In my experience, a well maintained vehicle that gets a sealant every wash or 2 = pro ceramic
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Nerd points:
a) No, I'm not saying a water-based sealant = resin-based ceramic in terms of long-term durability
b) No, I'm not saying an uncorrected car will look = to a corrected car *under close inspection*
Rather, in both cases, I'm saying most all people can't tell the difference so
the value in pro ceramics for most is generally knowing you have it vs seeing you have it
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In general there are 3 conditions to manage:
(1.) Normal dirt & dust
(2.) Road film
(3.) Rock chips not large enough for comp insurance, but big enough to bother you
The first is manageable with good routine wash technique, the 3rd with PPF if you get a lot of that. (In MN I did, in CA I don't, so I don't have PPF)
It's #2 that gets most people; Road Film comes from driving on wet roads and having your car get splashed with everything that leaks from ICE vehicles: oil, transmission fluid, coolant, etc + dirt, salt, other chemicals. The challenge is, the Road Film adheres to your paint and then dirt adheres to that. And PPF, ceramic, don't matter - Road Film attaches to them all.
Then you'll see people with $10k worth of PPF & ceramic foam cannon & 2-bucket the Road Film, clean off the dirt and think it's gone ... only suddenly they start noticing dust sticks to their car like glue so ceramic sucks!
Actually what's happened is, the wash (probably with pH neutral soap) abrated out the dirt particles suspended in the Road Film, but because the film is oily and pH neutral soap doesn't scare Road Film, the oil just got pushed around but it's still there.
The only way to remove Road Film is with a degreaser. It can be an all purpose cleaner (APC) like super clean or purple power or whatever (I like Superior Products' Road Warrior which is available at O'Reilly's, and Fire Power is great for wheels/tires when a stronger cleaner isn't needed - both are cheap as chips by the gallon).
Pointing this out just to say, if you've got Road Film type grime you'll have to shift techniques: e.g., An initial spray down (ideally w/ de-i water), then the APC spray & dwell, then a wash, then an assess. If you still get dirt coming up from a white MF w/ RW on it, then you'll have to do another round. And again, this would be whether you have ceramic or not. Once it's clean, then you'd spray-seal if that's your custom.
And then there's drying -
if your wash process involves a towel dry you'll want a drying aide, i.e., something to provide lubrication so you don't scratch your paint while drying. This is the place most micro-marring comes from: people had a nice lubricated soapy wash, but not all the dirt was captured & now they're dragging a dry rag over their paint, pulling up dirt, but there's no lubrication so they scratch the paint.
So, blahblahblah, what's the easy path for maintenance washes? 
Well, for me, it's a modified combo of everything:
(1.) Pre-power spray down with de-i water
(2.) Pre-spray the target wash panel with McKee's RW 2x strength
(3.) 1/4 MF max per panel, top-to-bottom, L to R; x# of passes until clean
(4.) Spray a wet-use sealant as the drying aide & buff dry
(5.) If there's bugs, tar, etc I spot treat it at this point with a bug sponge and/or citrol
If there's tons of road grime then depending on how well the pre-spray works I'll add a spray down of Road Warrior (they have stronger ones like Dark Fury but use with caution & their Fire Power is a great APC)
The general steps are:
* Wheels & tires, more/less same as below except Fire Power first and if that doesn't work, P&S Brake Buster
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* Pre-rinse & assess
* "chemical" wash (can be spraying on rinseless wash or road warrior or both)
* Contact wash (I use rinseless wash + 1/4 or 1/8 MF / panel)
* Drying aide / sealant
* Spot clean any tricky spots
I've adapted my home process to be mostly the same as
my on-the-road process to keep things easy.
I can do the whole vehicle in ~20min not incl wheels/tires which take another 20 to do well, but usually they spray off so I only do that every month or 2. I like spray sealants that can put on anything because they're fast, easy, & fool-proof and I've integrated them into my process so they don't add any additional time.
Is pro ceramic more durable? Yes. Do you care? I don't, because I seal just about every wash and I don't like the inflexibility of it, not to mention the time & special needs of it. Juice isn't worth the squeeze IMO (though, to be fair, there are some intermediate SiO2s I'm tempted by)
As for The Last Coat, I don't have any direct experience, but it hasn't tested well from what I've seen ... Ethos Resist and TW Seal & Shine seem to sit on top for durability but S&S can be a little streaky so Flex Wax works for me just because it requires nothing special and I can use it every wash.