Surety Bonds: AI Visibility Market Discovery Index

Benchmark Summary

Travelers leads the Surety Bonds benchmark in October 2026 with 55.8% valid recommendation coverage, ahead of The Hartford at 51.7%, a gap of 4.1 points. CNA posted the largest coverage decline this period, moving from 25.1% in July 2026 to 17.2% in October 2026, while Travelers registered the largest coverage increase across the same span, rising from 51.7% to 55.8%. No brand recorded a coverage increase beyond normal month-to-month variation across the full series.

The month-over-month picture is quieter than the series trend. CNA edged up 0.8 points from September 2026 to October 2026, and no brand's October move exceeded normal variation except Merchants Bonding Company, which rose 3.5 points from 1.1% in September 2026 to 4.6% in October 2026, its first upward movement in the series. Across the full July-to-October span, The Hartford and Travelers held the two leading positions, with The Hartford moving from 52.0% to 51.7% and Travelers from 51.7% to 55.8%.

The benchmark began with 800 prompt-surface observations in each month and produced 174 qualified observations in October 2026.

Current Benchmark at a Glance

The August 2026 and September 2026 measurements registered 152 and 189 qualified observations respectively, between the July and October totals. Qualified surface breadth counts the canonical AI/search 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 Surety Bonds

Research Scope and Qualification

Questions This Section Answers

• What was measured to produce the public surety bond benchmark?
• Why is the qualified observation count so much smaller than the raw prompt-surfaces collected?

The public benchmark is narrower than the raw collection universe by design. Brand-level percentages use the qualified observations as the public denominator, not the raw collection.

For the full research process, see AI Visibility Market Discovery Methodology.

Current Brand Standings

Questions This Section Answers

• Which surety bond brands lead on presence and valid recommendation coverage?
• How do top-three and rank-one rates differ from overall coverage among the leading brands?

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 is recommended in a way that qualifies as a valid recommendation.
• Top-three rate: share of qualified observations where the brand appears in the top three recommendations.
• Rank-one rate: share of qualified observations where the brand is the first recommendation.
• Net sentiment: positive mentions minus negative mentions divided by total mentions; ranges from -1 to 1.

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

Recommendation Coverage Movement

Questions This Section Answers

• Which surety bond brands lost or gained recommendation coverage since July 2026?
• What happened to CNA's recommendation coverage over the series?

CNA Surety appeared in the August 2026 tracking data with 16.4% valid recommendation coverage but was not present as a separate tracked entity in the July, September, or October 2026 brand sets.

Largest Decline: CNA

CNA's valid recommendation coverage fell from 25.1% in July 2026 to 17.2% in October 2026, a movement beyond normal variation across the series. Presence rate also declined beyond normal variation over the same span, from 43.2% in July 2026 to 29.3% in October 2026. The series shows CNA's coverage falling to 0.0% in August 2026 before recovering to 16.4% in September and 17.2% in October, a two-month upward streak that is within normal month-to-month variation.

Category Leader: Travelers

Travelers holds the highest valid recommendation coverage at 55.8% in October 2026, up from 51.7% in July 2026, a movement within normal variation and the largest baseline-to-current gain among tracked brands. Travelers also posted the highest presence rate at 83.9% in October 2026. The Hartford leads on rank-one rate at 21.8% against Travelers' 4.0%.

Recommendation Placement Snapshot

Questions This Section Answers

• How do the leading surety bond brands compare on first-position versus top-three placement?
• Where does The Hartford's rank-one rate stand against Travelers' despite Travelers leading on coverage?

Coverage alone does not show how prominently a brand is recommended. The table below shows the leading brands by valid recommendation coverage.

Close coverage can still hide very different first-position rates: The Hartford trails Travelers on coverage by 4.1 points in October 2026, yet The Hartford leads on rank-one rate at 21.8% versus 4.0%.

Buyer-Intent Distribution

Questions This Section Answers

• What types of buyer-intent questions are actually represented in this surety bond measurement?
• Are pricing and multi-brand comparison questions captured in the current public series?

All qualified observations in both months fell into the Brand Recommendation class.

The current public series measures brand recommendation discovery and does not yet contain qualified observations in the pricing and value or multi-brand comparison classes.

Historical Measurement Record

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, private or sponsored channels, or causality from a metric movement alone.

Top 10 Cited Domains

Questions This Section Answers

• Which domains are cited most often across AI platform answers about surety bonds?
• What kinds of sources dominate the surety bond citations observed in this period?

Across all AI platform responses in this measurement period, 6,969 citations were observed across 1,381 unique domains.

Citation share is broadly distributed across the top 10, which together account for roughly one quarter of observed citations, with no single domain exceeding 4.4%. The Hartford's own domain, thehartford.com, is the only tracked brand site in the top 10 and the third most-cited domain overall, cited across all six canonical surface families. The remaining sources skew toward financial comparison and insurance review publishers such as nerdwallet.com, moneygeek.com, and insurance.com, alongside general platforms like google.com and youtube.com.

About This Benchmark

The LLM Authority Index AI Visibility Market Discovery Index tracks how AI and search surfaces discover, mention, and recommend brands across industries. Each monthly measurement reflects a qualified set of prompt-level observations across six canonical AI/search surface families. Canonical research links:

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

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