of that edition, superseded since. The current standing is on the category page →
Index › Marketing › Email marketing › Small business › September 2026 Edition

Email marketing platforms for small business buyers

Asked as “email marketing platform”, and as “email marketing tool”, on behalf of a small B2B company. 55 first choices recorded across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, twelve models each.
Standing · first-choice share
25%
Contested · HubSpot Marketing Hub 24%
25ActiveCampaign24HubSpot Marketing Hub18Brevo33others

25% of first choices, contested.

ShowinginAll 112 categories in the September 2026 Edition →

By buyer segment

The same question asked on behalf of a different buyer. Each standing is computed within its segment; they sit side by side and are never added together.

The standing

Share is the count of first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, over all twelve models, for a small B2B company. Ordered by share.
ProductFirst-choice shareNegative rateLabelsQuadrant
01ActiveCampaign25%14%50accepted challenger
02HubSpot Marketing Hub24%14%42accepted challenger
03Brevo18%3%64accepted challenger
04MailerLite13%2%51accepted challenger
05Sender11%0%22accepted challenger
06Mailchimp5%42%53criticized challenger
07EmailOctopus2%0%12accepted challenger
08Zoho Campaigns2%0%12accepted challenger
Show the three products at 0%, ordered by negative rate
11Constant Contact0%48%25criticized challenger
10Kit0%21%14accepted challenger
09Klaviyo0%21%24accepted challenger
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.
All ten head-to-head pages: the top five products, each against each

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
04
05
06
07
08
09
10
11
Accepted challengerEndorsed leader
0%First-choice share → · lines at 30% share and 25% negative40%
Key
01ActiveCampaign25%
02HubSpot Marketing Hub24%
03Brevo18%
04MailerLite13%
05Sender11%
06Mailchimp5%
07EmailOctopus2%
08Zoho Campaigns2%
09Klaviyo0%
10Kit0%
11Constant Contact0%

What they warned about

Six of twelve models held their first choice under the paraphrase. Gemini 3.5 Flash, Mistral Small, DeepSeek V4 Flash, Llama 4 Maverick, Kimi K2 and MiniMax M2.5 changed. 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.
Mailchimp
42%
22 of 53 labels negative · 14 of 12 models · 5 hard negative
“Mailchimp ... has undergone major changes that make it a risky choice for budget-conscious teams” Gemini 3.5 Flash, negative prompt
Constant Contact
48%
12 of 25 labels negative · 10 of 12 models · 4 hard negative
“charges per contact, not per email, which means costs can **scale quickly**” Mistral Small, negative prompt
HubSpot Marketing Hub
14%
6 of 42 labels negative · 6 of 12 models · 3 hard negative
“a small-business-oriented review says to **avoid HubSpot at the small-business stage** because pricing rises aggressively beyond the entry tier” Perplexity Sonar, negative prompt
ActiveCampaign
14%
7 of 50 labels negative · 6 of 12 models
“step up to Klaviyo/ActiveCampaign only when automation needs justify the higher cost and steeper learning curve” Muse Glimmer 30B, budget prompt

What they cite

Citations exist only for the models that return a source list: fourteen of the twelve in this edition, and all six flagship models on the expanded tier.

Sites the answers cite

74 of 84 answers in this category came back with a source list, from 14 of 12 models: citations where the model returns them, or the search results it consulted. 914 links across 203 sites, every framing counted. Ranked by the number of answers carrying the site or page.

vendor site · Capterra37 answers · 39 citations · 12 models
vendor site · Sequenzy30 answers · 44 citations · 12 models
30 answers · 33 citations · 11 models
vendor site · Mailtrap27 answers · 31 citations · 11 models
vendor site · Brevo25 answers · 33 citations · 9 models
23 answers · 27 citations · 9 models
22 answers · 23 citations · 8 models
vendor site · ActiveCampaign21 answers · 32 citations · 11 models
21 answers · 29 citations · 12 models
vendor site · Sender21 answers · 29 citations · 11 models
vendor site · ZoomInfo19 answers · 23 citations · 10 models
vendor site · Hostinger19 answers · 19 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.

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 “best email marketing platform”, “email 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 productsShareOwn site citedName searches, GoogleAI search demand, est.Organic visitsPaid search a month, est.Google ads, last 30 daysBest Google position
ActiveCampaign activecampaign.com25%44518,100307235,709$1,42432
HubSpot parent site
HubSpot Marketing Hub 24%
24%934368,0009,776
Brevo brevo.com
Brevo 18%, Brevo [formerly Sendinblue] 0%
18%38640,50032781,741$17,8471069
MailerLite mailerlite.com13%15749,50031159,716$851157
Sender sender.net11%1059,90010,34969,07813
Intuit mailchimp.com
Mailchimp 5%
5%339368,0006,8621,931,402$1,2141073
EmailOctopus emailoctopus.com2%182,4003319,49638
Zoho parent site
Zoho Campaigns 2%
2%235,40058
Klaviyo klaviyo.com0%35390,5001,560200,057$57220
Moosend moosend.com0%381,9001971,5152

Google's top ten for the two searches hold 11 sites; 4 of them are among the sites the models cited here (brevo.com, emailtooltester.com, emailvendorselection.com, mailtrap.io). The first result for “best email marketing platform” is emailvendorselection.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
ModelDirect“What is the best email marketing platform for a small B2B company?”Paraphrase“Which email marketing tool would you recommend to a small business that sells to other businesses?”Comparative“What are the top email marketing platforms for a small team and how do they differ?”Budget-constrained“What is the best email marketing platform for a small company with a tight budget?”Scale-constrained“We are a 30 person company evaluating an email marketing platform. What should we look at?”Negative“Which email marketing platforms should a small business avoid or be cautious about?”
Claude Haiku 4.5HubSpot Marketing Hub, MailchimpHubSpot Marketing Hub, MailchimpHeld
Two alternativesAWeber, GetResponse
MailerLite
Five alternativesActiveCampaign, Brevo, Constant Contact, HubSpot Marketing Hub, Omnisend
MailerLite
Three alternativesBrevo, EmailOctopus, Moosend
no first choiceagainst: Adobe Campaign, Brevo, GetResponse, HubSpot Marketing Hub, Kit, Mailchimp
GPT-5.4 miniActiveCampaign
Three alternativesBrevo, HubSpot Marketing Hub, Mailchimp
ActiveCampaignHeld
Two alternativesConstant Contact, HubSpot Marketing Hub
Constant Contact
Three alternativesBrevo, Klaviyo, Mailchimp
against: HubSpot Marketing Hub
Brevo, MailerLiteagainst: Mailchimpno first choiceagainst: EmailDelivery.com, Mailtrap
Gemini 3.5 FlashHubSpot Marketing Hub
Four alternativesActiveCampaign, Apollo.io, Brevo, MailerLite
ActiveCampaign, HubSpot Marketing HubChanged
Four alternativesApollo.io, Brevo, Instantly, Smartlead
against: Kit
MailerLite
Five alternativesActiveCampaign, Beehiiv, Brevo, Kit, Klaviyo
Sender
Four alternativesBrevo, EmailOctopus, Flodesk, Moosend
against: ActiveCampaign, Mailchimp, MailerLite
ActiveCampaign
Five alternativesBrevo, HubSpot Marketing Hub, Kit, Klaviyo, MailerLite
against: Adobe Marketo Engage, Salesforce Marketing Cloud
against: Constant Contact, HubSpot Marketing Hub, Instantly, Keap, Lemlist, Mailchimp, Salesforce Marketing Cloud, Woodpecker
Perplexity SonarHubSpot Marketing Hub
Two alternativesActiveCampaign, MailerLite
HubSpot Marketing HubHeld
Two alternativesActiveCampaign, Mailchimp
Mailchimp
Six alternativesBrevo, Constant Contact, GetResponse, HubSpot Marketing Hub, MailerLite, Moosend
Brevo, MailerLite
One alternativeSender
no first choiceagainst: ActiveCampaign, Constant Contact, HubSpot Marketing Hub, Mailchimp
Grok 4.20ActiveCampaign
Three alternativesBrevo, HubSpot Marketing Hub, Mailchimp
ActiveCampaignHeld
Two alternativesBrevo, MailerLite
against: Mailchimp
Mailchimp
Three alternativesActiveCampaign, Brevo, MailerLite
against: Constant Contact
Brevo, MailerLite
Three alternativesOmnisend, Sender, Zoho Campaigns
against: Constant Contact, Mailchimp
Brevo
Two alternativesActiveCampaign, MailerLite
against: AWeber, Brevo, Constant Contact, Kit, Mailchimp, Robly, SendMails
Mistral SmallHubSpot Marketing Hub
Four alternativesActiveCampaign, Brevo, Sequenzy, Zoho Campaigns
no first choiceChangedBrevo, MailerLite
Three alternativesAWeber, Mailchimp, Zoho Campaigns
Sender
Four alternativesBrevo, EmailOctopus, MailerLite, Systeme.io
no first choiceagainst: Constant Contact, Drip, HubSpot Marketing Hub, Mailchimp
DeepSeek V4 FlashActiveCampaign
Two alternativesBrevo, HubSpot Marketing Hub
BrevoChanged
Three alternativesActiveCampaign, HubSpot Marketing Hub, MailerLite
MailerLite
Five alternativesBrevo, HubSpot Marketing Hub, Kit, Klaviyo, Mailchimp
Brevo, Sender
Three alternativesEmailOctopus, MailerLite, Zoho Campaigns
against: Mailchimp
no first choice
Five alternativesActiveCampaign, Brevo, HubSpot Marketing Hub, MailerLite, Mailjet
against: Klaviyo, Mailchimp
against: AWeber, ActiveCampaign, Constant Contact, Mailchimp, Sendinblue, iContact
Llama 4 MaverickHubSpot Marketing Hub
Two alternativesConstant Contact, Mailtrap Email Marketing
no first choiceChangedno first choiceSender
Four alternativesBrevo, MailerLite, Mailjet, SendGrid
no first choiceagainst: Constant Contact, Mailchimp
Qwen 3.7 FlashActiveCampaign
Three alternativesBrevo, HubSpot Marketing Hub, MailerLite
ActiveCampaignHeld
Two alternativesMailchimp, Sender
MailerLite
Three alternativesActiveCampaign, Brevo, HubSpot Marketing Hub
against: Mailchimp
Brevo
Three alternativesMailerLite, Moosend, Zoho Campaigns
no first choiceagainst: ActiveCampaign, Constant Contact, Klaviyo, Mailchimp, Omnisend
Kimi K2HubSpot Marketing Hub
Three alternativesActiveCampaign, Brevo, Zoho Campaigns
ActiveCampaignChanged
One alternativeZoho Campaigns
against: HubSpot Marketing Hub, Mailchimp
Brevo, MailerLite
Four alternativesActiveCampaign, Constant Contact, Kit, Mailchimp
EmailOctopus, Sender
Two alternativesBrevo, MailerLite
no first choice
Eight alternativesActiveCampaign, Brevo, HubSpot Marketing Hub, Klaviyo, Mailchimp, MailerLite, Moosend, Omnisend
against: Constant Contact, Mailchimp
GLM 4.7 FlashXActiveCampaign
Four alternativesBrevo, HubSpot Marketing Hub, MailerLite, Sequenzy
ActiveCampaignHeld
Two alternativesBrevo, HubSpot Marketing Hub
Brevo, Klaviyo
Three alternativesActiveCampaign, Mailchimp, MailerLite
Zoho Campaigns
Two alternativesBrevo, MailerLite
against: Mailchimp
no first choiceagainst: GetResponse, HubSpot Marketing, Mailchimp, Robly, SendMails
MiniMax M2.5Brevo, MailerLite
Two alternativesActiveCampaign, Zoho Campaigns
against: ZoomInfo Marketing
ActiveCampaign, HubSpot Marketing HubChanged
Two alternativesBrevo, Mailchimp
ActiveCampaign
Four alternativesBrevo, Kit, Mailchimp, MailerLite
Mailchimp, MailerLite
One alternativeSendinblue
no first choiceagainst: ActiveCampaign, Mailchimp
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
Seventy-two rows: every prompt, every model, every answer.
PromptModelVersion stringTime (UTC)SearchedSourcesLatency
Direct recommendationClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-10-01 09:51no04 s
Direct recommendationGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 10:55yes45 s
Direct recommendationGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 13:31yes1920 s
Direct recommendationPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 10:21yes173 s
Direct recommendationGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 14:12yes177 s
Direct recommendationMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 07:27yes76 s
Direct recommendationDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 11:26yes1824 s
Direct recommendationLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 07:37yes51 s
Direct recommendationQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 12:42no029 s
Direct recommendationKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 13:36yes1419 s
Direct recommendationGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 10:41yes1465 s
Direct recommendationMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 10:13yes825 s
ParaphraseClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-10-01 10:09no04 s
ParaphraseGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 08:50yes44 s
ParaphraseGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 11:07yes1224 s
ParaphrasePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 07:41yes192 s
ParaphraseGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 11:45yes1915 s
ParaphraseMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 12:02no01 s
ParaphraseDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 07:32yes1732 s
ParaphraseLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 11:33yes51 s
ParaphraseQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 12:53yes521 s
ParaphraseKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 13:33yes1119 s
ParaphraseGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 09:43yes1084 s
ParaphraseMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 08:54yes514 s
ComparativeClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-10-01 08:30yes98 s
ComparativeGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 12:07yes47 s
ComparativeGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 10:34yes1321 s
ComparativePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 09:24yes194 s
ComparativeGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 10:28yes2410 s
ComparativeMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 13:00yes1110 s
ComparativeDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 11:54yes2536 s
ComparativeLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 13:50yes51 s
ComparativeQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 08:18yes926 s
ComparativeKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 14:13yes1432 s
ComparativeGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 09:27yes2541 s
ComparativeMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 10:26yes1016 s
Budget constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-10-01 08:15yes97 s
Budget constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 10:01yes38 s
Budget constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 13:27yes1822 s
Budget constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 09:56yes194 s
Budget constrainedGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 13:27yes145 s
Budget constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 14:07yes53 s
Budget constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 10:37yes1419 s
Budget constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 12:37yes52 s
Budget constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 08:03yes520 s
Budget constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 12:30yes914 s
Budget constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 09:34yes2528 s
Budget constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 12:34no08 s
Scale constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-10-01 09:39no06 s
Scale constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 07:55no07 s
Scale constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 10:19yes321 s
Scale constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 09:05yes184 s
Scale constrainedGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 14:12yes158 s
Scale constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 11:13no06 s
Scale constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 08:24yes2148 s
Scale constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 11:27yes53 s
Scale constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 08:28no035 s
Scale constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 10:00yes1830 s
Scale constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 10:45no013 s
Scale constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 08:05yes527 s
Negative framingClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-10-01 13:43yes149 s
Negative framingGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 08:59yes45 s
Negative framingGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 10:17yes2625 s
Negative framingPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 10:11yes204 s
Negative framingGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 09:37yes2310 s
Negative framingMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 09:53yes106 s
Negative framingDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 10:59yes2441 s
Negative framingLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 13:47yes52 s
Negative framingQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 13:25yes1566 s
Negative framingKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 12:45yes2430 s
Negative framingGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 08:26yes2431 s
Negative framingMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 07:47yes1326 s

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
HubSpot read as HubSpot Marketing Hub
Hubspot read as HubSpot Marketing Hub
Zoho read as Zoho Campaigns
Unresolved, counted raw
EmailDelivery.com
Retainful
iContact
Discontinued, still offered
No shut-down product was recommended here.
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