Cooper
Index Update4 min read

1,370 More Verified Mentions Across Fewer Sources in This Week’s AI Software Index

This week maps 2,824 ranked products, 9,253 Sources and 39,211 Mentions, as the evidence corpus becomes denser and 25 Best leaders change.

What This Week Measures

This week's Cooper Index records recommendations from ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, and Perplexity across 80 business software categories. The August 24 to August 30 measurement window contains 2,824 distinct ranked products, 9,253 Sources and 39,211 Mentions under the aiq-v2 methodology.

The evidence corpus became denser rather than larger. Sources fell by 39 while Mentions increased by 1,370. Ranked products decreased by 91. That combination suggests more verified product references are being found across a slightly smaller set of cited pages, not that the assistants suddenly became more certain.

Four Questions, Four Different Jobs

Cooper asks Best, Most Affordable, Easiest to Set Up, and Rising separately in every category. AIQ runs from 1 to 100 inside one category and one question. It is not a global product score, and the four rankings are not blended into a public composite.

Best leadership changed in 25 categories. Most Affordable changed in 50, Easiest to Set Up in 57, and Rising in 47. 46 categories produce four different leaders, while 31 produce three. The practical implication is simple: a broad recommendation is only one version of the buying decision.

Agreement Has Limits

Among the 80 Best leaders, 56 appear in all 4 assistant lists, 14 appear in 3, 7 appear in 2, and 3 appear in only 1. 18 leaders hold #1 with every assistant. That is meaningful within a category; it does not make AIQ comparable across markets.

Eight Editorial Reads

Sales

Sales opens with a reminder that consensus and evidence volume are different readings. In Conversation Intelligence, Gong leads at Best AIQ 100, appears in 4 of 4 assistant lists, and stands 81 points ahead of third. Its 5 Sources and 5 Mentions document the trail around the result, not its cause.

Marketing

Marketing's most decisive Best signal this week comes from Product Analytics. Amplitude reaches Best AIQ 100 across 4 assistant lists, with a 75-point lead over third. The interesting question is whether channel specialists reclaim the shortlist when the buyer asks about cost, setup, or momentum.

Support

Support looks stable until the operating constraint changes. Zendesk leads Help Desk at Best AIQ 98; 4 assistants include it, and the podium spans 74 points. The hub report tests that broad recommendation against the products chosen for implementation and value.

HR

HR offers a strong Best reference point in Employer of Record (EOR), where Deel posts AIQ 98 and appears in 4 of 4 assistant lists. The 80-point advantage is substantial, but HR purchases still live or die on adoption, process fit, and time to value.

Finance

Finance rewards precision. SAP Concur leads Travel & Expense at Best AIQ 100, with 4-assistant breadth and a 76-point gap to third. Its evidence footprint, 18 Sources and 25 Mentions, is best treated as material for diligence rather than a shortcut to the buying decision.

Productivity

Productivity gives the broad recommendation a useful stress test. In Visual Collaboration (Whiteboards), Miro leads at Best AIQ 100 and appears in 4 assistant lists. A 68-point lead may settle the opening shortlist, but it cannot decide which product a team will actually adopt.

IT & Security

IT & Security combines one of the clearest category leads with the need for skepticism. CrowdStrike Falcon reaches Best AIQ 100 in Endpoint Security (EDR), spans 4 assistant lists, and leads third by 73 points. Security buyers still need the deployment and budget answers beside it.

Engineering

Engineering closes the overview with ecosystem gravity. Productboard leads Product Management at Best AIQ 100, appears across 4 assistant lists, and has a 76-point advantage over third. The hub analysis shows where that broad preference survives contact with setup, economics, and newer tools.

Read the Eight Category Reports

The overview stops at the market-level argument. Each report below covers all ten categories, the full Best Top 3, and the separate Most Affordable, Easiest to Set Up, and Rising answers.

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