Thunderdome B2B SaaS AI Visibility Index

← Email Marketing ranking

Startup & small team · Prompt 4 of 8 · September 2026

A real buyer question from the September 2026 snapshot, asked 3× to each of the three models. 9 answers recorded.

“Which email platform is best for a small business just getting started?”

ChatGPT answered 3× this snapshot

For a small business just getting started, the best email platform usually depends on what you mean by “email platform”: If you mean business email hosting: Use Google Workspace or Microsoft 365. Google Workspace: best for simplicity, Gmail interface, easy setup, good collaboration. Microsoft 365: best if you use Outlook, Word, Excel, and want tighter Office integration. Best default choice for most small…

Named across its answers: 1. Google Workspace2. Microsoft 3653. MailerLite4. Mailchimp5. Klaviyo

Verbatim excerpt from one collected ChatGPT answer; formatting flattened, words untouched.

Google Workspace dominates this question, appearing in 8 of 9 answers with an average position of 1.8, making it the near-unanimous first recommendation across all three models for small business email. Mailchimp holds a real but secondary position at 6 of 9 mentions, while category-ranked players like ActiveCampaign and HubSpot are completely absent, meaning AI is quietly rewriting which brands matter at the start of a buyer's journey.

AI-generated read of the September 2026 measurements.

Who wins this question

Owned Consensus

All three models name Google Workspace on this question.

ChatGPTClaudeGemini mentioned · first · avg. pos
Google Workspace 11126111 8/9 · 6× first · #1.8
Microsoft 365 222222 6/9 · never first · #2
Mailchimp 434111 6/9 · 3× first · #2.3
Zoho Mail 33333 5/9 · never first · #3
MailerLite 3435 4/9 · never first · #3.8
Brevo 534 3/9 · never first · #4
Titan 44 2/9 · never first · #4
Proton Mail 45 2/9 · never first · #4.5
Constant Contact 2 1/9 · never first · #2
Gmail 2 1/9 · never first · #2
Kit 4 1/9 · never first · #4
Klaviyo 5 1/9 · never first · #5

Each square is one collected answer; the number is the brand's position in that answer. Lime = the very first recommendation. Unlinked brands were named by the models here but sit outside this category's published top 15 overall. Never mentioned here: ActiveCampaign, HubSpot, Beehiiv, Omnisend, Salesforce Marketing Cloud, Braze, EmailOctopus, Adobe Campaign.

Build variants of this question: the Email Marketing prompt tree → ← Previous prompt Next prompt →

Part of the Email Marketing snapshot: 72 answers across 8 prompts. Full category ranking · Compare brands head-to-head · Methodology.