G2 Evaluation & Top 3 G2 Competitors in 2024

B2B technology review platforms are important because they provide firms with valuable information and insights regarding technologies that make their businesses more efficient. These platforms often provide this information to help businesses make informed decisions about technology investments: 

• user reviews
• comparisons of different products and services

Buyers are eagerly looking for unbiased and insightful reviews for purchasing a product, and vendors are looking for more online reviews for awareness:

• 92% of B2B tech buyers are depending on trusted reviews for their purchases.
• Five product reviews increase the conversion rate by 270%.

G2 is such a technology review platform aiming to help both buyers and vendors. However, there are some shortcomings of G2 on closer inspection such as potential sources of bias in reviews and the difficulty of gaining product insights since those insights are scattered across thousands of reviews.

In this article, we will review the performance of G2 and compare it against the top 3 G2 competitors.

G2 review

G2 is a B2B software marketplace founded in 2012, providing peer-to-peer software and technology online reviews. According to their statement, more than 60% of Forbes Cloud 100 are G2 customers.¹

G2 gathers user reviews and ratings for various software products and services and then uses that data to create rankings and reports. These rankings and reports are intended to help businesses and individuals make better product decisions when choosing the right software and technology. 

G2 uses the reviews and market presence data to create scores for satisfaction and market presence and then use these scores to place products into one of four categories on the G2 Crowd Grid:

• Leaders
• High Performers
• Contenders
• Niche.

G2 also provides a marketplace for vendors to list and promote their products.

Business size of users

• Most reviewers of G2 in other review platforms are from mid-market companies.

User ratings

• Trustpilot: 4.8/5

Pricing

G2 has a 4 different pricing plans with different features:

• Free
• Essential
• Pro
• Power

Pros

• G2 claims to use an algorithm to detect and remove fake user reviews, specifically those written by employees of the company being reviewed, or employees of the company’s competitors.
• G2 claims that its community manually reviews and approves comments to prevent spam and irrelevant feedback.
• G2 also asks for screenshots as proof of usage from the reviewer to ensure authenticity.

Cons

• G2’s model reduces reviews to two numbers; the total number of reviews and the rating. For more information, a user needs to read through thousands of reviews which is not practical. This model pushes buyers to focus on a few providers and miss out on those that may offer a better solution for their specific business thanks to superior pricing, industry-specific focus etc.
• Though they are the largest review platform regarding overall web traffic, they are not the market leader in all domains. For our analysis of market leadership with SEMrush analytics, you can check our article on best software reviews. 

• Some reviewers state that the platform is not accepting their reviews despite satisfying the required features.

• Some reviewers state that the platform is biased since it rejects some negative reviews of their advertisers.

• Some technology related topics are not comprehensively covered by the company

Top 3 competitors of G2

Below, we listed the best alternatives according to the alphabetical order. However, we can be biased in this domain as a competitor of G2.

AIMultiple

AIMultiple is the emerging technology industry analyst that assists companies in researching, selecting, and evaluating new technology solutions through the use of transparent metrics. 

AIMultiple addresses fundamental problems of review platforms with its approach:

• Most tech users never write reviews. AIMultiple leverages data beyond reviews including online popularity of technology solutions, their number of employees, case studies etc.
• Buyers do not have enough time to read reviews. Even if they had the time, they would be utterly confused since there is an abundance of superficial reviews that reflect the personal biases and unique working conditions of numerous users. AIMultiple summarizes review findings in product pages to highlight key aspects of solutions.
• Reviews are not confined to a single platform. G2 users miss out on learning about testimonials, case studies and reviews on other review platforms like TrustRadius, PeerSpot, Gartner Peer Insights etc. AIMultiple aggregates all of these sources of information.

User Ratings

• Trustpilot: 4.2/5

Pros

• Global leader in emerging technologies like RPA based on analysis of Semrush data. Read about our leadership identification methodology(see Figure 1)

Figure 1. Global market share of review platforms and industry analysts in RPA

• Global Leader in other emerging tech domains like
  • Conversational AI/Chatbots
  • Synthetic Data
  • Data Annotation/Labeling

Cons

• Has less reach in more traditional technology domains
• Does not include individual review information. For that, users can navigate to review platform of their choice.

Gartner

Gartner owns multiple review platforms, here we outline the larger ones but there are other ones like Software Advice and GetApp.

Capterra

Capterra is one of the G2 competitors that provides reviews and comparisons of software and technology products. It was founded in 1998, but purchased by Gartner in 2015.

Capterra is similar to G2 in that it allows users to read and write reviews, and it provides a platform for businesses to list and promote their products. It offers a variety of tools and resources to help businesses find the right software, such as: 

• a software directory
• software lists
• a comparison tool that allows users to compare products side-by-side. 

Business size

• Most reviewers of Capterra in other review platforms are from small businesses.

User ratings

• TrustRadius: 8.1/10

Pros

• Reviews are claimed to be independently audited to ensure accuracy and credibility

Cons

• Reviews take longer time to get published than G2

Gartner Peer Insights

Gartner Peer Insights is another review platform, provided by Gartner. The platform allows technology buyers to read and write reviews about IT products and services, and to gain insights into the experiences of their peers in the industry. It covers a wide variety of technology areas, such as Cloud, CRM, IT Services etc.

Gartner Peer Insights offers:

• Peer-to-peer discussions
• Verified ratings and reviews
• Quick polls to stay informed about key topics and latest news
• Synthesized insights allowing leveraging tools and resources to compare products, identify trends and make roadmap decisions

User ratings

• TrustRadius: 8.3/10

Business size

• Most reviewers of Gartner Peer Insights in other review platforms are from enterprise level companies.

Pros

• For vendors: Reviews can shape products’ standing in Gartner Magic Quadrant which is a widely-read source regarding vendor performance.
• For tech end-users: It is the largest source of reviews for enterprise focused technology areas

Cons

• For vendors: More expensive compared to other platforms, which can be a problem for mid-market and small businesses
• For tech end-users: Sometimes the information provided is highly complex for users to navigate

If you have questions or need help in finding vendors, feel free to reach out:

External Links

• 1. “About.” G2, https://company.g2.com/about. Accessed 29 January 2023.