"Fight Fake News, Protect Your Brand: Lessons from an AI Experiment" with Jack Brewster (#86)

It can cost bad actors less than $150 to create a fake (or "pink slime") news site and mess with your company's brand. We're deep into the USA election season, and we're watching this train wreck unfold.

Don't let misinformation ruin your hard-earned reputation. Listen to this episode, where we welcome Jack Brewster of NewsGuard. They are committed to providing transparent tools to counter fake news for marketers, leaders, and democracies.

Summary:

Here's what you can do to protect your brand:

1. Practice "pre-bunking" across the company. Jack recommends that "readers should be informed about sources that often share misinformation so they can critically evaluate the information they encounter."

2. Before you take the content seriously, copy the story into Google. See the source. Are they a Tier 1, credible site?

3. Embrace a healthy media diet. Cut your social media consumption by just five minutes a day (please avoid using Facebook, Instagram, and X as your "go-to" news feeds). Divert that energy to Tier 1 sources.

4. Refine your critical thinking skills. A lot of my CEO and CMO clients have young, inexperienced team members running their content and communications strategies. It's incumbent on their leaders to help them build critical thinking and strategic muscles. Invest in courses, such as "Developing Critical Thinking Skills" by my fellow LinkedIn Learning instructor Becki Salzman.

5. When using generative AI tools to brainstorm or summarize, ask the tool for exact sources and the URL to that source. Then test that URL. Some will not work!

Show Links:

Follow Jack Brewster's work, and subscribe to NewsGuard's free "Reality Check" e-news:https://www.newsguardtech.com/about/
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