Original research
Original research is data you collect and publish yourself, such as a survey or a study, that nobody else has.
Original research is data you gather and publish yourself: a survey of your customers, a study of prices in your market, a test you ran, a count nobody else has made. The point is that the numbers start with you.
That makes your page the place other people have to cite when they use them. Journalists, bloggers and list writers link to the source of a figure, and AI platforms read those pages. So a good piece of research can get you named in answers through pages you never wrote.
Why AI platforms pick it up
When a platform answers a question with a number in it, it looks for a page that states that number clearly. If your page is where the number came from, and other pages point back to you, you're the natural one to cite.
For example, say Kestrel Roasters surveys 1,200 of its customers and publishes "How the UK drinks coffee at home." A food magazine quotes the finding that most people now grind their own beans, and links to Kestrel. When someone later asks an AI platform how many people grind coffee at home, the answer may cite the magazine, Kestrel's own page, or both, and name Kestrel either way.
What makes research worth citing
- Ask a question people in your market actually ask
- Say how you got the numbers: who you asked, how many, and when
- Put the main findings near the top, in plain sentences that can be quoted alone
- Give it a date, and update it every year so it doesn't go stale
Small and honest beats big and vague. A clear finding from 300 customers is more useful than a glossy report with no method.
In AnswerOrbit
Once your research is out, watch who uses it. Sources shows which pages the platforms read for your prompts. You can star your research page to follow it, and use Before and after a date in Recommendations to compare your numbers before and after the day you published.