Content marketing platforms
Asked as “content marketing platform”, and as “content planning and production tool for marketing teams”, on behalf of a mid-market B2B software company. 20 first choices recorded across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, six models each.
Gane, the publisher, sells software in this category. Every product here is measured by the same method as in every other category. How the conflict is handled.
Standing · first-choice share
40%
Contested · StoryChief 15%
40HubSpot Content Hub15StoryChief10Buffer35others
40% 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
03
CoSchedule Marketing Suite10%6%16accepted challengernewNew since September 2026: not ranked then, 10% now.
CoSchedule Marketing Suite10%6%16accepted challengernewNew since September 2026: not ranked then, 10% now.Show the three products at 0%, ordered by negative rate
04
Semrush Content Marketing Platform0%13%15accepted challengernewNew since September 2026: not ranked then, 0% now.
Semrush Content Marketing Platform0%13%15accepted challengernewNew since September 2026: not ranked then, 0% 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 can't be told apart from repeat variation, and both are shown. Each index measures its own floor from its own repeat, over its own categories, so the floor differs from one index to the next. 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.
Head to head
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
020304
05
06Accepted challengerEndorsed leader
0%First-choice share → · lines at 30% share and 25% negative60%
Key
01HubSpot Content Hub40%
HubSpot Content Hub40%02StoryChief15%
StoryChief15%03CoSchedule Marketing Suite10%
CoSchedule Marketing Suite10%04Semrush Content Marketing Platform0%
Semrush Content Marketing Platform0%05Contently0%
Contently0%06Optimizely CMP0%
Optimizely CMP0%What they warned about
Two of six models held their first choice under the paraphrase. Claude Opus 5, GPT-5.6 Sol, Gemini 3.1 Pro and Perplexity Sonar Pro 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.
Contently29%
4 of 14 labels negative · 3 of 6 models
“like Contently, Kapost, or Seismic are built for enterprise companies and can cost thousands of dollars a month” Gemini 3.1 Pro, budget prompt
Jasper50%
3 of 6 labels negative · 3 of 6 models
“Annual Pro subscriptions are a 12-month commitment... I’d test real assignments on a trial or monthly plan before paying annually.” GPT-6 Astra, negative prompt
Medium100%
3 of 3 labels negative · 3 of 6 models
“Medium, LinkedIn articles, X long-form, Substack, Notion sites — fine as *distribution*, dangerous as *home base*.” Claude Opus 5, negative prompt
Optimizely CMP33%
4 of 12 labels negative · 3 of 6 models
“be wary of legacy enterprise solutions (like Optimizely Content Marketing or Upland Kapost) *if you are a small or mid-sized business*” Gemini 3.1 Pro, negative prompt
What they cite
Six of the six models returned a source list in this edition: six return the pages they cited.
Sites the answers cite
29 of 36 answers in this category came back with a source list, from 6 of 6 models: citations where the model returns them, or the search results it consulted. 472 links across 249 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 · HubSpot15 answers · 18 citations · 3 models
14 answers · 23 citations · 4 models
vendor site · Gartner11 answers · 13 citations · 4 models
vendor site · Optimizely9 answers · 13 citations · 4 models
vendor site · StoryChief9 answers · 11 citations · 4 models
vendor site · PRnews.io9 answers · 9 citations · 3 models
8 answers · 13 citations · 3 models
vendor site · HubSpot8 answers · 9 citations · 2 models
vendor site · Contently6 answers · 7 citations · 3 models
vendor site · Omnibound6 answers · 6 citations · 2 models
5 answers · 5 citations · 2 models
vendor site · Semrush5 answers · 5 citations · 4 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.
13 answers · 4 models
12 answers · 3 models
9 answers · 3 models
8 answers · 3 models
6 answers · 2 models
6 answers · 2 models
5 answers · 2 models
5 answers · 2 models
5 answers · 3 models
4 answers · 2 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 “best content marketing platform”, “content 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| HubSpot parent site HubSpot Content Hub 40%, HubSpot Marketing Hub 10% | 50% | 991 | 368,000 | 9,776 | |||
| StoryChief storychief.io StoryChief 15%, StoryChief Team Editorial 5% | 20% | 25 | 320 | 5 | 29,114 | ||
| CoSchedule Marketing Suite coschedule.com | 10% | 100 | 20 | 0 | 38,502 | 1 | |
| Buffer buffer.com | 10% | 202 | 90,500 | 35,151 | 966,256 | 18 | |
| Airtable airtable.com | 5% | 94 | 165,000 | 2,461 | 143,237 | 118 | |
| Welcome | 5% | ||||||
| Semrush parent site Semrush Content Marketing Platform 0% | 0% | 86 | 90,500 | 2,055 | |||
| Asana asana.com | 0% | 165 | 301,000 | 6,012 | 1,486,362 | $110,925 | 113 |
| Notion notion.com | 0% | 222 | 673,000 | 15,608 | 1,061,466 | 52 | |
| Canva canva.com | 0% | 185 | 24,900,000 | 183,421 | 81,177,765 | 101 |
Google's top ten for the two searches hold 15 sites; 0 of them are among the sites the models cited here. The first result for “best content marketing platform” is adroitte.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 content marketing platform for a mid-market B2B software company?”Paraphrase“Which content planning and production tool for marketing teams would you recommend to a mid-sized B2B software company?”Comparative“What are the top content marketing platforms and how do they differ?”Budget-constrained“What is the best content marketing platform for a company with a limited budget?”Scale-constrained“We are a 500 person company evaluating a content marketing platform. What should we look at?”Negative“Which content marketing platforms should I avoid or be cautious about?”
Claude Opus 5HubSpot Content Hubagainst: Contentful, Optimizely CMP, SanityAirtableChangedagainst: CoSchedule Marketing SuiteHubSpot Content Hub, Optimizely CMSBufferagainst: HubSpot Content Hub, Semrush Content Marketing Platformno first choiceagainst: AppSumo, LinkedIn articles, Medium, Notion sites, Substack, X long-form
Seven alternatives
Adobe Marketo Engage, Ahrefs, Airtable, Asana, Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement, Semrush Content Marketing Platform, WebflowThree alternatives
Asana, Clearscope, HubSpot Content HubSeven alternatives
CoSchedule Marketing Suite, Semrush Content Marketing Platform, Sitecore, Sprinklr Marketing, StoryChief, Storyteq, Surfer SEOFive alternatives
AWeber, Canva, MailerLite, RecurPost, WordPressClaude Opus 4.8HubSpot Marketing Hubagainst: WordPressHubSpot Marketing HubHeldHubSpot Content Hub, Semrush Content Marketing PlatformBuffer, HubSpot Content Hubno first choicenothing named
Three alternatives
Adobe Marketo Engage, Ahrefs, Semrush Content Marketing PlatformSix alternatives
Airtable, Asana, CoSchedule Marketing Suite, Monday.com, Notion, Semrush Content Marketing PlatformFive alternatives
Clearscope, CoSchedule Marketing Suite, Contently, Skyword, Surfer SEOFour alternatives
Beehiiv, Canva, EngageBay, WordPressGPT-6 AstraStoryChiefStoryChiefHeldHubSpot Content Hub, Semrush Content Marketing Platform, StoryChiefHubSpot Content Hubno first choiceagainst: Contently, HubSpot Marketing Hub, Jasper, Semrush Content Marketing Platform
Two alternatives
HubSpot Content Hub, Optimizely CMPThree alternatives
Asana, Optimizely CMP, PlanableThree alternatives
Adobe GenStudio, Contently, Optimizely CMSTwo alternatives
Brevo, BufferGPT-5.6 SolHubSpot Content Hubagainst: Contently, Optimizely CMPStoryChief Team EditorialChangedagainst: Optimizely CMPHubSpot Content Hub, Semrush Content Marketing Platform, StoryChiefHubSpot Content Hubagainst: Mailchimpno first choiceagainst: Copy.ai, HubSpot Content Hub, Jasper, Medium, Substack, Taboola, Teads, Writesonic
Two alternatives
CoSchedule Marketing Suite, StoryChiefTwo alternatives
CoSchedule Marketing Suite, HubSpot Content HubFour alternatives
CoSchedule Marketing Suite, Contently, Optimizely CMP, Sprinklr MarketingTwo alternatives
Buffer, WordPressGemini 3.1 ProHubSpot Content HubStoryChiefChangedno first choiceCoSchedule Marketing Suiteagainst: Contently, Kapost, SeismicWelcomeagainst: Contently, Fiverr, Optimizely CMP, Taboola, Teads, Textbroker, Upland Kapost, Upwork, Verblio, iWriter
Six alternatives
ClearVoice, Contently, Optimizely CMP, PathFactory, Semrush Content Marketing Platform, Upland KapostFour alternatives
Airtable, CoSchedule Marketing Suite, Notion, Optimizely CMPSeven alternatives
ClearVoice, CoSchedule Marketing Suite, Contently, HubSpot Content Hub, Optimizely CMP, Semrush Content Marketing Platform, StoryChiefSix alternatives
Canva, HubSpot Content Hub, MailerLite, Metricool, Notion, StoryChiefFour alternatives
CoSchedule Marketing Suite, Contently, HubSpot Content Hub, KapostPerplexity Sonar ProHubSpot Content HubCoSchedule Marketing SuiteChangedHubSpot Content HubHubSpot Content Hubagainst: Jasperno first choiceagainst: Facebook, Google Business Profile, Google Performance Max, Instagram, LinkedIn articles, Medium, Meta Advantage+, Pinterest, Quora, Reddit, TikTok, X
Three alternatives
Optimizely CMP, Skyword, StoryChiefTwo alternatives
Asana, HubSpot Content HubSix alternatives
Ahrefs, CoSchedule Marketing Suite, Jasper, Semrush Content Marketing Platform, StoryChief, Surfer SEOFive alternatives
Buffer, Canva, Google Analytics 4, Google Search Console, NotionBold 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.
Thirty-six rows: every prompt, every model, every answer.
| Prompt | Model | Version string | Time (UTC) | Searched | Sources | Latency |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Direct recommendation | Claude Opus 5 | claude-opus-5 | 2026-09-09 16:38 | yes | 37 | 51 s |
| Direct recommendation | Claude Opus 4.8 | claude-opus-4-8 | 2026-09-09 16:39 | no | 0 | 18 s |
| Direct recommendation | GPT-6 Astra | gpt-6-astra | 2026-09-09 18:51 | yes | 4 | 29 s |
| Direct recommendation | GPT-5.6 Sol | gpt-5.6-sol | 2026-09-09 18:52 | yes | 6 | 27 s |
| Direct recommendation | Gemini 3.1 Pro | gemini-3.1-pro-preview | 2026-09-09 16:40 | no | 0 | 26 s |
| Direct recommendation | Perplexity Sonar Pro | sonar-pro | 2026-09-09 18:49 | yes | 20 | 4 s |
| Paraphrase | Claude Opus 5 | claude-opus-5 | 2026-09-09 16:43 | yes | 24 | 61 s |
| Paraphrase | Claude Opus 4.8 | claude-opus-4-8 | 2026-09-09 16:44 | no | 0 | 18 s |
| Paraphrase | GPT-6 Astra | gpt-6-astra | 2026-09-09 18:53 | yes | 6 | 31 s |
| Paraphrase | GPT-5.6 Sol | gpt-5.6-sol | 2026-09-09 18:55 | yes | 5 | 30 s |
| Paraphrase | Gemini 3.1 Pro | gemini-3.1-pro-preview | 2026-09-10 17:22 | no | 0 | 44 s |
| Paraphrase | Perplexity Sonar Pro | sonar-pro | 2026-09-09 16:45 | yes | 20 | 5 s |
| Comparative | Claude Opus 5 | claude-opus-5 | 2026-09-09 16:48 | yes | 37 | 65 s |
| Comparative | Claude Opus 4.8 | claude-opus-4-8 | 2026-09-09 16:50 | yes | 30 | 49 s |
| Comparative | GPT-6 Astra | gpt-6-astra | 2026-09-09 18:56 | yes | 6 | 32 s |
| Comparative | GPT-5.6 Sol | gpt-5.6-sol | 2026-09-09 18:58 | yes | 9 | 41 s |
| Comparative | Gemini 3.1 Pro | gemini-3.1-pro-preview | 2026-09-10 17:00 | yes | 9 | 36 s |
| Comparative | Perplexity Sonar Pro | sonar-pro | 2026-09-09 16:50 | yes | 20 | 7 s |
| Budget constrained | Claude Opus 5 | claude-opus-5 | 2026-09-09 16:52 | yes | 34 | 42 s |
| Budget constrained | Claude Opus 4.8 | claude-opus-4-8 | 2026-09-09 16:54 | yes | 33 | 46 s |
| Budget constrained | GPT-6 Astra | gpt-6-astra | 2026-09-09 19:00 | yes | 4 | 20 s |
| Budget constrained | GPT-5.6 Sol | gpt-5.6-sol | 2026-09-09 19:00 | yes | 3 | 13 s |
| Budget constrained | Gemini 3.1 Pro | gemini-3.1-pro-preview | 2026-09-10 17:01 | no | 0 | 23 s |
| Budget constrained | Perplexity Sonar Pro | sonar-pro | 2026-09-09 16:55 | yes | 20 | 4 s |
| Scale constrained | Claude Opus 5 | claude-opus-5 | 2026-09-09 16:57 | yes | 24 | 72 s |
| Scale constrained | Claude Opus 4.8 | claude-opus-4-8 | 2026-09-09 16:58 | no | 0 | 15 s |
| Scale constrained | GPT-6 Astra | gpt-6-astra | 2026-09-09 19:02 | yes | 5 | 33 s |
| Scale constrained | GPT-5.6 Sol | gpt-5.6-sol | 2026-09-09 19:04 | yes | 5 | 57 s |
| Scale constrained | Gemini 3.1 Pro | gemini-3.1-pro-preview | 2026-09-10 17:02 | no | 0 | 24 s |
| Scale constrained | Perplexity Sonar Pro | sonar-pro | 2026-09-09 16:58 | yes | 20 | 7 s |
| Negative framing | Claude Opus 5 | claude-opus-5 | 2026-09-09 17:02 | yes | 20 | 81 s |
| Negative framing | Claude Opus 4.8 | claude-opus-4-8 | 2026-09-09 17:04 | yes | 38 | 48 s |
| Negative framing | GPT-6 Astra | gpt-6-astra | 2026-09-09 19:06 | yes | 5 | 26 s |
| Negative framing | GPT-5.6 Sol | gpt-5.6-sol | 2026-09-09 19:07 | yes | 6 | 36 s |
| Negative framing | Gemini 3.1 Pro | gemini-3.1-pro-preview | 2026-09-10 17:04 | yes | 2 | 42 s |
| Negative framing | Perplexity Sonar Pro | sonar-pro | 2026-09-09 17:04 | yes | 20 | 8 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
CoSchedule read as CoSchedule Marketing Suite
CoSchedule (Marketing Suite) read as CoSchedule Marketing Suite
HubSpot read as HubSpot Content Hub
HubSpot (Marketing Hub + Content Hub) read as HubSpot Content Hub
HubSpot (free tier) read as HubSpot Content Hub
LinkedIn read as LinkedIn articles
Optimizely Content Marketing Platform read as Optimizely CMP
Semrush read as Semrush Content Marketing Platform
Semrush (Content Marketing Toolkit) read as Semrush Content Marketing Platform
Semrush Content Toolkit read as Semrush Content Marketing Platform
Sprinklr read as Sprinklr Marketing
Unresolved, counted raw
None awaiting human review.
Discontinued, still offered
No shut-down product was recommended here.