According to expert analysis, Donald Trump lied an average of about 21 times a day during his presidency. 

Startling isn’t it? And with social media, this kind of disinformation can spread at the pace of a snotty cold at a toddler’s birthday party. 

What does all this have to do with PR practitioners? Most of us aren’t engaged in old school spin. Most of us are ethical. Most of us are in the business of telling the truth, not lies. 

But how many of us are inadvertently allowing misinformation to leak out into the world? It happens all too often.  

Recent examples include the Advertising Standards Authority cracking down on high-profile brands that overstate their environmental claims. Fashion brands (it always seems to be a fashion brand) campaigning on a platform of ethics and then being found to pay workers next to nothing. And don’t get me started on brands promising to plant trees for every purchase and equating that to carbon neutrality. I can’t get into tree planting here – we’d be here all week – but suffice to say, it is not that simple and any brand that believes otherwise is living in La La Land.   

For an industry obsessed by ethics, we rarely talk enough about our role in proactively tackling misinformation. 

So, as much as I hate to add to our collective professional anxiety and recurrent insomnia, our role in stemming the tide of misinformation is a conundrum that should keep PR practitioners up at night. 

As humans, we default to deeming others to be basically honest. That’s important for the functioning of society but the truth is that blind acceptance of what a client tells us results in bad, or at the very least misguided, PR. 

So what should we as PR professionals be doing to ensure that misinformation isn’t released into the world? 

Dive into the weeds 

When it comes to the climate in particular, navigating the science can be challenging. It’s our job to ensure that there is clarity and confidence behind every message being shared on behalf of clients, before it’s released to the public. Recently I spent a couple of hours pouring over documents and calculations from a client’s carbon footprint report and this is now part and parcel of our role as communicators. Obviously we can’t always do this alone. We have an environment expert on our Board and partnerships with organisations that measure environmental impact – we all need to consult the matter experts when  it matters.  

Get tough 

We are a client service business so the idea of asking the hard questions feels a little bit entitled but we need to get over it. If something doesn’t smell right, we have to ask the tough questions – whether that’s demanding (in a tactful way, naturally) the client’s diversity data or understanding much more about their supply chain and measurement criteria before we start going out with a carbon zero message. We’re accountable for the information we share so we have to push for greater transparency from brands – and this often means getting out of the marketing bubble and into HR, procurement, finance, but it has to be done.

Take the hit – either now or later 

It’s up to us who we represent. So ask yourself if putting out that story for that client is really worth it? Or if it’s better to have a tough conversation, and if necessary, walk away? Walking away from a big fat retainer has never been easy, but client comms are not just a risk to them but also to our industry and society at large. 

Misinformation isn’t always easy to spot and it’s not always intentional. But it is preventable if we’re willing to get into the details, demand transparency and take a stand for facts over  fiction. 

Sara Collinge 

Sara is the Managing Director of brand activism agency, Don’t Cry Wolf. The agency works with  businesses that have a role beyond profit, and can create positive change in the world by taking disruptive action on social, political or environmental issues.