Mass Communication Expert: Influencers Should Be Careful In Reviewing Products

Illustration. (Photo: Unsplash)

JAKARTA - Richard Lee is a beauty doctor who has often shared educational content on his personal YouTube, Instagram and TikTok channels since 2014. However, the owner of the Athens Beauty Clinic has also not escaped a row of controversies in reviewing products to being involved in feuds with celebrities and business competitors.

Responding to this, Strategic Communication Mass Expert Tuhu Nugraha also asked influencers to be more careful in giving statements and creating content on social media.

Tuhu also asked influencers to be more careful in giving statements about a product that is not from their expertise.

"I don't think this is a competence and place, they also need to be careful to make statements that are not their area of expertise," said Tuhu in his statement on Thursday, June 20.

Because according to him, if the statement is wrong, it will make perceptions in the public so that their reputation is damaged. Therefore, Tuhu urged influencers to ensure their authenticity to verify the data before submitting it to the public.

"There must be a verification process and checking the authenticity of the data before submitting it to the public. In addition, the public can also demand that influencers present original data that has been verified. Because once damaged, it takes time to recover, and costs are not cheap. Meanwhile, the competition for influencers is currently very tight," he said.

In addition, according to him, the problem is becoming interesting, so there needs to be content creators and influencers. Tuhu also agreed, if the Supervisory Board was formed to monitor influencers.

"Because of its impact on society, and it can even have material and reputation impacts. Meanwhile, on the side of the competency influencer, the competence is very diverse, but the audience cannot distinguish that, and the impact can be very heavy," he said.

For this reason, Tuhu also asked the public to be more critical when getting information or statements out of an influencer, whether an expert in their field or not.

"Rethinking whether he is an expert in his field? What about the opinions of other experts and other sources? Consumers can compare from search engines, authorities or AI," said Tuhu.

"I always apply zero trust info on the internet, especially crucial issues. I will check further information from various sources, especially now that there is deepfake AI technology," he said.