Don't Ask Claude to Write Your Wikipedia Strategy
Wikipedia has an outsized digital presence that displaces other search results and disproportionately influences LLMs. That means that if your brand, business, or CEO has a Wikipedia article, then that article is:
Surfacing as a top organic search result, and
Informing AI answers and search summaries.
New research continues to show just how much ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini are pulling from
the encyclopedia. It's not surprising, then, that so many organizations are incorporating Wikipedia into their SEO and GEO strategies.
Given the uncertainty about exactly how Wikipedia is influencing LLMs and what you can do about it, you might be tempted to ask AI for suggestions on how you can optimize articles to reflect better on your brand or organization. After all, who would know AI strategies better than AI itself? Well, with all due respect to our artificial overlords, it turns out that AI isn't necessarily the best authority on Wikipedia. Here's why:
First, AI doesn't know your strategy or goals.
Sure, you can prompt an LLM to "optimize this Wikipedia article for AI search," and it will spit out some ideas. However, the LLM has no context for how your company or executive wants to appear in search results or AI summaries, what messaging is most important to you, or which details do (or don't) matter when it comes to your strategic goals.
Claude or ChatGPT's strategy might have you arguing for changes to Wikipedia that you don't actually care about or especially need to make. You could waste valuable time and resources going back and forth with editors about updates and details that don't achieve any of your key goals.
Second, AI may not even know much about your company.
Depending on how established and well-known your company is, or what kind of media coverage your company's CEO has earned, LLMs may be drawing on limited and/or outdated information when generating their recommendations. Keep in mind, too, that many LLMs "hallucinate" (make up) information to respond to a prompt—especially if there isn't adequate information in their training data to provide an accurate answer to your question or request.
These hallucinations are a major reason why the Wikipedia editor community has recently banned the use of AI to generate article content. In Wikipedia editors' experience, LLMs often make claims that are not supported by the sources they cite, and may even manufacture sources to back up claims for which supporting secondary sources do not exist.
Third, and most significantly, AI doesn't know the nuances of how changes are actually made on Wikipedia.
LLMs may have a decent understanding of Wikipedia's criteria for sourcing, conflict of interest editing policies, and other guidelines as documented on the site. What they often get wrong, however, is how editors actually apply these guidelines in practice.
AI-generated Wikipedia strategies often appear credible by heavily citing Wikipedia guidelines and supporting references in their reports. A closer look, however, often reveals a myriad of problems that would come to light as soon as a human Wikipedia editor becomes involved.
Time and again, our team at Lumino has seen AI-generated Wikipedia assessments that claim a company or executive is eligible for an article (when they're clearly not) and AI-generated drafts that:
Make factual claims that are not supported by the source(s) cited
Draw inferences from sources, which Wikipedia editors do not allow
Invent URLs to sources that do not exist
Propose wording that would be considered promotional or otherwise not meet the site's editorial guidelines
Each of these transgressions will draw the suspicion (and even ire) of Wikipedia editors, who carefully review proposed content against sources cited and the site's content guidelines.
How to create an effective Wikipedia strategy
The best Wikipedia strategies start not with an LLM audit, but with you: your own knowledge of your team's priorities and goals and your knowledge of your brand, company, or executive team. Knowledge of how to navigate Wikipedia is another crucial component, and one that partners like Lumino can help you with. While AI tools may help you brainstorm ideas or do preliminary research, there is no substitute for your own thinking and experience when it comes to defining your goals for Wikipedia.
We know that engaging on Wikipedia can be intimidating if you have limited experience with the site and its complex set of guidelines. Lumino's team of Wikipedia experts is here to help you craft a Wikipedia strategy that is both aligned with your team's goals and which aligns with the expectations and norms of the Wikipedia editor community today.
Want to learn more about how we help top brands and executives strategize for Wikipedia? Send us a note at shout@luminodigital.com.