Why Original Data Is the Strongest Signal of Brand Authority in the AI Era

Most B2B brands are trying to sound original instead of publishing anything that actually is.

Meanwhile, Liz Reid, VP of Google Search, recently made it explicit: low-value, repetitive content now counts as spam. 

If your content doesn’t add new information, analysis, or perspective… It's noise and you may even get penalized. 

AI has made production effortless, but originality is what still gets rewarded.

And the most effective way to prove originality and authority is to publish something measurable: your own research, benchmarks, or proprietary insights.

It’s the kind of signal that still has to start with human insight.

Original Data Is What AI Can't Create

There's a concept from Stijn Hendrikse's book Syntropy that explains this perfectly.

AI creates entropy—it remixes existing patterns, churns out variations, generates noise at massive scale. It's built to amplify what's already been said.

Humans create syntropy—original observations, proprietary insights, signal that cuts through the noise.

AI can polish your grammar and optimize your headlines, but it can't create insights that don't exist in its training data yet.

Original data is information that only you can provide. It's the research you conduct, the patterns you observe in your product, the insights you gather directly from your market.

That could be:

• Anonymized product or platform data — Benchmark how your users perform compared to industry standards
• Market research surveys — Ask your ICP about their challenges, priorities, and behaviors
• Customer success data — Analyze outcomes across your customer base to quantify impact
• Dual-audience studies — Survey two related groups (buyers and their customers, managers and their teams) to surface misalignment
• Industry trend analysis — Study how your market is responding to regulatory changes, economic shifts, or emerging patterns

How B2B SaaS Brands Build Authority with Original Data

Original data powers two pillars of B2B growth: credibility and compounding visibility.

For Thought Leadership: You Become the Source

When you publish proprietary data, you stop echoing other people’s insights and start shaping the conversation yourself. That kind of credibility attracts media coverage, speaking opportunities, and strategic partnerships.

💡Example: Navattic and Chili Piper have been doing this since 2023 with their annual B2B Buyer First Report, analyzing top B2B SaaS companies to see if they follow buyer-first best practices. Three years in, they’ve not only built authority but co-owned the narrative. 

At Kalungi, we’ve seen the same impact through our own reports — 2023 B2B SaaS Benchmarks: The Ultimate Growth Report and 2025 B2B SaaS Benchmarks for Early Stage Companies.

Year-over-year data highlights progress, reveals trends, and keeps your brand at the center of the conversation shaping how B2B SaaS evolves.

For Organic Growth: You Create Assets That Compound

Every time someone cites your insights in an article, on LinkedIn, or in a conference deck, your authority grows. And that’s just the start — one research report can fuel months of content across every channel.

💡 Think about Dreamdata's LinkedIn Ads Benchmarks Report or Navattic's State of the Interactive Product Demo. These aren't just "content assets." They're industry references that keep driving traffic, mentions, and authority long after launch.

How One Research Report Fuels Months of GTM Momentum

Let’s take a research report as an example—most people underestimate how powerful one can be. It’s not just a PDF you gate on your website; it’s a content multiplier that fuels your GTM for months.

From one strategic research asset, you can create:

• Webinars discussing the results with customers and industry experts.
• Social content with data visualizations that stop the scroll and get saved and reshared.
• Video series unpacking key findings—perfect for YouTube, paid ads, and social distribution.
• Event decks where your team presents at conferences—opening doors to speaking opportunities and building authority from the stage.
• SEO blogs that keep ranking as others cite your data—turning one report into long-term organic traffic.

💡In the new SEO landscape, brand mentions are the new backlinks. When you publish original research, people cite you. They reference your data in their articles, in social forums like Reddit,  their presentations, their LinkedIn posts. That's the kind of authority Google is looking for.

• Lead magnets and email sequences built around your findings that convert because people want useful insights they can't get elsewhere.
• Sales one-pagers with benchmarks that work as conversation starters and open doors.
• PR pitches with newsworthy angles that journalists actually want to cover.

💡 Exit Five built an entire Salary Negotiation Guide to complement their salary benchmark data.

One asset. Endless opportunities. A content strategy that fuels your GTM for months and builds authority that compounds long after launch.

How Kalungi Ran a Benchmark Study That Built Market Authority for an HR Tech Brand

We recently worked with a leading HR Tech company selling to Fortune 500s. Their market was asking: What does best-in-class look like? How are other companies structuring these programs? Where are the gaps?

We designed a benchmark study surveying HR leaders at Fortune 500 companies—household names everyone knows. We asked how they're structuring programs, what governance looks like, how they measure impact, and where they're facing challenges.

The timing amplified everything. 2025 brought major regulatory and political shifts to their space. Everyone had opinions, but no one had data on how companies were actually responding. Our benchmark captured both the practices and the pressure.

We just launched it and it's now the only comprehensive benchmark on this topic during a critical industry moment.

Become the Brand Others Cite

Most companies either skip research because it's too complex, or they DIY it and end up with weak methodology that kills trust. 

If you want to do this well and fast, work with people who've done it before and have the frameworks to make it actually work.

At Kalungi, we've helped B2B SaaS companies design studies that tie directly to strategic narratives, and turn reports into months of category-defining content. We don't just execute research—we bring the strategic lens that makes it position you as the authority, not just another vendor with a PDF.

Book a call with Kalungi to discuss how we can help you build a research report that fuels your GTM strategy and positions you as the category authority.