A 'SmartScore' from a desk review, on a site the ranked vendors pay for leads.
What it's really for A vendor-funded software directory; placement and 'featured' slots are paid.
What our grade covers The grade on this page is about its 'SmartScore' B2B software rankings, not everything the site does.
High Scoring Confidence Checked against primary sources. We are confident in the facts and the grade here.
By its own admission the parties it ranks are the ones who pay it: FinancesOnline states it stays free because "some of the vendors... are willing to pay us for traffic and sales opportunities," and it runs paid lead-generation for software clients including Oracle, Salesforce, and HubSpot, with paying vendors getting "featured" placement (it claims non-payers can also rank, but provides no independent verification that payment is decoupled from position).
Source →- Operating since
- 2012 (14 years) · source
- What it costs you
- Free to read The reviews are free to read.
- How they make money
- It is a vendor-funded B2B software directory that makes money by selling traffic, paid/featured listings, and lead-generation to the software vendors it reviews.
- What they do
- It publishes scored rankings, comparisons, and "SmartScore" ratings of business/SaaS software (plus some personal-finance products) based on its analysts' feature reviews and aggregated web sentiment.
- What to watch for
- The "SmartScore" comes from a desk review of vendor-described features, not independent hands-on testing, and the vendors being ranked pay the site for traffic and leads — so a high score is not proof a product was independently verified or is unbiased toward paying clients.
- Composite score
- 1.70 / 5.00 → grade D+
How the grade was reached
Does the site take money from the very entities it ranks? Pay-for-placement, vendor-funded data, and affiliate commissions all pull this down. The less the ranking can be bought, the higher the score.
What is the ranking actually built on? Hands-on testing scores highest, then verified first-hand reviews, then opinion or popularity surveys and self-reported figures, then pay-to-rank, which scores lowest.
Is the methodology published, specific, and reproducible? Can a reader see how a given rank was reached, or is it a black box?
Are commercial relationships, sponsorships, and affiliate arrangements disclosed clearly and near the rankings themselves, rather than buried?
How hard is it to game? Controls against fake reviews, solicited reviews, and vendor gaming raise this; an open box anyone can stuff lowers it.
Evidence
- FinancesOnline's own disclosure: "We are able to keep our service free of charge thanks to cooperation with some of the vendors, who are willing to pay us for traffic and sales opportunities provided by our website," adding that it "lists all vendors" and claims "all software providers have an equal opportunity to get featured in our rankings." This confirms a vendor-paid model and that paying vendors are explicitly tied to being featured. Source: FinancesOnline scoring methodology / funding disclosure →
- The SmartScore (1-10) is built from a weighted desk analysis of vendor features (main functionalities 20%, collaboration 15%, customization 15%, integrations 10%, ease of use 10%, support 5%, security 5%, mobility 5%, general impression 5%) prepared by FinancesOnline's analysts, with a separate 'Customer Satisfaction Algorithm' aggregating sentiment from social media, blogs and review sites. It is analyst opinion plus scraped sentiment, not hands-on testing or verified first-hand reviews. Source: FinancesOnline scoring methodology page →
- Third-party financial profile: FinancesOnline reported ~$3.4M revenue (2024), founded 2012 by CEO Sebastian Lambert, bootstrapped with $0 outside funding, and operates 'B2B Lead Generation Services' for 300+ clients including Oracle, Salesforce and HubSpot — i.e., it is paid by the same software vendors it ranks. Source: GetLatka company profile for FinancesOnline →