Money Matters Episode 309: Combating Election Year Disinformation: Goodspero's Innovative Strategies

Nelson Vanegas & Jessica Bolaños: Money Matters Podcast Interview

February 20, 2024 . 10:55 AM . ID: 558678077

Transcript

00:01 - 00:03
[speaker unknown]
This conference will now be recorded.

00:04 - 00:13
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Welcome to the Money Matters podcast, where finance meets real life, and we dive into the strategies that help you lead a financially savvy lifestyle.

00:13 - 00:22
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
I'm Christian instantly, and for nearly a decade, we've been the go to resource for Houstonians and beyond looking to make sense of their dollars and cents.

00:22 - 00:31
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Today's episode is a special one where we explore the intersection of digital content creation, social impact in digital misinformation, especially during the election.

00:31 - 00:35
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
You're joining us are Jessica Bolanos, Ines, Nelson, von ...

00:35 - 00:38
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Nelson, I'm sorry, I'm probably slot, the last name there.

00:38 - 00:54
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
You guys will tell me that in just a second here, the dynamic duo behind Good, Sparrow, they've harness the power of storytelling to not only captivate the audience, but also to drive meaningful change into the digital world as we navigate through the complexities of finance, digital, misinformation.

00:54 - 01:09
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
And the social economy, Jessica Nelson, will share insights from their journey, revealing how they're leveraging their platform to educate and inspire action in an era where truth and transparency are more valuable than ever.

01:10 - 01:12
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Both of you, Thank you so much for being on the show.

01:12 - 01:13
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Welcome to the show today.

01:15 - 01:15
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Thank you.

01:15 - 01:16
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Chris.

01:16 - 01:24
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
And Jessica Nelson, Now, you guys, this is one of the special episodes that I'm having where I'm having a alumni guests on there.

01:24 - 01:27
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
So I was you were on my to-do list already.

01:27 - 01:33
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
I was gonna reach out to you and contact you, but I follow you guys on LinkedIn.

01:33 - 01:40
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
And you posted something very recently about digital misinformation that I read it.

01:40 - 01:41
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
It was very good.

01:41 - 01:52
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Listeners who, you know, who aren't following you, the stuff that you guys are putting on LinkedIn, is really, really good stuff, and so that I thought that would be a good reason for us to revisit.

01:52 - 01:59
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
But for listeners who don't know, I looked back at the original episode that you were on.

01:59 - 02:01
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
And for some reason it was 10.5.

02:01 - 02:03
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
I don't even know what the zero point five watts.

02:03 - 02:05
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
That's how it was over 10 years ago.

02:05 - 02:15
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
And for some reason, I put, like 10.5, so you guys were on one of the, the, you know, the first few shows that we had, where you come, where we were live on K, P of T, you came into the studio.

02:16 - 02:27
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
And so, so, that's, that's where, and I don't even know if you remember this, but you guys invited me to a crowd sourcing talk as well, where Angela Blanchard was the year.

02:27 - 02:34
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
And that was my first introduction to Angela, who I also follow on social media, and is a fantastic writer.

02:35 - 02:39
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
And so I wanted to thank you, guys for making that introduction as well.

02:39 - 02:46
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
But tell us a little bit about Good Sparrow, and give us kind of an update what's been going on for the last 10 years.

02:48 - 02:49
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Yeah.

02:49 - 02:51
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So yeah, it's been a long time.

02:51 - 02:55
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
You actually caught us, right when we're relaunching good sparrow's.

02:55 - 02:59
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So we just celebrating our 10 year anniversary actually this month.

03:00 - 03:01
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Nice, good to.

03:01 - 03:02
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Be back.

03:02 - 03:03
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And yeah.

03:03 - 03:09
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So we've been using tech, though, like whatever the latest tech is back.

03:09 - 03:15
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Then, like you said, it was crowdfunding, but we've always been into what's happening now.

03:16 - 03:33
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Social media wise, digital tools, video, you know are our superpower is video storytelling, but, so we've always been into the latest stuff and not just using it, but teaching others, teaching communities like the session you attended 10 years ago.

03:34 - 03:37
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
I was at platform Houston when that was around in rice village.

03:37 - 03:40
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
But, yeah, it was always host things for the community.

03:40 - 03:49
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
But then, we also would go into organizations like Baker Ripley were Angela Blanchard, was and teach their teams how to do the same things that we're doing.

03:51 - 03:53
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
On the executive level.

03:53 - 03:55
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Are beginners, intermediate, advanced.

03:55 - 03:59
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Wherever people are, we just kinda teach them how to use those tools.

03:59 - 04:08
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And we're still doing that today, You know, 10 years ago, it was cut funding, but now, it's all this AI stuff, which is why we've been writing about it.

04:10 - 04:18
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Love it, I love it now definitely caught my attention because we know that's a big topic that I've been, you know, dive in my feed into lightly, AI.

04:18 - 04:25
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
So, I think everybody is, is, you know, interesting that that's a fantastic topic, but yeah, what's crowd crowdsourcing back?

04:26 - 04:44
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
And so the, you know, technology we've pivoted and we've, we've changed throughout their, maybe talk a little bit about that, some of the advancements in technology and how it's impacted the fight against what you call digital information in that article that you published on LinkedIn?

04:46 - 04:49
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Yeah, so, things have changed a lot.

04:49 - 04:55
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So social media has always been here, you know, even 10 years ago, but it wasn't, you know?

04:56 - 04:57
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
It wasn't being used.

04:57 - 05:16
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So, politically, And we people weren't aware of it, You know, we, we've always been influenced by what's in our feeds, but now we kind of understand more of, like, how the algorithms are affecting us as, like, echo chambers that we're starting to be aware of.

05:17 - 05:19
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And that's based on our own behavior.

05:19 - 05:28
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So, and some people may not know this still, but I think it's becoming more common knowledge, whatever we do on, and also depends on the platform.

05:28 - 05:39
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So most platforms, where designed would their algorithms to where, if, you know, they would assume that if our friends are lacking something, then we're like something.

05:39 - 05:41
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And so the platform may show us that.

05:41 - 05:45
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Then there's tiktok, which is their algorithm was different when it came out.

05:45 - 05:47
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
It was more about what we're doing.

05:47 - 05:50
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And so if we are looking at something that it would feed us more of that.

05:51 - 05:53
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So other algo algorithms are different.

05:54 - 05:56
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
But now, we also have this AI stuff.

05:57 - 06:08
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Now we have deep fakes, which are, you know, really realistic video or audio content that some people can't really tell if it's real or if it's fake.

06:09 - 06:17
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And then we have people really microtargeting us because of all the data that they're able to collect.

06:17 - 06:36
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And you know, even 10 years ago, you had the Cambridge Analytica scandal with the data and they just kind of fed Facebook users, know this little quizzes or whatever, and gathered a bunch of information without our consent and the information of our friends.

06:36 - 06:37
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And then they use that.

06:38 - 06:50
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And so Cambridge Analytica is a political consulting firm for those who don't know and so they use that data to feed people, ads tailored to like their fears.

06:50 - 07:01
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Or maybe if they were undecided voters, they would target them specific ads to kind of push them into a certain spectrum of.

07:01 - 07:11
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Or talking about immigration if there, if they're feel fearful about immigration or even trying to get voters, not to vote and in the elections and stuff like that.

07:11 - 07:22
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So, but we also have tools, like AI tools, that are helping us combat this stuff, which are kinda talked about in my LinkedIn newsletter Working with common cause.

07:23 - 07:23
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
You know.

07:23 - 07:24
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Which is they?

07:25 - 07:48
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
They kind of They lead these efforts during elections and campaigns, working with the platforms, working with citizens like me, I was just a volunteer, and then they had us equipped with, So tools, which, you know, like, back then, it was like a bot, sentinels, so out we would add this bots who are Chrome X?

07:48 - 07:48
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
It Was a Chrome extension.

07:48 - 07:58
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So we went on Twitter, and we could see whenever things are being posted, how, you know, how toxic no user may be.

07:58 - 08:14
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And so we would flag information, there was a whole process and a training that we all went through, just as citizens, and then they had even more trained people on their team, you know, flagging that up, talking to the Facebooks and the different platforms.

08:15 - 08:22
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So we have tools, you know, to combat this stuff, to fact checking organizations, working with journalists, and just users.

08:22 - 08:25
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And so, you know, we're working on some good stuff, too.

08:26 - 08:26
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
Yeah.

08:26 - 08:27
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
And I think.

08:27 - 08:27
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
The.

08:28 - 08:29
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
Stage is also change, right?

08:29 - 08:37
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
So like it was public discourse in the beginning when we had Twitters and Facebooks that were the main platforms.

08:37 - 08:45
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
And now we're seeing a lot of these groups take the conversations in a more private places to where it isn't in the public eye.

08:45 - 08:46
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
Right?

08:46 - 08:50
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
So it's a little tougher to combat that kind of information.

08:50 - 08:54
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
And that's something relatively new that we're seeing that we weren't having to deal with in the past in the past.

08:54 - 09:01
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
It was about, well, how can we get ahead of misinformation and disinformation in these public type of forums.

09:01 - 09:13
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
But now, I think the majority of, or, at least, a big portion of this information is happening behind closed doors in private groups, maybe whatsapp groups, who are in Discord servers, where it isn't in the public eye.

09:13 - 09:19
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
So, that is a new challenge that, I think will definitely have to be dealt with.

09:20 - 09:21
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Nelson, thank you for that.

09:21 - 09:25
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
See, all of this is an extremely important right.

09:25 - 09:28
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Now, you know, we are entering an election cycle.

09:28 - 09:34
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
So I always say, you know, hold your watch up high because the rooms falling up with BS during an election cycle.

09:34 - 09:39
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
We have some of the worst, you know, viral headlines.

09:39 - 09:40
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
And it can be bad.

09:40 - 09:47
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
So some of the things that you mentioned, Jessica, you talked about the echo Chamber, the Algorithms, Cambridge, Analytica.

09:47 - 09:54
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
You know, there was that Netflix documentary that hit that I think it kind of opened up a bunch of people's eyes up to you know, we knew it was bad, but we didn't quite know.

09:54 - 10:00
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
And then we that that documentary came out, and so now we've got AI.

10:00 - 10:02
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
That's kind of sprinkled on top of it.

10:02 - 10:09
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
And then, Nelson, you mentioned that, you know, that things like that are happening in the background, where people on discourse.

10:09 - 10:15
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
You know, it's these groups that these micro targeting that we mentioned there earlier.

10:15 - 10:19
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
So, all of this stuff is is, you know, a different way to look at it.

10:19 - 10:22
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
I am, say, less than optimistic about this.

10:22 - 10:26
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Along with that rolling out.

10:26 - 10:32
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
But you guys have given me some optimism here because the article You mentioned ways that we can kinda compat combat misinformation.

10:32 - 10:42
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Could you talk a little bit more about what somebody who wants to be aware of, this type of stuff can do to kind of help themselves this year?

10:47 - 10:52
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
Well, the main thing I think is, is to get both yourself and your social circle.

10:52 - 10:53
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
And in the habit of fact, checking.

10:54 - 10:55
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
Before we share things, I guess.

10:55 - 10:58
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
One of the big things, let's go ahead and fact, check.

10:58 - 11:06
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
Some of these things that we're seeing online to make sure that it is at least based on some kind of fact, and there are some sources that you can go ahead and site.

11:07 - 11:12
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
And I think just, There's some pretty cool tools that maybe you found or something else you want to add?

11:13 - 11:20
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Yeah, there's some Some of the No more known ones, like snopes dot com I don't know if anybody's heard that one.

11:20 - 11:23
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
But that's one where you can go and see.

11:24 - 11:25
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Just kinda check.

11:25 - 11:34
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Or if you go to the website, they kind of present a news article, maybe that's gone viral, and then they'll tell you if it's real or fake.

11:34 - 11:35
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Maybe provide some sources.

11:35 - 11:45
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
There's also factcheck dot org, But if you Google any of these fact checking sites, it can pull up a different ones most are non partisan.

11:45 - 11:48
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And I'm sure there are also some that maybe not as credible.

11:48 - 11:54
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
But that's another thing you have to kind of be aware of when you're using these, even these sites then.

11:55 - 11:57
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
There's also like, educational programming that.

11:57 - 12:16
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
I think, we're seeing more of these days, digital literacy campaigns to teach people how to, you know, look into the source's, before you start sharing things, teaching people to be skeptical, skeptical of the information that they're seeing.

12:16 - 12:22
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
If there's not verifiable edit evidence from what's being presented, there's one.

12:22 - 12:34
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So the University of Cincinnati Library has a pretty good digital literacy guide where they talk about how to evaluate online sources, how to spot fake news.

12:34 - 12:43
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
They, they even talk about AI generated content and echo chambers that we're talking about, conspiracy theories, all kinds of stuff that you can go and look into.

12:43 - 12:51
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So, that's a pretty good guide, um, but, yeah, I think, I've mentioned common cause and organizations like that.

12:51 - 12:55
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So I would definitely encourage people to volunteer for things like that.

12:55 - 12:59
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And, you know, I learned a lot just working as a volunteer with these organizations.

12:59 - 13:04
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So, definitely recommend looking into or it's like that working to combat this stuff.

13:06 - 13:07
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
I love it.

13:07 - 13:12
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
You know the tools that for people who haven't heard of these before, snopes dot com, factcheck dot org.

13:12 - 13:16
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
And we kinda smile because we're like, Well, and then you have to fact check the fact check.

13:16 - 13:19
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Because it doesn't make sure that they're, they're reliable sources as well.

13:19 - 13:24
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
But you mentioned things like, you know, educational programs, rolling out, digital literacy.

13:24 - 13:27
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
I know when I started, you know, we're thinking 10 years back.

13:28 - 13:35
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
There was the idea of the age group that I work with 55 and up that, oh, they're not going to be digital digitally literate, right?

13:35 - 13:44
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
And what we found is that during the pandemic and the last, you know, couple of years here, people who were not digitally literate were kind of forced to do it.

13:44 - 13:51
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Everything was being pointed online, and so surprised we get more and more people that are online now, so, you know, even generational.

13:51 - 13:54
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
There's bigger bucket, two generations there.

13:54 - 13:57
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
You mentioned the University of Cincinnati, the Digital Library there.

13:57 - 13:59
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
That's a great resource as well.

13:59 - 14:00
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
So I want to, I want to pivot.

14:00 - 14:02
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
We're about halfway through.

14:02 - 14:07
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
We're about 15 minutes through, so I want to pivot and talk a little bit about more, really just catching up with you guys.

14:07 - 14:12
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
So I skipped the bio section altogether, But we, Nelson, we could do a whole show, just on a leaf.

14:12 - 14:17
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
When I was doing, when I was looking at, I realized, that, you were born in a leaf that, you know, I went to Hastings.

14:17 - 14:24
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
I know for our international listeners that may not, they may not know and may not mean anything but Houstonians here, we, we know.

14:24 - 14:28
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
So Nelson, catch us up, you know, in the last 10 years.

14:29 - 14:36
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Tell us a little bit about maybe some of the success stories that you guys have had working with clients, with what you do with Good Spero.

14:37 - 14:44
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
And so one of the big ones that we always talk about our, our, our business, our agency, was started out at ...

14:44 - 14:46
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
Center, and it's a program inside of the University of Houston.

14:47 - 14:51
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
And it was a really formative type of program for us.

14:51 - 14:52
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
I mean, I see it.

14:52 - 14:55
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
And it's often described as like an elevator, right?

14:55 - 14:59
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
If you go to Harvard, you kinda expected to be up on that top floor already.

15:00 - 15:09
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
And in the University of Houston, the neat thing is that the wolf centers like an elevator so brings people from different communities and gives them access to the top floor.

15:09 - 15:14
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
It takes him up to the very top to be a Buddha playing in that arena.

15:14 - 15:19
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
So coming out of that, we were like, how can we still be involved with the Wolf Center?

15:19 - 15:30
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
How can we be a part of this really important thing where a lot of our youth can actually develop their strengths into something that's really fruitful, right?

15:30 - 15:44
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
So we decided to see how we can help work with the wolf centered and just like design a social media type of program where the students themselves can go ahead and manage the program itself, right?

15:44 - 15:48
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
So we didn't want to make a program dependent on us.

15:49 - 15:51
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
We wanted to see, how can we build capacity?

15:51 - 15:55
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
How can we go ahead and teach as much as we can, while we also create some content?

15:55 - 16:06
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
So, like phase one of that year was, well, let's go ahead and test the waters out, Let's bring out and roll out the scaffolding of what this program might look like, and get some students involved.

16:06 - 16:13
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
In Phase two, year two, We started and take those step back, started to let the students lead the effort a little bit more.

16:14 - 16:21
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
Let them kind of adjust as the program went on to see how this can continue without even us being involved.

16:21 - 16:23
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
And then in the third year, we're almost hands off.

16:23 - 16:25
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
We're pretty much hands off.

16:25 - 16:37
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
We were only meeting with them a couple of times, and it's nice to see them now and their social media channels just blossomed because of the way that the students really find ownership in that.

16:37 - 16:39
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
And they, they have their own voice.

16:39 - 16:44
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
So, the best way, we've always felt stories can be told this by the communities themselves, right?

16:44 - 16:59
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
So, that, to me, was like a great example of how we tend to see our relationship with clients, we, we like to teach, build capacity, as we're creative, creating content for them, we're teaching them how to do that.

16:59 - 17:02
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
And then, eventually, we'll be able to plug out.

17:02 - 17:09
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
And when they get up to the level of wanting more higher production value type things, that's when we step back in, right?

17:09 - 17:17
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
So, that, to us, was such a nice project to be involved with, and we've kinda done some similar things with other organizations sometime.

17:18 - 17:22
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
I love it, I love it, And Jessica, I have this memory in the back of my head.

17:22 - 17:26
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
From our original interview, Something about, Beyond Say, and.

17:27 - 17:27
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
The.

17:27 - 17:30
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Largest collection, or so I can refresh my memory on that.

17:31 - 17:37
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
I don't know if I can still live up to that, now, but, yeah, I have always been a ...

17:37 - 17:44
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Fan, really more about the, the business side of it, and all the social impact she does.

17:44 - 17:49
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
That's not really talked about, you know, sometimes you'll hear about it, but she's kinda low key about it.

17:49 - 17:53
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So yeah, that was, um, yeah, It was an article, I think.

17:53 - 17:58
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
What's been a few articles now about it about my love for Beyonce.

18:01 - 18:03
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
I do remember that, I do remember that.

18:04 - 18:07
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
And so let's see, we've got about 10 more minutes here.

18:07 - 18:23
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
And tell us a little bit more about kind of the evolution of Good Sparrow, where you guys are at today, because you shared with us this success story with you of H And I can tell you, I've talked to somebody recently, again, this may not for people outside of Houston, they may not know.

18:23 - 18:26
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
But I've run into people from the Wolf ...

18:26 - 18:41
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Program, The Business School at U of H, And the difference, you know, when I used to go out in these network meetings and shake hands, I can always tell when it was somebody who's graduated from U of H, they were just a different caliber, compared to just just everybody else there.

18:42 - 18:50
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
But give us a little bit more into how good sparrows evolved, in terms of its mission and the services that it offers today.

18:51 - 18:52
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Sure.

18:52 - 18:52
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Yeah.

18:52 - 18:55
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So our mission hasn't really changed much.

18:55 - 19:00
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Like I said earlier, it's really just the tech that's changed, and we know the vehicle.

19:00 - 19:01
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
We're using to deliver.

19:02 - 19:04
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
On our work.

19:04 - 19:13
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And so, we still support organizations, we still support founders, and helping them solve their challenges, just using whatever the latest tech is.

19:13 - 19:15
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So, like I said, right now, that's AI.

19:15 - 19:19
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So, we're using a lot of AI to help solve problems.

19:19 - 19:35
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And, we kind of, know, so, we talked about when we started, it was about creating content for crowdfunding campaigns, and we were teaching corporate teams how to do the same, realizing, if you want to know how to crowd fund, you're gonna have to know how to do social media.

19:35 - 19:39
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And so, that's why we kind of went to that space, teaching social media.

19:39 - 19:45
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And then we moved up to teach, you know, the actual content creation and dug deeper into that.

19:45 - 19:57
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And, so, helping create content for brand awareness, or capital campaigns, or fundraising efforts, or even internal and external communications, really, whatever.

19:59 - 20:06
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Whatever the need, you can pretty much solve it with digital, and video, and somehow, and so, that's what we did, and we so do that.

20:06 - 20:08
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And so now, we're loving AI, the AI world.

20:08 - 20:22
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Because, you know, I know people, some people are scared about it, taking our jobs and everything, but I mean, I, we always tell people like, Well, this is just another tool that's making our lives easier, so, I think you're right.

20:22 - 20:26
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
If you're not using them, they could probably take your job, but maybe not AI.

20:26 - 20:33
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
It's going to be the next person using AI, So, we like to get into all these new new tools.

20:34 - 20:41
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Even in our own workflows, outside of teaching other people how to solve their problems were using it as well.

20:41 - 20:46
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So, obviously, Chad GBT was like, the big thing that everybody started using.

20:46 - 20:50
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
If you're not using the paid version, I would highly recommend it.

20:50 - 20:52
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
It's only, like, 20 bucks or something a month.

20:52 - 21:01
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And now, you're able to create your own custom G PT's, which, if you're not familiar with that space, it's, it's so pretty much.

21:01 - 21:04
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
We, like, we created a good spirit ...

21:04 - 21:14
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Or when we have worked with clients, I'll create a custom GPC for that client and you basically are able to feed it your own knowledge base.

21:14 - 21:34
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So, you can upload your documents as an organization, You can upload it, You know what your goals are, and whatever you want it to know, and then it's kind of like, you can just toggle over from chat GBT to your company, GBT and its, It makes life so much easier.

21:34 - 21:40
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And then you can now, they just opened up the marketplace for you to use other people's ....

21:40 - 21:52
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So if, Chris, you made a GBT for No Money Matters or whatever you wanted to do, I could use your GP to you and your knowledge base of all of this financial data that I don't know.

21:52 - 21:59
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And so I'm going to ask, essentially, be asking you questions, and, you know, with your knowledge base, so that's, it's pretty cool.

22:00 - 22:06
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So, that's what we're still doing, you know, teaching things like that, the latest stuff that people should be getting into, and how to use it.

22:07 - 22:15
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Guiding organizations on how to use it as well, which is something that people have always asked us when they see what we're doing.

22:15 - 22:19
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
They, they ask us, Hey, can you teach our teams how to do that?

22:19 - 22:22
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Or can you help us, You know, with whatever knowledge.

22:22 - 22:25
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
It's, you know, they may have to do that step to sell.

22:26 - 22:27
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Yeah, ourself.

22:27 - 22:29
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Shaking my head yes, on all of this.

22:30 - 22:32
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Very, very good stuff here, 100%.

22:33 - 22:35
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
So, I hear embracing AI.

22:35 - 22:43
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
And what you've done is you've kind of shared the evolution with me where we started with the crowd funding than social media, content creation.

22:43 - 22:46
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
And, you know, the tools have changed, it's AI now.

22:46 - 22:55
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
But you guys now have the experience after 10 years to help guide these organizations to actually learn about these new tools as they roll out.

22:55 - 23:03
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
I love it, I love it, I can see it in the stuff that, you're posting the the it I'm very steeped in Chat GBT as well.

23:03 - 23:07
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
In fact, if you go out and look at Podcast Promoter, GVT, that's me, so.

23:08 - 23:15
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
So in both, both me and my assistant 100% on board, I got certified through Vanderbilt in the analytic side of ...

23:15 - 23:17
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
For the visualization.

23:17 - 23:29
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
So yes, for companies, Small companies, if you're here in Houston and you're looking for somebody who's got the experience now to guide you through, as the technology changes, look at them.

23:29 - 23:35
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
This is a great, great couple who's been doing this for, you know, many, many years.

23:35 - 23:38
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
There were bumping right towards the end of the show.

23:38 - 23:44
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Jessica Nelson, what have I forgot to ask you that you'd like to share with listeners today?

23:46 - 23:51
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
Ameen, the future is always something that's top of mind for me.

23:51 - 23:54
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
I'm always looking forward and seeing what the next thing is going to be.

23:54 - 24:02
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
Right, and we were talking with Jess about how content is being hyper personalized now, more so than in the past.

24:02 - 24:05
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
So we did talk about how much information, Facebook has, an hour.

24:05 - 24:11
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
It could even anticipate what we're thinking of what we're liking before we even know about it, right.

24:11 - 24:16
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
But in the future, I think was really changing, is the location in the place and how they're going to be.

24:17 - 24:20
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
We're going to be consuming information, right?

24:20 - 24:27
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
Which, if we're consuming information, that means it's also an open door for organizations or companies to feed us information, right.

24:27 - 24:34
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
So now, we're seeing AR, M, R, and X, are, kinda take a little more center stage.

24:34 - 24:37
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
We're seeing the whole Apple vision thing.

24:38 - 24:39
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
And what does that mean?

24:39 - 24:39
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
Right?

24:39 - 24:44
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
And then we have talks about neuro link, and, and being able to control things.

24:46 - 24:49
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
Without having this interface of a thing, of an issue, right.

24:50 - 24:53
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
So it's, it's both good and bad, right?

24:53 - 24:56
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
I think, for every advancement, we have these challenges that pop up.

24:56 - 25:05
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
But with these challenges, also mean, is there opportunities for maybe our communities to be able to build businesses around solving these problems?

25:05 - 25:10
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
So every time I do hear about new advancements, it's happening.

25:10 - 25:13
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
I mean, yes, there are concerns that should be addressed.

25:13 - 25:24
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
But I would love our communities to be at the forefront addressing those concerns before they balloon and have us not be at the table helping guide these technologies.

25:24 - 25:26
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
And then make solutions for them.

25:27 - 25:28
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
I love it.

25:28 - 25:31
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
I love Jessica closing thoughts here as we wrap up.

25:34 - 25:45
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
I would just say hearing all the nice things you say about us, Chris, and our work, I just want to be clear that, no, I'm not sure I liked the word expert.

25:45 - 25:52
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
I know you didn't use that word, but I just want to make it clear, we're all still learning, especially in this new AI world.

25:53 - 25:55
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
But that's, that's the fun part, I think.

25:55 - 26:06
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
That, you know, if I, we hear a lot from people that they're kinda nervous or they don't know where this stuff is going and you know that, they're really know what to do, I mean.

26:06 - 26:11
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Our favorite thing to do is just dabble in it and so we encourage people to just try it out.

26:12 - 26:17
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Everybody's offering free trials of all these things, and so you don't even have to pay for it.

26:17 - 26:27
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Just, you know, dip your toes in the water, and if you love somehow, we always host stuff in the community, and other people are also doing the same.

26:27 - 26:31
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
I see tons of even podcaster talking about it and go on YouTube.

26:31 - 26:41
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
You can learn more about it But just I would just encourage everybody to like find those tools, find the digital literacy guides and find all these things that are out there for us.

26:42 - 26:45
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So we're not just bystanders watching all this stuff happen.

26:45 - 26:49
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
We we should all be helping to create the tools, as well.

26:49 - 27:04
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
Especially, like, kind of Nelson was touching on diverse communities, because a lot of the stuff that's being created, a lot of these tools there, they're kind of skewed just because of the people that are creating this stuff.

27:04 - 27:08
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And so in definitely more women need more Latinos, we need more black people.

27:08 - 27:13
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
We need more, like, everybody to be involved in the creation and advancement of all this technology.

27:13 - 27:16
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
I love that, Jessica, Nelson, thank you so much.

27:16 - 27:20
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
My 96 year old grandmother is on Facebook, so she can do it.

27:20 - 27:24
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
You can get out of your comfort zone and download the free version of ..., and just get your feet wet.

27:24 - 27:25
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Start playing with it, right.

27:26 - 27:33
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Thank you so much for being on the show, just the last minute thought for listeners who'd like to find out more about you, what is the best place for them to go.

27:35 - 27:36
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
Visit ...

27:36 - 27:36
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
Dot com, right?

27:36 - 27:37
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
Jess Unkind.

27:38 - 27:39
Nelson Vanegas, Goodspero
Yep.

27:39 - 27:39
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
That's right.

27:39 - 27:43
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
I was also going to say we live on social media and the big surprise there.

27:43 - 27:49
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
So, you can follow us at Goods Barrow, which is G O O D S P E R O.

27:50 - 27:58
Jessica Bolaños, Goodspero
And then you can follow me on all platforms at fancy capitalists and Nelson at Nelson ....

28:00 - 28:01
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Love it, I love it, guys.

28:01 - 28:02
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Thank you so much for being on the show.

28:02 - 28:03
Christopher Hensley, RICP®
Have a great rest of the day there.