When asked for the best company research tool, 6 AI assistants named 8 brands between them this month. Crunchbase was named most often, followed by LinkedIn and ZoomInfo. 3 brands were named by every assistant that answered: Crunchbase, LinkedIn, ZoomInfo.
Who named whom
| Brand | ChatGPT | Perplexity | Claude | Grok | DeepSeek | Cohere | Named by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Crunchbase | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | 6 of 6 |
| ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | 6 of 6 | |
| ZoomInfo | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | 6 of 6 |
| LinkedIn Sales Navigator | ✓ | ✓ | · | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | 5 of 6 |
| Apollo.io | · | ✓ | · | ✓ | ✓ | · | 3 of 6 |
| Owler | ✓ | · | · | ✓ | · | ✓ | 3 of 6 |
| SEMrush | · | · | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | · | 3 of 6 |
| Similarweb | · | · | ✓ | · | ✓ | · | 2 of 6 |
Share of voice
What each assistant said
ChatGPT
Named 5 brands, in this order: LinkedIn, LinkedIn Sales Navigator, ZoomInfo, Crunchbase, Owler.
Selecting the best company research tool for a small business depends on the specific needs of the business, including budget, the type of data required, and how the information will be used.
Perplexity
Named 5 brands, in this order: Apollo.io, Crunchbase, LinkedIn, LinkedIn Sales Navigator, ZoomInfo.
For a small business, the best company research tool is usually Apollo.io if you want the strongest balance of company data, contact data, and affordability.
Claude
Named 4 brands, in this order: LinkedIn, Crunchbase, ZoomInfo, SEMrush.
Here are some top options depending on your needs:
Grok
Named 7 brands, in this order: Crunchbase, ZoomInfo, Apollo.io, LinkedIn, LinkedIn Sales Navigator, Owler, SEMrush.
DeepSeek
Named 6 brands, in this order: Apollo.io, LinkedIn, LinkedIn Sales Navigator, Crunchbase, ZoomInfo, Similarweb.
The "best" tool really depends on what you mean by company research — sales prospecting, competitive intel, market/customer research, or due diligence on partners.
Cohere
Named 5 brands, in this order: LinkedIn, LinkedIn Sales Navigator, Crunchbase, Owler, ZoomInfo.
Choosing the best company research tool for a small business depends on your specific needs, budget, and the type of information you’re looking for.
The questions asked
- What is the best company research tool for a small business?
Asked between 2026-09-26 and 2026-09-26. Not answering this month: Gemini, Mistral.
Track what AI assistants say about every client, with white-label reports your clients can read.
See the GEO suiteHow this was measured
Each month we ask every assistant the same plain buyer questions, worded the way a person shopping for this kind of product would ask them, with no brand suggested in the question except where the question itself names the market leader to find alternatives to. Each assistant answers in a fresh session with no earlier conversation, so an answer reflects what the assistant says to anyone who asks, not what it was steered towards.
From each answer we keep the product and company names it recommends. A name counts only when it appears in the answer as a proper name, is not a heading such as "Best for" or "Pricing", and is confirmed by a second assistant naming it too, by a website the answer cites, or by being the market leader named in the question. Share of voice is each brand's share of all brand mentions in the category this month. Assistants that could not answer this month are listed as not answering, never counted as naming nobody.
Cite this page
https://mentionfox.com/ai-recommends/company-research-tools