Sample brief Send three buyer questions

HR and payroll software

Buyers choosing a payroll tool ask an AI too.

We ask the 50 questions they would ask, every week, and hand you one page to fix on Monday.

Send three buyer questions Read the sample brief

HR and payroll software

What payroll software fits a 75 person US team?

OpenAI

Here are five payroll tools teams of about 75 tend to use.

  1. 1 Competitor A US payroll, 50 to 250 employees Linked its site
  2. 2 Competitor B Setup help included Linked its site
  3. 3 Competitor C Flat monthly price per employee Named only
  4. 4 Competitor D Payroll plus benefits in one Linked its site
  5. 5 Competitor E Multi-state tax filing Named only
  6. ?Your companyNot mentioned

Google Gemini

For a US team that size, these come up most.

  1. 1 Competitor F Payroll and time tracking together Linked its site
  2. 2 Competitor A US payroll, 50 to 250 employees Linked its site
  3. 3 Competitor G Benefits administration included Named only
  4. 4 Competitor D Payroll plus benefits in one Named only
  5. 5 Competitor H Files in all 50 states Linked its site
  6. ?Your companyNot mentioned

Perplexity

At 75 people these are the ones that fit.

  1. 1 Competitor A 50 to 250 employees, US Linked its site
  2. 2 Competitor H Files in all 50 states Linked its site
  3. 3 Competitor B Setup help included Named only
  4. 4 Competitor G Benefits administration Named only
  5. 5 Competitor C Flat price per employee Linked its site
  6. ?Your companyNot mentioned
Each service listed five companies and stopped there. Switch them to see the lists differ. Example answer

Questions we'd ask

Ten of the fifty, written for this industry.

Six ask what to use and four ask about you by name. The real 50 are settled with your team on the first 30-minute call.

  1. 01What's a good payroll tool for a 75 person US team?
  2. 02Recommend a payroll tool under $12 per employee a month.
  3. 03Payroll takes two days a month and we file in four states. What do people do about this?
  4. 04What are some alternatives to Competitor A?
  5. 05Do I really need a payroll tool for a 75 person US team?
  6. 06What should I look for in a payroll tool?
  7. 07What does your company do?
  8. 08How much does your company cost per month?
  9. 09Does your company work for a 75 person US team?
  10. 10How is your company different from Competitor A?

What answers look like

Named, linked, or left out.

  • Five companies, one answer. A buying question usually comes back with a handful of names and nothing else.
  • A link is not a mention. Some answers name a company and stop. Some also link its site. We count those separately.
  • The sixth line is empty. When you are not in the answer, there is nothing to click and nothing to compare.

Pages a Monday brief might name

Usually a page that never states a fact the buyer asked for.

  • The product page
  • The pricing page
  • The comparison page
  • The onboarding page

A missing mention alone is never the reason. We read the live page first.

FwdLink Week 3 · Monday Awaiting approval Example

One page to fix

Page
Evidence
The fix
Owner
Due
Second count

Your team approves it and publishes it.

The brief, blank

Six fields, every Monday.

A filled-in example is on the sample brief page, with the answers and the fix in place.

Read the sample brief →

How a pilot starts

Here's how the first month goes.

  1. Week 1

    Before you pay: agree the 50 questions

    We settle the 50 questions and the five competitors with your team on a 30-minute call, starting from the draft we built from the questions you sent. They go into an order with the date of everything below. Week 1 is not billed.

  2. Week 2

    First 450 answers

    All three services get the questions for the first time. You see where you're named and where you're missing.

  3. Week 3

    First brief, first fix

    One page to fix lands on Monday. Your team reviews it and publishes, and we're on the weekly call if anything gets stuck.

  4. Week 4

    We ask again

    We confirm the page is live and run all 450 again. What moved and what didn’t goes in the report.

Week 1 is not billed. The questions and every date above are settled first, and your first charge lands when collection starts in week 2, so the 14-day refund window opens a week before your first brief rather than closing before it.

$990 a month. Billed monthly, cancel whenever you like. If you cancel within 14 days of the first payment, we refund that payment.

Send three buyer questions

Questions

Asked by teams in this industry.

FwdLink's own count, September 2026. All 50 companies were HR software vendors. We have not yet run the same study in other industries. In that count, 13.6% of answers named the company and 7.7% linked its own site.

How we measure → Glossary →

Is this the industry you counted?

Yes. The study on our research page looked at 50 HR software vendors. It was a count of the market, not a result from this service.

We sell to HR and to finance. Which buyer do the questions follow?

Pick one on the first call. Fifty questions go further when they follow one buyer.

Can you track the big platforms as competitors?

You name five companies, and they can be any size.

Who publishes the change?

Your team. We check the page once it is live and count again on the agreed date.

Start with three questions

Send three questions your buyers would type into an AI.
We run them and send back what each service answered. If it is not a fit, we will say so.

Send three buyer questions

It costs nothing, and you can take your time deciding afterward.