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Seven AI engines answered 100 buyer questions every day for eight days. On the 90 that leave Herd's name out, 32 of 4,622 answers name it, and 23 of those 32 recommend it.
Scores are the share of answers, out of 100, in which an engine names Herd in its own sentences. A link to Herd's site without the name is counted separately.
| Stage | Questions | Names the company | Share of answers naming it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Learning | 31 | No | 0.4 |
| Comparing | 34 | No | 0.7 |
| Buying | 10 | No | 2.5 |
| Running it | 15 | No | 0.0 |
| By name | 10 | Yes | 98.4 |
Of the 100 questions we track, 31 are asked while a buyer is still learning the category, 34 while they compare platforms, 10 while they price one and 15 once a program is running. None of those 90 carries Herd's name, and across them an engine names Herd in 32 of 4,622 answers.
The other ten do carry it, and there Herd is named in 502 of 510. The engines can describe Herd when they are asked to. They almost never bring it up themselves.
“What is this, and do we need it?”
“Vendors like KnowBe4, Proofpoint, Mimecast, and Living Security have rebranded around "human risk management" platforms specifically because they now combine simulated phishing, behavioral analytics, and adaptive coaching rather than just serving up slideshows.”
“Which platforms should we look at?”
“For cybersecurity-focused human risk management, Living Security, KnowBe4, Hoxhunt, Proofpoint, and Mimecast are worth shortlisting.”
“What does it cost, and on what terms?”
“This is a classic B2B SaaS sales tactic, and it's almost universal in the security awareness training space (KnowBe4, Proofpoint, Mimecast, Hoxhunt, etc.).”
“How do we know the training is working?”
“Platforms like KnowBe4, Proofpoint, or Cofense automatically log these metrics during scheduled or randomized phishing campaigns.”
“Is Herd right for us?”
“Yes, Herd Security is an excellent fit for a startup preparing for SOC 2, but with one critical caveat: it only solves the employee training and policy acknowledgment piece of your compliance puzzle.”
Each column is one tracked question, and its height is the share of answers to it that name Herd, across the seven engines and the eight days. A question that scores zero is drawn as a short stub so it can still be counted.
| Question | Names Herd Security | Share of answers naming it |
|---|---|---|
| How does Herd Security's phishing simulation scoring work? | Yes | 100.00 |
| Does Herd Security integrate with Slack, Teams, Okta and Google Workspace? | Yes | 100.00 |
| Is Herd Security (herdsecurity.io) the same company as other security products called Herd? | Yes | 100.00 |
| Herd Security reviews: is HerdAI good for security awareness training? | Yes | 98.08 |
| Herd Security vs KnowBe4 | Yes | 98.08 |
| How much does Herd Security cost? | Yes | 98.04 |
| Does HerdAI cover deepfakes and AI threats in its training? | Yes | 98.04 |
| What is Herd Security (HerdAI) and what does its security awareness platform do? | Yes | 98.00 |
| Is Herd Security a good fit for a startup preparing for SOC 2? | Yes | 98.00 |
| Does Herd Security training meet SOC 2 and ISO 27001 requirements? | Yes | 96.08 |
| Security awareness training with flat-rate pricing and unlimited employees | No | 25.00 |
| How do I generate security training automatically from our own policies? | No | 11.76 |
| Best security awareness training that works inside Slack or Microsoft Teams | No | 11.54 |
| Mid-market security awareness training that doesn't need a dedicated admin | No | 7.69 |
| How do I get SOC 2 ready fast as a startup, including employee security training? | No | 1.96 |
| Security awareness training for AI startups | No | 1.96 |
| Security awareness training inside Microsoft Teams without a separate login | No | 1.92 |
| What is human risk management and how is it different from security awareness training? | No | 0.00 |
| What is AI security awareness training? | No | 0.00 |
| How often should employees do security awareness training? | No | 0.00 |
| Does security awareness training actually reduce cyber incidents or is it just a compliance checkbox? | No | 0.00 |
| Do phishing simulations help, harm, or just annoy employees? | No | 0.00 |
| What percentage of breaches involve human error? | No | 0.00 |
| Why do employees keep falling for phishing even after training? | No | 0.00 |
| Why does security awareness training make employees hate it and how do you fix it? | No | 0.00 |
| What is an agentic AI security platform? | No | 0.00 |
| Best security awareness training platforms | No | 0.00 |
| What should we look for when choosing a security awareness training provider? | No | 0.00 |
| Best phishing simulation tools for enterprise | No | 0.00 |
| Best human risk management platforms | No | 0.00 |
| Best AI-powered security awareness training platforms | No | 0.00 |
| What security awareness platform are you guys using and would you recommend it? | No | 0.00 |
| Best security awareness training for a very small company or startup | No | 0.00 |
| What's the best security awareness training you've actually used? | No | 0.00 |
| What is the best KnowBe4 alternative for a 2,000+ person organization? | No | 0.00 |
| KnowBe4 alternatives for a team switching because of high pricing and poor reporting | No | 0.00 |
| KnowBe4 vs Adaptive Security | No | 0.00 |
| Adaptive Security vs Hoxhunt | No | 0.00 |
| Hoxhunt vs KnowBe4 for a mid-size company | No | 0.00 |
| Alternatives to Mimecast for phishing awareness training | No | 0.00 |
| Proofpoint security awareness vs Cofense vs KnowBe4 | No | 0.00 |
| Living Security vs KnowBe4 for human risk management | No | 0.00 |
| Riot vs Jericho Security vs Fable Security | No | 0.00 |
| How much does security awareness training cost per employee? | No | 0.00 |
| How much does KnowBe4 cost for 500 users? | No | 0.00 |
| Security awareness training pricing for a company under 25 employees | No | 0.00 |
| Is there free or very low-cost security awareness training for a very small company? | No | 0.00 |
| How do I handle a KnowBe4 renewal when competitors look better and cost less? | No | 0.00 |
| Do security awareness vendors require multi-year contracts? | No | 0.00 |
| Which security awareness platform features are worth paying for: phishing, content library or reporting? | No | 0.00 |
| Why won't security awareness vendors give prices without a sales call? | No | 0.00 |
| Does security awareness training satisfy SOC 2, ISO 27001 and HIPAA requirements? | No | 0.00 |
| What security awareness training do I need for SOC 2? | No | 0.00 |
| What evidence do auditors want for security awareness training? | No | 0.00 |
| HIPAA security awareness training requirements for workforce members | No | 0.00 |
| ISO 27001 security awareness training requirements | No | 0.00 |
| PCI DSS security awareness training requirement | No | 0.00 |
| How much of ISO 27001 and SOC 2 audit prep can be automated, including training evidence? | No | 0.00 |
| Security awareness training for a solo GRC lead who owns compliance alone | No | 0.00 |
| What do you do about users who repeatedly fail phishing simulations? | No | 0.00 |
| Is click rate the right metric for phishing simulations? | No | 0.00 |
| Does phishing training work better with coaching than shaming? | No | 0.00 |
| How often should you run phishing simulations? | No | 0.00 |
| How do I run phishing simulations without making employees feel targeted? | No | 0.00 |
| Will phishing simulation emails get filtered by Microsoft 365 or Gmail? | No | 0.00 |
| Microsoft Defender attack simulation training vs a dedicated phishing platform | No | 0.00 |
| Phishing simulation platform with customizable scenarios for voice, SMS and email | No | 0.00 |
| How do I train staff who don't have a company email address? | No | 0.00 |
| How do you train employees to resist voice-clone phishing? | No | 0.00 |
| What training actually works against deepfake voice and video scams? | No | 0.00 |
| How do voice deepfake phishing simulations work? | No | 0.00 |
| How do I train employees to spot QR code phishing? | No | 0.00 |
| How do I run SMS phishing simulations for employees? | No | 0.00 |
| How do I train employees to use ChatGPT, Claude and Copilot safely at work? | No | 0.00 |
| How do I stop employees from putting sensitive data into AI tools? | No | 0.00 |
| Do Microsoft Teams phishing attacks bypass security awareness training? | No | 0.00 |
| What does employee AI governance training need to cover for the EU AI Act? | No | 0.00 |
| Can I deliver security awareness training in Slack instead of a separate LMS? | No | 0.00 |
| Does microlearning work better than annual security training videos? | No | 0.00 |
| Security awareness platform that integrates with Okta and Microsoft Entra ID | No | 0.00 |
| Security awareness training that syncs with Workday, BambooHR or Rippling for onboarding | No | 0.00 |
| Security awareness training that syncs with Drata for SOC 2 evidence | No | 0.00 |
| Can security awareness results feed into Splunk or a SIEM? | No | 0.00 |
| How do I send training reminders without nagging employees? | No | 0.00 |
| How do I build a security awareness program from scratch with no budget? | No | 0.00 |
| What should a CISO report to the board about human risk? | No | 0.00 |
| Security awareness training for digital health companies | No | 0.00 |
| Security awareness training for defense-tech and government contractors | No | 0.00 |
| How should new employees get security training during onboarding? | No | 0.00 |
| Security awareness training for non-technical teams such as sales and HR | No | 0.00 |
| Security awareness training discounts for nonprofits and schools | No | 0.00 |
| How do I measure the success of a security awareness program? | No | 0.00 |
| What human risk metrics should I track beyond completion and click rate? | No | 0.00 |
| How do I track phishing reporting rate and time to report? | No | 0.00 |
| What training completion rate is realistic for security awareness programs? | No | 0.00 |
| Does an AI security training vendor train its models on my company data? | No | 0.00 |
| How do I vet the security of a security awareness training vendor? | No | 0.00 |
| How hard is it to migrate from KnowBe4 to a new security awareness platform? | No | 0.00 |
| How long does it take to roll out security awareness training to the whole company? | No | 0.00 |
| What do customers and auditors expect in a security questionnaire about employee training? | No | 0.00 |
The set is 100 questions, run on every engine every day. Ninety leave Herd's name out, because a shortlist forms before a buyer knows the vendor. The ten that carry it are there to watch how Herd is described once it is found.
The 90 fall into ten topics of nine, from the fundamentals of the category to pricing and compliance. Thirteen of them name a competitor, as questions about alternatives and head-to-head comparisons do. 40 of the 100 are marked as the ones the work goes after first.
Where each question came from is recorded with it. 37 were asked by real people, 18 come from the market's own material, 10 use Herd's own wording, 21 are our hypotheses and 4 follow up on gaps we had already seen in the category.
90 leave Herd Security's name out, in grey. 10 carry it, in colour.
37 of the 90 are questions buyers put to Reddit and Quora in their own words. Across all of them, 1 answer names Herd.
18 come from analyst notes, review sites and the lists vendors publish about the category. 6 answers to them name Herd.
10 use the words Herd's own site uses for what it does. 1 answer to them names Herd.
21 are questions we expected a buyer to ask and could not find asked anywhere. They hold 24 of the 32 answers that name Herd, which is a reason to read that count with care.
| Stage | Questions | Carries Herd Security's name |
|---|---|---|
| Learning | 31 | No |
| Comparing | 34 | No |
| Buying | 10 | No |
| Running it | 15 | No |
| By name | 10 | Yes |
Across the 3,950 answers to questions that name no vendor, KnowBe4 is named in 32.6%, Proofpoint in 20.9% and Hoxhunt in 18.9%. Herd is named in 0.8%, eighth of the eleven brands we track and ahead of three of them.
What the answers say is a different matter. Of the 32 that name Herd, 23 make it the top pick or recommend it in a short list, and none warns a buyer away. Counting only answers that name the brand, Herd's average grade is 0.62 against 0.53 for KnowBe4 in a sample of 150. Thirty-two answers is a small base, so read that as direction and not as a ranking.
“I'd start by comparing Herd, Adaptive Security, and KnowBe4.”
Each elephant's area is the share of 3,950 answers that name the brand, on questions that name no vendor: the three named most, Adaptive Security and Herd.
| Brand | Share of answers |
|---|---|
| Herd | 0.8% |
| Adaptive Security | 4.3% |
| Hoxhunt | 18.9% |
| Proofpoint | 20.9% |
| KnowBe4 | 32.6% |
How strongly the engines recommend a brand, from 0 to 100. Every answer is graded the way a buyer reads it, from 1.0 for a top pick down to 0.05 for a bare source link.
| Brand | Salienz Score | Share of answers it appears in | Average grade |
|---|---|---|---|
| KnowBe4 | 17.8 | 36.8% | 0.48 |
| Adaptive Security | 3.3 | 22.4% | 0.15 |
| Herd Security | 0.5 | 1.5% | 0.32 |
Asked about Herd by name 80 times, Claude said in 53 of its answers that it could not find reliable information. It described Herd in the other 27, including all 8 comparisons with KnowBe4.
“I don't have reliable, verified information about a company called "Herd Security" or "HerdAI" and its specific security awareness platform.”
Asked whether Herd is the same company as other products with the name, ChatGPT pointed in all 8 of its answers to a G2 listing called "Herd Intelligence Platform". Across the seven engines, 20 of 51 answers to that question named another product called Herd.
“I also found references to another "Herd Security" listing associated with a "Herd Intelligence Platform" (a threat intelligence product) on G2.”
ChatGPT names Herd in 3.6% of its answers to questions that name no vendor. No other engine reaches 1%, and Perplexity and Claude never name it at all. 22 of the 32 answers that name Herd are ChatGPT's.
Claude is where the incumbents are strongest. It names KnowBe4 in 59.4% of those answers, Proofpoint in 46.3% and Hoxhunt in 39.0%, each well above what any other engine gives them. Herd is in none of them.
Darker cells are higher shares. Engines are ordered by Herd's share, highest first.
GPT ChatGPT · AIM Google AI Mode · AIO Google AI Overviews · CPL Microsoft Copilot · GEM Gemini · PPX Perplexity · CLD Claude
| Engine | Herd | KnowBe4 | Proofpoint | Hoxhunt | Mimecast | Cofense | Adaptive Security | Living Security |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ChatGPT | 3.57 | 27.92 | 19.97 | 19.32 | 4.06 | 10.23 | 4.55 | 2.11 |
| Google AI Mode | 0.86 | 32.98 | 17.77 | 14.35 | 2.14 | 1.71 | 2.14 | 1.93 |
| Google AI Overviews | 0.60 | 28.43 | 10.54 | 9.54 | 2.39 | 0.80 | 5.96 | 3.38 |
| Microsoft Copilot | 0.32 | 31.01 | 22.24 | 19.97 | 6.33 | 12.82 | 9.42 | 2.76 |
| Gemini | 0.16 | 33.44 | 19.16 | 17.37 | 2.27 | 3.25 | 4.55 | 2.11 |
| Perplexity | 0.00 | 10.47 | 4.84 | 7.95 | 1.94 | 2.13 | 2.33 | 0.97 |
| Claude | 0.00 | 59.42 | 46.27 | 38.96 | 18.67 | 6.17 | 0.81 | 9.74 |
“Once you can show reduced phishing click rates or increased reporting, that data becomes your pitch for even a small budget (which usually unlocks a proper platform like KnowBe4, Proofpoint, or Hoxhunt).”
On the 90 questions that leave Herd's name out, the engines cited a source 30,971 times. Herd's own site took 93 of those citations. The sites of the ten rivals we track took 5,342, and the three most-cited sites in the whole set are three of theirs: adaptivesecurity.com, knowbe4.com and hoxhunt.com.
Herd's pages do get read. Its page on security awareness training is cited 26 times and its guide to SOC 2 training 12. They land late in the answer, at an average position of 8.2 and 8.7, and mostly without the name beside them.
The lists the engines lean on leave Herd out. 443 of the round-ups, comparisons and reviews they cited name a tracked rival and not Herd. They also cited 182 Reddit threads, and our tool found Herd in none of them.
Split by who owns the page cited.
| Owner | Citations | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Herd's own site | 93 | 0.3% |
| Rival sites | 5,342 | 17.2% |
| Everyone else | 25,536 | 82.5% |
How often each is cited, and how early in the answer it lands.
| Page | Citations | Average position |
|---|---|---|
| /platform/security-awareness-training | 26 | 8.2 |
| /blog/soc-2-training-requirements | 12 | 8.7 |
| /solutions/enterprise | 11 | 12.4 |
| /solutions/mid-market | 8 | 9.8 |
| /compliance-for-smb | 7 | 10.3 |
| /platform/herd-ai | 7 | 6.4 |
| Home page | 7 | 7.6 |
| /pricing | 5 | 3.2 |
Of these, 2 sell security awareness training themselves.
| Site | Kind | Citations |
|---|---|---|
| nist.gov | Docs | 940 |
| microsoft.com | Vendor | 870 |
| cyberaware.com | Vendor | 518 |
| reddit.com | Platform | 510 |
| gartner.com | Analyst | 496 |
| g2.com | Reviews | 419 |
| youtube.com | Platform | 343 |
| linkedin.com | Platform | 341 |
Pages cited in the week that name tracked rivals and not Herd Security.
| Page | Rivals named | Cited |
|---|---|---|
| knowbe4.comBest Security Awareness Training Products | KnowBe4 | Hoxhunt, KnowBe4, Living Security, Mimecast | 129 |
| hoxhunt.com8 Best Security Awareness Training Platforms for Enterprise (2026) | Cofense, Hoxhunt, KnowBe4, Proofpoint | 121 |
| cipherssecurity.comBest Security Awareness Training Platforms 2026: 6 Compared | Cofense, Hoxhunt, KnowBe4, Mimecast, Proofpoint | 115 |
| ciopages.comBuyer's Guide: Security Awareness Training | CIOPages Buyer Guide | Cofense, Hoxhunt, KnowBe4, Living Security, Mimecast, Proofpoint | 112 |
| learn.g2.comI Evaluated G2's 7 Best Security Awareness Training Software | Hoxhunt, KnowBe4, Proofpoint | 95 |
| doozy.liveBest Security Awareness Training Platforms for 2026 (Compared) | Doozy | Hoxhunt, KnowBe4, Mimecast, Proofpoint | 94 |
“Best security awareness training for enterprises, what are you all actually running in 2026”
“Security awareness training for a very small company.”
Herd was named in 2 to 6 answers a day, between 0.5% and 1.0% of what the engines returned. That is too few to read a direction from: one answer more or fewer moves the line.
The last two days ran short. On 8 October three engines returned fewer answers than usual, and on 9 October only four of the seven returned any, so those days rest on 506 and 360 answers against 619 to 629 on the first six. Eight days gives a baseline. A direction takes a month of readings.
One scale per panel. The shaded days ran on fewer answers.
| Day | Answers naming Herd | Answers citing its site | Answers collected |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2 Oct | 0.64% | 0.95% | 629 |
| 3 Oct | 0.64% | 1.27% | 629 |
| 4 Oct | 0.48% | 1.27% | 628 |
| 5 Oct | 0.64% | 1.44% | 625 |
| 6 Oct | 0.96% | 1.28% | 626 |
| 7 Oct | 0.97% | 0.97% | 619 |
| 8 Oct | 0.59% | 2.17% | 506 |
| 9 Oct | 0.56% | 1.39% | 360 |
Each of these opens once the site is connected to our tool, which is our job in week one.
No work has started, and this is the shape it would take: twelve weeks, aimed at the 90 questions that leave Herd's name out. The first month connects what this read could not see and settles the facts the engines repeat. The next two publish against the questions Herd loses today and earn a place on the lists the engines read.
Two of those facts wait on Herd. The engines quote six different prices for it, from three sources, and cite a second website as its own in 124 answers. Until Herd confirms both, this page repeats neither.
The work is measured the way this page was: the same 100 questions, the same seven engines, the same ten rivals.
In the order it ships. Week twelve re-runs the whole set.
Each answer stands on its own, with the numbers and the dates it rests on, so it can be quoted without the charts. Every figure comes from the same read as the rest of the page.
Between 2 and 9 October 2026, seven AI engines answered 90 buyer questions about security awareness training that leave Herd's name out. They named Herd in 32 of 4,622 answers, on 7 of the 90 questions. On questions that name no vendor, Herd was named in 0.8% of answers, against 32.6% for KnowBe4.
On questions that name no vendor, KnowBe4 was named in 32.6% of answers, Proofpoint in 20.9% and Hoxhunt in 18.9%. Mimecast, Cofense and Adaptive Security followed at 5.7%, 5.6% and 4.3%. Herd Security was named in 0.8%.
Of the 32 answers that named Herd without being asked about it, 23 made it the top pick or recommended it in a short list, and none warned a buyer away. The questions where it is named most ask for flat-rate pricing, training inside Slack or Microsoft Teams, and training built from a company's own policies.
ChatGPT gave 22 of the 32 answers that named Herd. Google AI Mode gave 4, Google AI Overviews 3, Microsoft Copilot 2 and Gemini 1. Perplexity cited Herd's site in 11 answers without naming it, and Claude neither named nor cited it in 720.
0.5 out of 100, with a 95% range of 0.1 to 1.0. The Salienz Score grades every answer the way a buyer reads it, from 1.0 for a top pick down to 0.05 for a bare source link. On the same scale KnowBe4 scored 17.8 and Adaptive Security 3.3.
With our tracking tool, which asked 100 buyer questions every day for eight days on ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews, Google AI Mode and Microsoft Copilot, against ten fixed rivals. It read 5,132 answers and traced 34,471 citations. A brand counts as named only when the answer says it in its own sentences.
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An audit measures where you actually stand and names the work that would move it. Nothing moves on its own: the reading changes when the fixes ship. You get the baseline either way, whether or not it flatters anyone.