The importance of intermediaries in the Reputation Economy

I had a business meeting in Singapore and decided to stay with a friend. However, I needed to track down a Lego toy for my 10 year-old son and I turned to the ever-reliable concierge at the Conrad Hotel which is my home whenever I'm in Singapore. Sure enough, the concierge staff were able to point me to the nearest retailer, complete with their phone number and address.

As the Internet becomes truly a place of infinite information, we need to rely on intermediaries or trusted sources such as the Conrad concierge. Several trusted sources have evolved in the early years of the Internet, most of them facilitating search (e.g. Google, Amazon.com, etc). However, the holy grail of marketing, now shifts from search, or knowing where to buy the latest Lego toy, to deciding which toy to buy.

In my search for the best value for an LCD TV, I would now turn to another trusted source, this time my electronics-guru and friend, Joel Garcia. Needless to say, as transactions shift to the online world, I would be developing the online equivalent of the Conrad concierge and Joel.

Enter the world of the Reputation Economy (pg 73). "Measured by the amount of attention a product attracts [or an authority like Joel], reputation can be converted into other things of value: jobs, tenure, audiences, and lucrative offers of all sorts."

Just like in the real-world, there's the challenge of discerning between the snake-oil salesman and the true authority. The only challenge in cyber-world, is that you may not have the luxury of developing long-term relationships with these sources. Who then becomes the trusted source?