How Much Does Buyer Intent Change AI Software Shortlists? October 2026
A RecommendationIndex study compares AI recommendation shortlists across 15 buyer prompts for CRM, project management, and email marketing software.
This cross-sectional study compares 15 exact buyer prompts, 60 completed prompt-and-model evaluations, 287 observation rows, and 30 within-market prompt-pair comparisons.
Supported findings
- Across 30 within-market prompt-pair comparisons, the mean overlap between pooled recommendation shortlists was 0.403 on a 0-to-1 Jaccard scale.
- Email marketing prompts produced the most similar shortlists on average (0.492), compared with CRM (0.367) and project management (0.349).
- The enterprise project-management prompt produced 13 distinct resolved company IDs, versus 6 for the small-team prompt; the two pooled shortlists overlapped by 0.118.
- The CRM AI-features prompt and mid-sized-company prompt produced the same six-company pooled recommendation set across the four recorded models.
- The ecommerce email-marketing shortlist overlapped by 0.273 with the broader small-and-growing-business comparison prompt, while the general business and growing-small-business prompts overlapped more strongly.
Market comparison
| Market | Average overlap | Minimum | Maximum | Distinct recommended IDs |
|---|
| CRM | 0.367 | 0.111 | 1.000 | 21 |
| Project Management | 0.349 | 0.105 | 0.857 | 22 |
| Email Marketing | 0.492 | 0.273 | 0.750 | 12 |
All measured prompts
| Market and exact prompt | Recommended IDs | Average overlap | Unique IDs |
|---|
CRM
What CRM software platforms have the best AI features and automation capabilities? | 6 | 0.529 | 0 |
CRM
What is the best CRM software for a mid-sized company? | 6 | 0.529 | 0 |
CRM
What are the best alternatives to Salesforce and HubSpot CRM? Compare leading CRM platforms. | 8 | 0.283 | 3 |
CRM
What are the best enterprise CRM software platforms? Compare leading providers and explain why they are recommended. | 11 | 0.164 | 7 |
CRM
What are the best CRM software platforms for small businesses? Include recommended companies, rankings, and sources if available. | 9 | 0.331 | 4 |
Project Management
What is the best project management software for a remote team? | 7 | 0.458 | 0 |
Project Management
What are the best enterprise project management software platforms? Compare leading providers and explain why they are recommended. | 13 | 0.125 | 10 |
Project Management
What are the best project management software platforms for small teams? Compare leading options and explain why they are recommended. | 6 | 0.412 | 0 |
Project Management
What are the best project management software platforms for businesses? Include recommended companies, rankings, and sources if available. | 8 | 0.351 | 1 |
Project Management
What project management software platforms have the strongest AI features and automation capabilities? | 8 | 0.401 | 1 |
Email Marketing
What email marketing platforms have the strongest AI features and automation? | 5 | 0.441 | 1 |
Email Marketing
What is the best email marketing software for a growing small business? | 6 | 0.543 | 0 |
Email Marketing
What are the best email marketing platforms for ecommerce businesses? | 6 | 0.329 | 3 |
Email Marketing
What are the best email marketing platforms for businesses? Include recommended companies and sources. | 6 | 0.592 | 0 |
Email Marketing
Compare leading email marketing platforms for small and growing businesses. When is each platform appropriate, and what are the main reasons to choose one over another? Include recommended companies and sources if available. | 8 | 0.554 | 1 |
Recorded systems and model versions
- openai: gpt-5-mini
- anthropic: claude-sonnet-4-6
- gemini: gemini-flash-latest
- perplexity: sonar
Source provenance
| Market | Dataset | Measured UTC | Rows | SHA-256 |
|---|
| CRM | ri-research-crm-2026-10-08-57fc9473 | 2026-10-09T11:30:02+00:00 to 2026-10-09T12:10:15.904+00:00 | 96 | 29627b3bf40183b9210e72b7347a97f27b05a2c9604ec6eb802c8d378b32923e |
| Project Management | ri-research-project-management-2026-10-16-1f948d7c | 2026-10-16T12:10:03.459+00:00 to 2026-10-16T13:30:25.909+00:00 | 97 | cbec47f22fa515c07d8d02edf9d8117cf1081bc92a12405355a923bf31b7aeb9 |
| Email Marketing | ri-research-email-marketing-2026-10-16-1a8250a5 | 2026-10-16T12:10:35.208+00:00 to 2026-10-16T13:10:11.636+00:00 | 94 | 0339219834f4b4bbf4e5a9f11a1e8745d99fba0a0cc50146437695c165997df4 |
Methodology
Cross-sectional comparison of five exact buyer prompts within each of three October 2026 RecommendationIndex snapshots; no new model runs were initiated.
For each prompt, the set contains every resolved company ID with recommended=true in at least one of the four completed provider evaluations.
Jaccard overlap equals the intersection divided by the union of two prompt-level recommendation sets. Five prompts create 10 pair comparisons per market and 30 overall.
Only observation rows with recommended=true and a resolved company ID enter a prompt recommendation set.
An observation can mention a company without recommending it; mentions are excluded from all shortlist-overlap calculations.
Citation records are retained in the source evidence but are not treated as mentions or recommendations.
The three SHA-256 values are reused from the previously validated shared RI/PMM evidence record. This candidate does not redefine RI canonical hashing.
Limitations
- This is a single cross-sectional snapshot per market, not a longitudinal trend.
- The prompts differ in both wording and buyer need, so the study cannot isolate wording alone or claim that phrasing caused the observed differences.
- Recommendation sets pool four AI systems and therefore do not describe the behavior of any one model.
- Jaccard overlap ignores rank, recommendation frequency, confidence, explanation quality, and citations.
- Resolved company IDs can distinguish product variants or related commercial offerings; counts should not be read as unique corporate parents.
- The CRM snapshot was measured on October 9, while project management and email marketing were measured on October 16, 2026 UTC.
- AI outputs can change with model updates, retrieval behavior, source availability, system instructions, and prompt wording.
- Recommendation presence is not commercial market share, customer adoption, product quality, or a PromptMarketMap endorsement.
Related research
Cross-model recommendation agreement
September–October recommendation stability
Read the full methodology
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