September 2026 Edition, published · The permanent record of that edition, superseded since.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

Social media management for small business buyers

Asked as “social media management platform”, and as “social media scheduling and monitoring tool”, on behalf of a small B2B company. 54 first choices recorded across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, twelve models each.
Standing · first-choice share
35%
Contested · Agorapulse 7%
35Buffer07Agorapulse07PostPlanify50others

35% 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
01Buffer35%5%61endorsed leader
02Zoho Social7%8%36accepted challenger
03Vista Social7%0%19accepted challenger
04Agorapulse7%24%25accepted challenger
05Metricool6%10%31accepted challenger
06Hootsuite6%64%42criticized challenger
07SocialPilot4%10%21accepted challenger
08Sprout Social4%62%40criticized challenger
09Later2%7%29accepted challenger
10Sendible2%12%17accepted challenger
Show the two products at 0%, ordered by negative rate
12Sprinklr Social0%92%12criticized challenger
11SocialBee0%0%11accepted 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.
Head to headHead-to-head pages are published for mid-market buyers, so these open on mid-market figures, not small business.
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
12
Accepted challengerEndorsed leader
0%First-choice share → · lines at 30% share and 25% negative50%
Key
01Buffer35%
02Zoho Social7%
03Vista Social7%
04Agorapulse7%
05Metricool6%
06Hootsuite6%
07SocialPilot4%
08Sprout Social4%
09Later2%
10Sendible2%
11SocialBee0%
12Sprinklr Social0%

What they warned about

Two of twelve models held their first choice under the paraphrase. GPT-5.4 mini, Gemini 3.5 Flash, Perplexity Sonar, Mistral Small, DeepSeek V4 Flash, Llama 4 Maverick, Qwen 3.7 Flash, Kimi K2, 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.
Hootsuite
64%
27 of 42 labels negative · 12 of 12 models · 12 hard negative
“Avoid or Use Extreme Caution (Overpriced for SMB Needs): Hootsuite: Starts at $99/user/month ... billing issues like surprise auto-renewals/refund denials” Grok 4.20, negative prompt
Sprout Social
62%
25 of 40 labels negative · 10 of 12 models · 11 hard negative
“Enterprise tools like Hootsuite/Sprout Social ($99-199/user) are overkill/too costly for small teams” Grok 4.20, comparative prompt
Sprinklr Social
92%
11 of 12 labels negative · 9 of 12 models · 7 hard negative
“designed for complex enterprise social, listening, care, and governance operations, so SMBs usually get better value from lighter tools instead” Perplexity Sonar, negative prompt
Agorapulse
24%
6 of 25 labels negative · 6 of 12 models · 2 hard negative
“Agorapulse — $99/month minimum, better for engagement-heavy businesses” Kimi K2, budget prompt

What they cite

Four of the twelve models returned a source list in this edition: four return the pages they cited.

Sites the answers cite

20 of 72 answers in this category came back with a source list, from 4 of 12 models: citations where the model returns them, or the search results it consulted. 244 links across 117 sites, every framing counted. Ranked by the number of answers carrying the site or page. The other 8 models searched through a gateway that returned no source list on this edition.

vendor site · Zapier11 answers · 12 citations · 2 models
10 answers · 14 citations · 4 models
vendor site · Sprout Social10 answers · 11 citations · 3 models
vendor site · Buffer9 answers · 12 citations · 3 models
vendor site · Postiv7 answers · 7 citations · 3 models
vendor site · Reddit6 answers · 10 citations · 2 models
vendor site · Planable6 answers · 6 citations · 2 models
vendor site · NapoleonCat5 answers · 5 citations · 1 model
vendor site · PostEverywhere5 answers · 5 citations · 1 model
vendor site · Sprinklr5 answers · 5 citations · 2 models
4 answers · 4 citations · 1 model
4 answers · 4 citations · 2 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 social media management platform”, “social media 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 days
Buffer buffer.com35%20290,50035,151966,25618
Zoho parent site
Zoho Social 7%
7%703,60024
Vista Social vistasocial.com7%384,4001,41038,70912
Agorapulse agorapulse.com7%763,6003573,9392
PostPlanify postplanify.com7%16
Metricool metricool.com6%5140,500158184,69166
Hootsuite hootsuite.com6%22049,5001,036748,222119
SocialPilot socialpilot.co4%586,6004393,623$3,14921
Oktopost oktopost.com4%1671,000117,4716
DemandBird demandbird.com4%4

Google's top ten for the two searches hold 15 sites; 6 of them are among the sites the models cited here (efficient.app, learn.g2.com, planable.io, reddit.com, sproutsocial.com, zapier.com). The first result for “best social media management platform” is zapier.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 social media management platform for a small B2B company?”Paraphrase“Which social media scheduling and monitoring tool would you recommend to a small business that sells to other businesses?”Comparative“What are the top social media management platforms for a small team and how do they differ?”Budget-constrained“What is the best social media management platform for a small company with a tight budget?”Scale-constrained“We are a 30 person company evaluating a social media management platform. What should we look at?”Negative“Which social media management platforms should a small business avoid or be cautious about?”
Claude Haiku 4.5Buffer, Hootsuite
One alternativeSprout Social
Buffer, HootsuiteHeldagainst: Sprout SocialBuffer, SocialPilot
Two alternativesHootsuite, Later
Buffer, SocialPilot
One alternativeSocialBu
no first choiceagainst: Hootsuite, Sprinklr Social
GPT-5.4 miniBuffer
Three alternativesHootsuite, Oktopost, Sprout Social
AgorapulseChanged
Two alternativesBuffer, Sprout Social
Buffer
Two alternativesLater, Sprout Social
against: Hootsuite
Buffer
One alternativeLater
against: Hootsuite, Sprout Social
no first choiceagainst: Hootsuite, Sprout Social
Gemini 3.5 FlashTaplio
Four alternativesMetricool, Postbeam, SocialBee, Zoho Social
against: HubSpot Social, Oktopost, Sprout Social
Zoho SocialChanged
Three alternativesAgorapulse, Buffer, Taplio
Planable
Four alternativesBuffer, Later, Loomly, Vista Social
Metricool
Three alternativesBuffer, MeetEdgar, Publer Professional
Loomly
Three alternativesAgorapulse, Buffer, Metricool
against: Salesforce Social Studio, Sprinklr Social, Sprout Social
against: Hootsuite, HubSpot Marketing Hub, Sprinklr Social, Sprout Social
Perplexity SonarZoho Social
Two alternativesBuffer, Oktopost
BufferChanged
Four alternativesDemandBird, HubSpot Social, Loomly, SocialBee
Buffer
Five alternativesLater, Loomly, SocialPilot, Vista Social, Zoho Social
Buffer
Two alternativesMetricool, Zoho Social
no first choiceagainst: Hootsuite, HubSpot Social, Later, Sprinklr Social, Sprout Social, Zoho Social
Grok 4.20Buffer
Two alternativesAgorapulse, Sendible
against: Oktopost
BufferHeld
Two alternativesSocialPilot, Zoho Social
against: Hootsuite
Buffer, SocialPilot
Four alternativesLater, Metricool, Sendible, Vista Social
against: Agorapulse, Hootsuite, Sprout Social
Buffer
Four alternativesLater, Metricool, Vista Social, Zoho Social
against: Hootsuite, Sprout Social
Agorapulse, Hootsuite, Sprout Social, Vista Social
Two alternativesBuffer, SocialPilot
against: CoSchedule, Crowdfire, Hootsuite, HubSpot Social, MeetEdgar, Sendible, Sprinklr Social, Sprout Social
Mistral SmallSendible
Three alternativesBuffer, Oktopost, Zoho Social
Buffer, OktopostChanged
Three alternativesDemandBird, LinkedIn Native Scheduler, PostPlanify
Vista Social
Five alternativesBuffer, Later, Loomly, Sendible, SocialPilot
Buffer
Three alternativesLater, Metricool, Zoho Social
no first choiceagainst: Hootsuiteagainst: Agorapulse, Hootsuite, Later, Metricool, Sked Social, Sprinklr Social, Zoho Social
DeepSeek V4 FlashBuffer, Metricool
Three alternativesHubSpot Social, Publer Professional, SocialBee
against: Hootsuite, Sprout Social
AgorapulseChanged
Two alternativesVista Social, Zoho Social
against: Buffer, Hootsuite, Metricool, Sprout Social
Buffer
Four alternativesLater, Metricool, SocialPilot, Vista Social
against: Hootsuite, Sprout Social
Buffer
Three alternativesLater, Metricool, Publer Professional
against: Agorapulse, Hootsuite, Sprout Social
Vista Social
One alternativeAgorapulse
against: Hootsuite, Sprinklr Social, Sprout Social
against: Hootsuite, Loomly, Planoly, Sendible, SocialPilot, Sprinklr Social, Sprout Social, Zoho Social
Llama 4 MaverickPostPlanify
One alternativeOktopost
DemandBirdChangedPostPlanify
Five alternativesAgorapulse, Buffer, Hootsuite, Sprout Social, Vista Social
no first choiceno first choiceagainst: Hootsuite, HubSpot Social, Sprout Social
Qwen 3.7 FlashZoho Social
Two alternativesBuffer, Planable
PostPlanifyChanged
Two alternativesAgorapulse, Buffer
Buffer
Three alternativesLater, SocialPilot, Zoho Social
against: Hootsuite, Sprout Social
Zoho Social
Two alternativesBuffer, SocialPilot
Agorapulse, Vista Social
Two alternativesHootsuite, Planable
against: Buffer, Metricool, Sprout Social
against: Agorapulse, Buffer, Hootsuite, HubSpot Social, Sprout Social
Kimi K2Buffer, Metricool
Two alternativesOktopost, Sendible
BufferChanged
Six alternativesAgorapulse, Brand24, LinkedIn Native Scheduler, Mention, Supergrow, Taplio
against: Hootsuite, Sprout Social
Metricool
Six alternativesBuffer, Later, Sendible, Social by IDM, SocialBee, Vista Social
Buffer
Three alternativesMetricool, Vista Social, Zoho Social
against: Agorapulse, Hootsuite, Sprout Social
SocialPilot, Vista Social
Two alternativesBuffer, Later
against: Hootsuite, Sprout Social
against: Birdeye Social, Brandwatch, Emplifi, Hootsuite, Khoros, Mention, Sprinklr Social, Sprout Social
GLM 4.7 FlashXPlanable
Five alternativesAgorapulse, Buffer, CoSchedule, ContentStudio, Sprout Social
Oktopost, PostPlanifyChanged
One alternativeSprout Social
Buffer
Six alternativesAgorapulse, Hootsuite, Later, Metricool, Sprout Social, Vista Social
Buffer
Four alternativesMetricool, SocialPilot, Vista Social, Zoho Social
no first choiceagainst: Agorapulse, Hootsuite, Sprinklr Social, Sprout Social
MiniMax M2.5PostPlanify
One alternativeSocialPilot
DemandBirdChanged
Three alternativesBuffer, Sprout Social, Zoho Social
Buffer, Vista Social
One alternativeLater
Buffer, LaterSprout Social
Four alternativesAgorapulse, Hootsuite, HubSpot Marketing Hub, Zoho Social
against: CoSchedule, Crowdfire, Hootsuite, MeetEdgar, SocialPilot, Sprinklr Social
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.
Seventy-two rows: every prompt, every model, every answer.
PromptModelVersion stringTime (UTC)SearchedSourcesLatency
Direct recommendationClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-15 01:37no04 s
Direct recommendationGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-15 04:01yes54 s
Direct recommendationGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-15 00:10yes1319 s
Direct recommendationPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-14 23:00yes204 s
Direct recommendationGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex (asked for grok-4.20-non-reasoning; the API answered as this version)2026-09-15 02:11yes05 s
Direct recommendationMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-14 23:09yes09 s
Direct recommendationDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-15 02:31yes016 s
Direct recommendationLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-14 23:49yes02 s
Direct recommendationQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-15 03:33yes029 s
Direct recommendationKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-15 04:29yes025 s
Direct recommendationGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-15 01:12yes0120 s
Direct recommendationMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-15 01:59yes010 s
ParaphraseClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-15 00:27no04 s
ParaphraseGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-15 00:23yes33 s
ParaphraseGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-15 02:43yes1018 s
ParaphrasePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-14 22:53yes205 s
ParaphraseGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex (asked for grok-4.20-non-reasoning; the API answered as this version)2026-09-15 02:47yes09 s
ParaphraseMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-14 23:08yes07 s
ParaphraseDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-14 23:03yes015 s
ParaphraseLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-15 04:16yes02 s
ParaphraseQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-14 23:27yes035 s
ParaphraseKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-15 01:25yes026 s
ParaphraseGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-15 02:56yes022 s
ParaphraseMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-15 04:20yes09 s
ComparativeClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-15 02:49yes78 s
ComparativeGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-15 02:47yes47 s
ComparativeGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-15 03:35yes1625 s
ComparativePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-15 01:18yes2023 s
ComparativeGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex (asked for grok-4.20-non-reasoning; the API answered as this version)2026-09-15 01:33yes06 s
ComparativeMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-15 01:23yes09 s
ComparativeDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-15 03:53yes024 s
ComparativeLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-15 00:59yes03 s
ComparativeQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-14 23:50yes037 s
ComparativeKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-15 01:13yes030 s
ComparativeGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-15 01:48yes097 s
ComparativeMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-15 01:41yes014 s
Budget constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-15 04:11yes67 s
Budget constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-14 22:56yes54 s
Budget constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-15 04:37yes1118 s
Budget constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-15 04:24yes204 s
Budget constrainedGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex (asked for grok-4.20-non-reasoning; the API answered as this version)2026-09-15 03:09yes04 s
Budget constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-15 00:31yes06 s
Budget constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-15 03:05yes012 s
Budget constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-15 01:49yes02 s
Budget constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-15 00:01yes024 s
Budget constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-15 02:37yes021 s
Budget constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-15 01:42yes017 s
Budget constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-15 02:28no011 s
Scale constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-15 01:40no06 s
Scale constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-15 00:06no07 s
Scale constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-14 23:12yes1123 s
Scale constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-15 03:27yes207 s
Scale constrainedGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex (asked for grok-4.20-non-reasoning; the API answered as this version)2026-09-15 04:11yes07 s
Scale constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-15 02:21no08 s
Scale constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-09-15 02:34yes040 s
Scale constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-15 01:53yes03 s
Scale constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-15 02:25yes069 s
Scale constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-15 04:59yes039 s
Scale constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-15 00:55yes027 s
Scale constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-15 04:30yes015 s
Negative framingClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-15 00:06yes138 s
Negative framingGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-15 04:07yes37 s
Negative framingGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-14 23:59yes1722 s
Negative framingPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-15 01:39yes205 s
Negative framingGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex (asked for grok-4.20-non-reasoning; the API answered as this version)2026-09-15 00:21yes08 s
Negative framingMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-15 01:22yes08 s
Negative framingDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-09-14 23:11yes056 s
Negative framingLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-15 01:30yes02 s
Negative framingQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-15 00:39yes033 s
Negative framingKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-15 02:22yes076 s
Negative framingGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-15 02:20yes0178 s
Negative framingMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-15 00:10yes021 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 Social
Sprinklr read as Sprinklr Social
Zoho read as Zoho Social
Unresolved, counted raw
Birdeye Social
Lately
Linktree or Carrd
Social by IDM
Discontinued, still offered
No shut-down product was recommended here.
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