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September 2026 Edition, published September 15, 2026 · The permanent record of that edition, superseded since.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 › Revenue operations › Commissions › Small business › September 2026 Edition

Sales commissions and incentive compensation for small business buyers

Asked as “sales commission management platform”, and as “incentive compensation management tool”, on behalf of a small B2B company. 53 first choices recorded across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, twelve models each.
Standing · first-choice share
47%
Clear leader
47QuotaPath21Sales Cookie17Commissionly15others

47% of first choices, clear leader.

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
01QuotaPath47%10%67endorsed leader
02Sales Cookie21%0%35accepted challenger
03Commissionly17%0%42accepted challenger
04Everstage6%19%37accepted challenger
05Visdum4%0%15accepted challenger
Show the six products at 0%, ordered by negative rate
10Varicent0%92%13criticized challenger
11Xactly Incent0%87%23criticized challenger
09CaptivateIQ0%48%40criticized challenger
08Salesforce Spiff0%41%44criticized challenger
06Qobra0%4%23accepted challenger
07EasyComp0%0%15accepted 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 twenty-eight head-to-head pages: the top eight 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% negative60%
Key
01QuotaPath47%
02Sales Cookie21%
03Commissionly17%
04Everstage6%
05Visdum4%
06Qobra0%
07EasyComp0%
08Salesforce Spiff0%
09CaptivateIQ0%
10Varicent0%
11Xactly Incent0%

What they warned about

Four of twelve models held their first choice under the paraphrase. Claude Haiku 4.5, GPT-5.4 mini, Grok 4.20, Mistral Small, Llama 4 Maverick, Qwen 3.7 Flash, GLM 4.7 FlashX 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.
Xactly Incent
87%
20 of 23 labels negative · 11 of 12 models · 12 hard negative
“Platforms to Avoid or Approach with Extreme Caution: 1. **Xactly** ... SMB reviews note it's "overkill," with long onboarding (months), high licensing fees” Grok 4.20, negative prompt
Salesforce Spiff
41%
18 of 44 labels negative · 9 of 12 models · 2 hard negative
“If you're a small business with a simple commission structure and under 50 reps, Spiff is likely overkill and overpriced.” DeepSeek V4 Flash, negative prompt
Varicent
92%
12 of 13 labels negative · 8 of 12 models · 7 hard negative
“Small business users report it's too rigid, expensive (custom quotes starting high), and admin-heavy without yielding ROI for simple plans.” Grok 4.20, negative prompt
CaptivateIQ
48%
19 of 40 labels negative · 8 of 12 models · 6 hard negative
“What to Avoid - **CaptivateIQ** and **Xactly**: Powerful but typically quote-based with setup fees and steeper learning curves.” Kimi K2, paraphrase 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

79 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. 1061 links across 125 sites, every framing counted. Ranked by the number of answers carrying the site or page.

vendor site · Qobra63 answers · 189 citations · 12 models
vendor site · Everstage54 answers · 96 citations · 14 models
vendor site · Guideflow42 answers · 54 citations · 11 models
36 answers · 66 citations · 13 models
35 answers · 36 citations · 12 models
33 answers · 42 citations · 10 models
vendor site · CaptivateIQ32 answers · 44 citations · 14 models
vendor site · QuotaPath31 answers · 45 citations · 11 models
vendor site · Forma.ai23 answers · 26 citations · 11 models
vendor site · Capterra17 answers · 21 citations · 8 models
vendor site · Visdum17 answers · 20 citations · 9 models
17 answers · 17 citations · 7 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 sales commission management platform”, “sales commission management 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
QuotaPath quotapath.com47%1781,600521,168$1,546343
Sales Cookie salescookie.com21%502601384374
Commissionly commissionly.io17%542100447
Everstage everstage.com6%1341,3001526,345$1,064411
Visdum visdum.com4%4170315,22501
ElevateHQ2%
Easy-Commission easy-commission.com2%8
Core Commissions corecommissions.com2%17
Qobra qobra.co0%72260147,8087
EasyComp easycomp.ai0%2217041020

Google's top ten for the two searches hold 15 sites; 5 of them are among the sites the models cited here (captivateiq.com, croclub.com, everstage.com, quotapath.com, visdum.com). The first result for “best sales commission management platform” is everstage.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 sales commission management platform for a small B2B company?”Paraphrase“Which incentive compensation management tool would you recommend to a small business that sells to other businesses?”Comparative“What are the top sales commission management platforms for a small team and how do they differ?”Budget-constrained“What is the best sales commission management platform for a small company with a tight budget?”Scale-constrained“We are a 30 person company evaluating a sales commission management platform. What should we look at?”Negative“Which sales commission management platforms should a small business avoid or be cautious about?”
Claude Haiku 4.5Commissionly
Three alternativesCaptivateIQ, Qobra, QuotaPath
ElevateHQ, EverstageChanged
One alternativeSalesforce Spiff
Commissionly, QuotaPath
Two alternativesEasyComp, Sales Cookie
Commissionly
Three alternativesPipedrive, QuotaPath, Sales Cookie
no first choiceagainst: Anaplan, Varicent, Xactly Incent
GPT-5.4 miniQuotaPath, Sales Cookie
Three alternativesCaptivateIQ, Everstage, Salesforce Spiff
QuotaPathChanged
One alternativeSalesforce Spiff
against: CaptivateIQ, Xactly Incent
QuotaPath
One alternativeCaptivateIQ
Visdum
One alternativeQuotaPath
against: CaptivateIQ, Performio, Salesforce Spiff
no first choiceagainst: CaptivateIQ, Performio, SAP Commissions, Salesforce Spiff, Varicent, Xactly Incent
Gemini 3.5 FlashQuotaPath
Three alternativesPalette, Sales Cookie, Visdum
against: CaptivateIQ, Salesforce Spiff
QuotaPathHeld
Two alternativesEasyComp, Visdum
against: CaptivateIQ, Salesforce Spiff
QuotaPath
Four alternativesCarvd, Commissionly, Qobra, Salesforce Spiff
against: Anaplan, Varicent, Xactly Incent
Sales Cookie
Three alternativesCommissionly, Easy-Commission, Quota Queue
against: CaptivateIQ, Everstage, QuotaPath, Salesforce Spiff
QuotaPath
Four alternativesEverstage, Qobra, Sales Cookie, Visdum
against: SAP Commissions, Varicent, Xactly Incent
against: CaptivateIQ, NetSuite, SAP Commissions, Sage, Salesforce Spiff, Varicent, Xactly Incent
Perplexity SonarQuotaPath
Two alternativesCommissionly, Sales Cookie
QuotaPathHeld
Two alternativesEverstage, Sales Cookie
against: Performio
Commissionly
Three alternativesQobra, QuotaPath, Sales Cookie
against: Everstage
Sales Cookie
Two alternativesCommissionly, QuotaPath
no first choiceagainst: Anaplan, CaptivateIQ, Optymyze, Salesforce Spiff, Varicent, Xactly Incent
Grok 4.20Everstage
Two alternativesCaptivateIQ, Salesforce Spiff
QuotaPathChanged
Three alternativesEverstage, Sales Cookie, Salesforce Spiff
no first choice
Four alternativesCommissionly, Everstage, Qobra, QuotaPath
against: CaptivateIQ, Salesforce Spiff, Xactly Incent
Sales Cookie
Three alternativesEasyComp, Qobra, Xoxoday Compass
against: QuotaPath
no first choiceagainst: SAP Commissions, Varicent, Xactly Incent
Mistral SmallQuotaPath
Two alternativesCommissionly, Visdum
Commissionly, EverstageChangedQuotaPath
Three alternativesCommissionly, Sales Cookie, Visdum
Commissionly, QuotaPath
One alternativeQobra
no first choiceagainst: Core Commissions, Easy-Commission, Iconixx, Javelin, Model N, SAP Commissions
DeepSeek V4 FlashQuotaPath
Two alternativesCaptivateIQ, Commissionly
QuotaPathHeld
One alternativeCommissionly
against: CaptivateIQ, Salesforce Spiff
QuotaPath
Four alternativesCaptivateIQ, Commissionly, Salesforce Spiff, Visdum
against: Everstage
Sales Cookie
Two alternativesCommissionly, QuotaPath
against: CaptivateIQ, Salesforce Spiff, Varicent, Xactly Incent
QuotaPath
Three alternativesCommissionly, Everstage, Salesforce Spiff
against: CaptivateIQ, Performio, Varicent, Xactly Incent
against: Core Commissions, Iconixx, Performio, QuotaPath, Salesforce Spiff, Varicent, Xactly Incent
Llama 4 Maverickno first choiceCommissionlyChanged
Two alternativesEverstage, Forma.ai
Commissionly
Four alternativesEverstage, QuotaPath, Sales Cookie, Visdum
Commissionly
Four alternativesEasyComp, Qobra, QuotaPath, Sales Cookie
no first choiceagainst: Everstage, Qobra
Qwen 3.7 FlashQuotaPath, Sales Cookie
One alternativeVisdum
QuotaPathChanged
Three alternativesAffinia, Commissionly, Salesforce Spiff
against: Oracle, Veeva
Qobra
Two alternativesEasyComp, QuotaPath
against: Salesforce Spiff
Sales Cookie
Two alternativesCommissionly, QuotaPath
against: CaptivateIQ, Xactly Incent
no first choiceagainst: Anaplan, Veevaagainst: CaptivateIQ, QuotaPath, Salesforce Spiff, Verifone / Paycom, Xactly Incent
Kimi K2QuotaPath
Three alternativesEverstage, Sales Cookie, Salesforce Spiff
QuotaPathHeld
Three alternativesEverstage, Sales Cookie, Salesforce Spiff
against: CaptivateIQ, Xactly Incent
Sales Cookie
Two alternativesElevateHQ, QuotaPath
against: CaptivateIQ, Salesforce Spiff
Commissionly, Sales Cookieagainst: CaptivateIQ, QuotaPath, Xactly IncentQuotaPath
Three alternativesEverstage, Qobra, Salesforce Spiff
against: Anaplan, CaptivateIQ, Salesforce Spiff, Varicent, Xactly Incent
GLM 4.7 FlashXCore Commissions
Four alternativesCaptivateIQ, Everstage, QuotaPath, Salesforce Spiff
QuotaPathChanged
Two alternativesCommissionly, Everstage
against: Salesforce Spiff
Commissionly
Three alternativesCaptivateIQ, Everstage, QuotaPath
against: Salesforce Spiff
Sales Cookie
Two alternativesCommissionly, QuotaPath
no first choiceagainst: Core Commissions, Easy-Commission, Iconixx, Javelin, Model N
MiniMax M2.5QuotaPath, Visdum
Two alternativesCaptivateIQ, QCommission
QuotaPathChanged
Three alternativesEverstage, Qobra, Salesforce Spiff
QuotaPath
Four alternativesCommissionly, EasyComp, Everstage, Salesforce Spiff
Sales Cookie
Two alternativesEasyComp, Spreadsheets
against: QuotaPath, Xoxoday Compass
no first choiceagainst: Core Commissions, Everstage, Oracle Incentive Compensation, SAP Commissions, Xactly Incent
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 13:15yes910 s
Direct recommendationGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 07:32yes55 s
Direct recommendationGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 09:40yes1618 s
Direct recommendationPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 08:29yes173 s
Direct recommendationGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 12:19yes209 s
Direct recommendationMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 08:14yes53 s
Direct recommendationDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 10:15yes2221 s
Direct recommendationLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 11:18yes51 s
Direct recommendationQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 08:25yes1033 s
Direct recommendationKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 10:49yes2021 s
Direct recommendationGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 12:16yes13107 s
Direct recommendationMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 07:56yes510 s
ParaphraseClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-10-01 10:47yes98 s
ParaphraseGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 12:04yes26 s
ParaphraseGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 14:01yes1321 s
ParaphrasePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 11:38yes203 s
ParaphraseGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 10:45yes215 s
ParaphraseMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 11:19yes53 s
ParaphraseDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 13:43yes2426 s
ParaphraseLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 09:32yes51 s
ParaphraseQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 11:33no036 s
ParaphraseKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 08:06yes1922 s
ParaphraseGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 11:09yes2423 s
ParaphraseMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 14:16yes1529 s
ComparativeClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-10-01 09:47yes109 s
ComparativeGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 11:11yes36 s
ComparativeGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 10:57yes1721 s
ComparativePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 12:31yes185 s
ComparativeGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 12:11yes189 s
ComparativeMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 09:53yes106 s
ComparativeDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 09:14yes2338 s
ComparativeLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 13:47yes52 s
ComparativeQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 10:40yes1028 s
ComparativeKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 12:05yes2027 s
ComparativeGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 12:52yes2362 s
ComparativeMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 13:45yes920 s
Budget constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-10-01 09:54yes97 s
Budget constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 07:50yes44 s
Budget constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 08:04yes1822 s
Budget constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 09:09yes203 s
Budget constrainedGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 14:00yes238 s
Budget constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 14:09yes54 s
Budget constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 14:11yes2435 s
Budget constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 13:23yes52 s
Budget constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 10:55yes1030 s
Budget constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 09:33yes1420 s
Budget constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 11:24yes2130 s
Budget constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 12:16yes2023 s
Scale constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-10-01 07:35no07 s
Scale constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 13:59no010 s
Scale constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 09:25yes1122 s
Scale constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 08:48yes174 s
Scale constrainedGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 08:26yes156 s
Scale constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 07:24no06 s
Scale constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 13:23yes1640 s
Scale constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 09:26yes52 s
Scale constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 09:42no034 s
Scale constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 12:38yes1321 s
Scale constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 08:46yes1924 s
Scale constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 08:45yes524 s
Negative framingClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-10-01 14:14yes1612 s
Negative framingGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 08:34yes45 s
Negative framingGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 07:55yes2630 s
Negative framingPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 11:32yes195 s
Negative framingGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 13:13yes2411 s
Negative framingMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 13:23yes147 s
Negative framingDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 08:54yes2432 s
Negative framingLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 10:06yes54 s
Negative framingQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 07:56yes844 s
Negative framingKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 11:14yes2322 s
Negative framingGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 10:44yes19155 s
Negative framingMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 13:28yes2061 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
Xactly read as Xactly Incent
Xactly (Incent) read as Xactly Incent
Xactly (Incentive) read as Xactly Incent
Unresolved, counted raw
Affinia
Compass
Google Sheets/Excel Templates
Oracle
PayClarity
Sage
Spreadsheets Excel/Google Sheets
Verifone / Paycom
Discontinued, still offered
No shut-down product was recommended here.
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