Blackbird.AI didn’t just attend the Meltwater Summit: We brought illegally Blonde to Times Square. Inspired by Reese Witherspoon’s keynote and the iconic Bend and Snap move, our team lit up the event in vibrant pink shirts, fuzzy pens, snap bracelets, rose-colored glasses, and an impossible energy to ignore. 

But people couldn’t stop talking to us because of the pink shirts or cool swag. It was the promise of something they desperately needed, a solution to a problem they could no longer ignore. Brands face narrative threats that can destroy reputation, disrupt operations, and drain revenue. They know that traditional social listening isn’t enough, and if they didn’t know, they understood before they packed up to head home. As Reese Witherspoon emphasized in her keynote speech, ‘Walk with purpose in the direction you are going.’ That means one thing in our world: protect your organization, or better yet, Know the Narrative!

Executive Strategy Dinner

Our dinner transformed into a high-level strategy session with executives from Nestlé, Capital One, Canadian Teacher Pension Plan, the London Metropolitan Police, and AWS. Their candid conversations revealed universal concerns about rapid narrative attacks and information overload. These leaders sought more than basic monitoring data about their brands. They needed clarity on attackers, motives, and effective response strategies. Blackbird.AI delivers this essential, actionable intelligence.

Meltwater + Blackbird.AI: Comprehensive Narrative Intelligence

Our Meltwater partnership transforms brand narrative protection through integrated intelligence capabilities.

Meltwater Capabilities

Meltwater excels at media monitoring and social listening, offering organizations real-time visibility across news and social channels. This platform tracks mentions, trends, and sentiment, creating essential awareness.

Blackbird.AI Capabilities

Blackbird.AI technology reveals deeper narrative insights:

• Intent behind statements and messaging
• Actors orchestrating narratives, including bots and coordinated groups
• Impact measurements before narratives spread widely

Combined Solution Benefits

Together, these platforms create comprehensive protection. Meltwater ensures complete data coverage while Blackbird.AI enables strategic threat analysis.

Key Advantages

• Faster threat identification
• Root cause understanding
• Proactive counter-narrative strategies
• Continuous security adaptation

Our spotlight moment came during our sponsored panel, “Bend & Snap: What to Do After a Narrative Attack,” featuring Blackbird.AI CEO Wasim Khaled, Ameesha Durham of Nestlé, and Kara Taylor of Capital One, moderated by Chris Hackney, CPO of Meltwater. 

Narrative Attack Response Strategies

“Bend & Snap: What to Do After a Narrative Attack” Panel included Wasim Khaled (Blackbird.AI CEO), Ameesha Durham (Nestlé U.S. Digital Content Director), Kara Taylor (Capital One Senior Director, Strategy & Digital Intelligence), and Chris Hackney (Meltwater CPO) as moderator.

This sponsored panel delivered practical narrative intelligence strategies. Wasim Khaled explained narrative attacks occur rapidly, target specific audiences, and arrive unexpectedly. He stressed brands must anticipate rather than merely respond.

Ameesha Durham described how Nestlé identifies genuine threats beyond basic mentions tracking. Kara Taylor showcased Capital One automation techniques that help teams manage digital risks.

The experts demonstrated methods brands use to detect, decode, and neutralize harmful narratives immediately, converting potential crises into leadership opportunities.

Executives Discuss Future Marketing Intelligence

Industry executives gathered for “The Future of MarTech” panel at Meltwater. Participants included Jay Prasad (Relo Metrics CEO), Mark Arduino (Meltwater Partner Director), Doug Balut (Meltwater SVP), Wasim Khaled (Blackbird.AI CEO), Arnon Mashiah (NICE SVP), and Rob Key (Converseon.AI CEO).

Wasim spoke on this second Meltwater panel after his narrative intelligence presentation. The group examined how technology reshapes brand communication strategies.

Mark Arduino moderated the discussion with Rob Key, Jay Prasad, and Arnon Mashiah as they addressed technology solutions for complex digital landscapes.

Wasim emphasized that brands must understand narrative attacks, not merely listen to them. Effective understanding requires knowledge about message motivations, attack orchestrators, and potential damage assessment.

His insights highlighted a fundamental truth: intelligence needs context. Brand protection succeeds through timely, relevant insights rather than data volume. Companies that decode the intent behind narratives become market leaders.

Executives Discuss Future Marketing Intelligence

Industry executives gathered for “The Future of MarTech” panel at Meltwater. Participants included Jay Prasad (Relo Metrics CEO), Mark Arduino (Meltwater Partner Director), Doug Balut (Meltwater SVP), Wasim Khaled (Blackbird.AI CEO), Arnon Mashiah (NICE SVP), and Rob Key (Converseon.AI CEO).

Wasim Khaled spoke on this second Meltwater panel after his narrative intelligence presentation. The group examined how technology reshapes brand communication strategies.

Mark Arduino moderated the discussion with Rob Key, Jay Prasad, and Arnon Mashiah as they addressed technology solutions for complex digital landscapes.

Wasim emphasized that brands must understand narrative attacks, not merely listen to them. Effective understanding requires knowledge about message motivations, attack orchestrators, and potential damage assessment.

His insights highlighted a fundamental truth: intelligence needs context. Brand protection succeeds through timely, relevant insights rather than data volume. Companies that decode the intent behind narratives become market leaders.

LEARN: What Is Narrative Intelligence?

The New Era of Narrative Intelligence

Traditional social listening has become obsolete. Our panel demonstrated why brands now require real-time capabilities to detect, analyze, and neutralize manipulated narratives. The Blackbird.AI and Meltwater integration delivers exactly this—providing organizations with faster threat detection, deeper insights, and enhanced community understanding.

This isn’t theoretical. Nestlé’s Ameesha Durham shared how they distinguish genuine threats from background noise. Capital One’s Kara Taylor explained how intelligence-driven automation transforms crisis management, freeing teams to focus on strategy rather than monitoring.

With narrative attacks evolving rapidly, waiting to react proves increasingly costly. The new playbook demands proactive defense, identifying threats before propagating across platforms.

The Blackbird.AI and Meltwater partnership combines real-time social and media intelligence with AI-driven narrative analysis, enabling organizations to identify emerging threats, map harmful actors, and detect manipulated narratives even in dark web channels.

As our panelists emphasized, narrative intelligence isn’t just about neutralizing threats; it’s about building trust, reinforcing positive narratives, and transforming potential crises into opportunities for authentic engagement and brand resilience.

THE WAY FORWARD: BEND, SNAP, AND STRATEGIZE

Master Early Detection: Stop reacting. Start anticipating. Use Blackbird.AI to identify threats before they become crises.

Enhance Decision-Making: Go beyond the noise. Leverage AI-driven insights to understand who is behind a narrative and their motives.

Automate Intelligence: Automation saves your team time. It means spending less time chasing false alarms and more time focusing on strategy.

Turn Crisis into Opportunity: A narrative attack shouldn’t be a setback. It can be a springboard. Transform a negative story into a brand win.

Lead with Confidence: Use narrative intelligence not just for defense but to actively shape your brand’s reputation and message.

Narrative intelligence and social listening are complementary and essential for modern brands. The Blackbird.AI and Meltwater partnership delivers comprehensive protection through combined data coverage and strategic threat analysis. Organizations using these integrated capabilities gain critical advantages in threat identification, understanding attack motivations, and implementing proactive defense strategies.

• To receive a complimentary copy of The Forrester External Threat Intelligence Landscape 2025 Report, visit here.
• To learn more about how Blackbird.AI can help you in these situations, book a demo.