Sales intelligence and contact data
Asked as “B2B contact data and sales intelligence platform”, and as “B2B prospecting database”, on behalf of a mid-market B2B software company. 49 first choices recorded across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, six models each.
Standing · first-choice share
73%
Clear leader
73Apollo.io12ZoomInfo04Lusha10others
73% of first choices, clear leader.
Since September 2026▼−3Since September 2026: 76% → 73%, −3 points. Inside the 12-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.Apollo.io held the lead, −3 points on 76%, inside the 12-point floor.
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
01
Apollo.io73%16%68endorsed leader▼−3Since September 2026: 76% → 73%, −3 points. Inside the 12-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.76% → 73%
Apollo.io73%16%68endorsed leader▼−3Since September 2026: 76% → 73%, −3 points. Inside the 12-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.76% → 73%02
ZoomInfo12%36%69criticized challenger▼−7Since September 2026: 17% → 10%, −7 points. Inside the 12-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.17% → 10%
ZoomInfo12%36%69criticized challenger▼−7Since September 2026: 17% → 10%, −7 points. Inside the 12-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.17% → 10%03
Lusha4%13%52accepted challenger▲+5Since September 2026: 0% → 5%, +5 points. Inside the 12-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.0% → 5%
Lusha4%13%52accepted challenger▲+5Since September 2026: 0% → 5%, +5 points. Inside the 12-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.0% → 5%04
UpLead4%0%25accepted challenger=heldSince September 2026: 5% → 5%, ±0 points. Inside the 12-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.5% → 5%
UpLead4%0%25accepted challenger=heldSince September 2026: 5% → 5%, ±0 points. Inside the 12-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.5% → 5%05
Cognism2%13%52accepted challenger=heldSince September 2026: 2% → 2%, ±0 points. Inside the 12-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.2% → 2%
Cognism2%13%52accepted challenger=heldSince September 2026: 2% → 2%, ±0 points. Inside the 12-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.2% → 2%Show the four products at 0%, ordered by negative rate
09
Seamless.AI0%47%15criticized challenger=heldSince September 2026: 0% → 0%, ±0 points. Inside the 12-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.0% → 0%
Seamless.AI0%47%15criticized challenger=heldSince September 2026: 0% → 0%, ±0 points. Inside the 12-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.0% → 0%08
HubSpot Breeze Intelligence0%18%11accepted challenger=heldSince September 2026: 0% → 0%, ±0 points. Inside the 12-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.0% → 0%
HubSpot Breeze Intelligence0%18%11accepted challenger=heldSince September 2026: 0% → 0%, ±0 points. Inside the 12-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.0% → 0%06
LinkedIn Sales Navigator0%10%20accepted challenger=heldSince September 2026: 0% → 0%, ±0 points. Inside the 12-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.0% → 0%
LinkedIn Sales Navigator0%10%20accepted challenger=heldSince September 2026: 0% → 0%, ±0 points. Inside the 12-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.0% → 0%07
Clay0%0%14accepted challenger=heldSince September 2026: 0% → 0%, ±0 points. Inside the 12-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.0% → 0%
Clay0%0%14accepted challenger=heldSince September 2026: 0% → 0%, ±0 points. Inside the 12-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.0% → 0%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.
One product takes 73% of first choices here, so the chart would put eight markers in one corner and one at the far edge. The two measurements it plots are columns in the standing above: share, and the negative label rate. Two products carry a negative rate above 25% in this category.
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.
ZoomInfo36%
25 of 69 labels negative · 14 of 6 models · 5 hard negative
“Multiple 2024 securities class actions** alleging misleading investors about financial performance and using coercive auto-renewal policies” MiniMax M2.5, negative prompt
Apollo.io16%
11 of 68 labels negative · 10 of 6 models · 2 hard negative
“Apollo's data quality issues are well-documented and compound fast, with 20-30% bounce rates being its most critical weakness” Claude Haiku 4.5, negative prompt
Seamless.AI47%
7 of 15 labels negative · 7 of 6 models · 6 hard negative
“If I had to single out one for extra caution, it would be Seamless.AI\u2014not necessarily because its data is always poor, but because of recurring complaints about auto-renewal and cancellation.” GPT-6 Luna, negative prompt
Lusha13%
7 of 52 labels negative · 7 of 6 models · 1 hard negative
“The credit model can feel like a trap... Users report accuracy has declined, particularly for phone numbers” Claude Haiku 4.5, 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. 1105 links across 225 sites, every framing counted. Ranked by the number of answers carrying the site or page. None of the 36 answers across every segment cited this index's own page for the category.
vendor site · ZoomInfo53 answers · 186 citations · 11 models
vendor site · Apollo.io35 answers · 58 citations · 11 models
vendor site · Lusha28 answers · 45 citations · 11 models
vendor site · Cognism27 answers · 34 citations · 12 models
vendor site · Salesmotion26 answers · 36 citations · 11 models
vendor site · Amplemarket24 answers · 29 citations · 12 models
vendor site · HubSpot22 answers · 23 citations · 8 models
vendor site · Demandbase21 answers · 26 citations · 9 models
16 answers · 31 citations · 11 models
14 answers · 16 citations · 7 models
vendor site · Salesgenie13 answers · 15 citations · 5 models
vendor site · Cleverly12 answers · 12 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.
22 answers · 9 models
20 answers · 12 models
20 answers · 8 models
18 answers · 9 models
14 answers · 8 models
14 answers · 8 models
14 answers · 7 models
12 answers · 6 models
11 answers · 8 models
10 answers · 7 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 “b2b contact data and sales intelligence platform”, “best b2b contact data and sales intelligence 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Apollo.io apollo.io | 73% | 1000 | 33,100 | 396 | 111,608 | 94 | 3 | |
| ZoomInfo zoominfo.com | 12% | 846 | 135,000 | 1,810 | 6,376,738 | $1,140 | 120 | 2 |
| Lusha lusha.com | 4% | 322 | 12,100 | 893 | 52,570 | $11 | 57 | |
| UpLead uplead.com | 4% | 101 | 3,600 | 57 | 15,339 | 7 | ||
| Cognism cognism.com | 2% | 384 | 3,600 | 68 | 48,685 | 15 | ||
| Lead411 lead411.com | 2% | 20 | 1,600 | 29 | 79,355 | 4 | ||
| HubSpot parent site HubSpot CRM 2%, HubSpot Breeze Intelligence 0%, HubSpot Sales Hub 0% | 2% | 693 | 368,000 | 9,776 | ||||
| LinkedIn parent site LinkedIn Sales Navigator 0% | 0% | 102 | 11,100,000 | 77,031 | ||||
| Clay clay.com | 0% | 226 | 135,000 | 168,089 | 294,056 | 11 | ||
| Hunter hunter.io | 0% | 75 | 201,000 | 280,275 | 152,782 | 6 |
Google's top ten for the two searches hold 11 sites; 6 of them are among the sites the models cited here (apollo.io, demandbase.com, g2.com, leadfeeder.com, pipeline.zoominfo.com, salesgenie.com). The first result for “b2b contact data and sales intelligence platform” is autobound.ai.
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 B2B contact data and sales intelligence platform for a mid-market B2B company?”Paraphrase“Which B2B prospecting database would you recommend to a mid-sized B2B company?”Comparative“What are the top sales intelligence and contact data platforms and how do they differ?”Budget-constrained“What is the best B2B contact data and sales intelligence platform for a company with a limited budget?”Scale-constrained“We are a 500 person company evaluating a B2B contact data and sales intelligence platform. What should we look at?”Negative“Which sales intelligence and contact data 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 |
|---|
Noise floor in this category
Flips between the edition run and its calibration repeat. Six prompts per model is a small sample; the index-wide floor is the number to trust.
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Normalization in this category
Every judgment call made between the raw labels and the numbers above, listed so it is visible and reversible.
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Category-scoped readings
None. Every name in this category resolved on its own.
Unresolved, counted raw
HubSpot Sales
Lead Scrape
Lessie.ai
Salesforce
Seamless AI
Discontinued, still offered
No shut-down product was recommended here.