Commercial Cleaning Services: AI Market Discovery Index

Benchmark Summary

Jan-Pro led the Commercial Cleaning Services benchmark in August 2026 with a valid recommendation coverage of 54.7%, down from 57.2% in July 2026. The gap to the next brand, Stratus Building Solutions, widened to 21.6 points, with Stratus at 33.1% in August 2026, down from 38.8% in July 2026.

The largest coverage increase came from City Wide Facility Solutions, which rose to 10.7% in August 2026 from 4.6% in July 2026. The largest coverage decline was ServiceMaster Clean, which fell to 22.7% in August 2026 from 31.3% in July 2026.

This was a month of significant movement, with four brands declining beyond normal month-to-month variation and one brand rising beyond it. The benchmark produced 384 qualified observations in August 2026, up from 348 in July 2026.

Current Benchmark at a Glance

Qualified surface breadth refers to the number of canonical AI surface families with at least one qualified observation. The six families are ChatGPT, Copilot, Gemini, Perplexity, AI Overviews, and AI Mode.

For the strategic interpretation of this benchmark, read CiteWorks Studio's analysis of How AI Search Is Recommending Commercial Cleaning Services

Current Brand Standings

This table is the primary current-month benchmark view.

How to Read the Standings

• Presence rate: share of qualified observations where the brand is mentioned at all.
• Valid recommendation coverage: share of qualified observations where the brand appears in a valid recommendation shortlist.
• Top-three rate: share of qualified observations where the brand appears among the top three recommended options.
• Rank-one rate: share of qualified observations where the brand is the first recommended option.
• Net sentiment: share of positive mentions minus negative mentions, relative to all mentions.

For formulas and denominator rules, see AI Market Discovery Metric Definitions.

Recommendation Coverage Movement

Largest Increase: City Wide Facility Solutions

City Wide Facility Solutions rose to 10.7% valid recommendation coverage in August 2026 from 4.6% in July 2026, on 41 valid recommendation observations. The brand's presence rate also climbed to 11.7% in August 2026 from 4.9% in July 2026, and its top-three rate rose to 7.5% from 2.3%. This movement went beyond normal month-to-month variation.

Largest Decline: ServiceMaster Clean

ServiceMaster Clean fell to 22.7% valid recommendation coverage in August 2026 from 31.3% in July 2026, on 87 valid recommendation observations. The brand's presence rate dropped to 35.9% in August 2026 from 44.8% in July 2026. This movement went beyond normal month-to-month variation.

Other Significant Declines

Three additional brands also declined beyond normal month-to-month variation. Anago Cleaning Systems fell to 17.7% in August 2026 from 23.8% in July 2026. Coverall fell to 17.2% in August 2026 from 23.8% in July 2026. Vanguard Cleaning Systems fell to 18.0% in August 2026 from 24.1% in July 2026.

Category Leader: Jan-Pro

Jan-Pro remained the category leader in August 2026, though its valid recommendation coverage declined 2.5 points from 57.2% in July 2026 to 54.7% in August 2026, a move within normal month-to-month variation. Its rank-one rate actually rose to 27.9% in August 2026 from 27.0% in July 2026.

Recommendation Placement Snapshot

Coverage alone does not show how prominently a brand is recommended. Among the leading brands, placement patterns differ.

Close coverage levels can still hide different first-position rates. Jan-Pro's 46.1% top-three rate in August 2026 sits alongside a 27.9% rank-one rate, while Jani-King's 25.3% top-three rate sits alongside a 6.5% rank-one rate.

Buyer-Intent Distribution

All qualified observations in August 2026 fell into the Brand Recommendation class, which represents direct requests for provider suggestions.

The current public series measures Brand Recommendation discovery and does not yet contain qualified observations in the Pricing & Value or Multi-Brand Comparison classes.

Historical Measurement Record

This is an evergreen benchmark URL. New measurements are added to the same report.

Evidence and Source Layer

The benchmark is built from prompt-level observations that retain the query, AI/search surface, answer, brand outcome, recommendation placement, sentiment, and where exposed, citations or attributable evidence sources. Source presence is evidence about the information environment. It is not automatically proof that the source caused the recommendation.

Scope Boundaries

This public benchmark does not measure market share, attributable sales, every possible AI response, organic-search ranking, social mention volume, or private/sponsored channels. A metric movement alone does not establish causality.

About This Benchmark

The LLM Authority Index AI Market Discovery Index tracks how often brands appear and are recommended across major AI search and assistant surfaces. Each month, the benchmark runs a standardized set of prompts across six canonical AI surface families and records whether and how each tracked brand is mentioned, recommended, and ranked.

• AI Market Discovery Methodology
• AI Market Discovery Metric Definitions
• AI Market Discovery Research Standards
• Modeled AI Authority Value

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