What is a Trust Community and Why Should You Care?

The conversation about social media, Twitter and Facebook is the wrong one to have, even though it’s the one most people are having.  It is now a normal everyday action to connect on the real time social web the same way you share with friends on the phone or by email; only now one action can reach thousands of people.  Though these topics were revolutionary a year or two ago, now they simply point out the obvious way these tools are ingrained in our everyday communication behaviors.

The conversation about Trust Communities is the right one to have.  You’re already a part of Trust Communities even though you may not call them that.

Your family, your Facebook friends, your Twitter followers and the people you work with interact with you in those general Trust Communities.  If you connect online or offline with a group of people who share your interests (gardening, motorcycles, football, reading, music, underwater basket weaving, etc.) then you participate in niche Trust Communities.

With the latest advances in social networking technologies, people are naturally searching out and finding others in their tribes.  Without the geographical and time constraints that we had only a few years ago, it is now possible to instantly connect, build relationships and share content with thousands of people who care about what you care about.  Real-time search has changed the game forever.

The Internet is becoming exponentially more socialized every day.  Since humans are psychologically driven to connect and be validated by other people, this is the primary way we are using the new tools we are being given online.  We are connecting, creating content and consuming content like there’s no tomorrow.

This has generated a seismic shift in power from the limited number of perceived experts and authorities we used to follow to an unlimited number of influencers we follow because we like and trust them.  These influencers have proven themselves by sharing content in blogs and videos.  They didn’t necessarily have to have a degree or a fancy title.  If fact, we believe regular people with a passion long before we believe many people put forth to us as experts by sources that we don’t trust.  These regular people are the tent poles that Trust Communities are based around.

Do you remember when your only choice to get an expert medical opinion was to make an appointment with your doctor?  Then you discovered WebMD.com, and then you could join forums, then you could Google search articles and now you can send a message on Twitter and get real-time answers from doctors and regular people who know the answers you’re looking for.  With Google Side Wiki and other new technologies it’s only going to get easier to build Trust Communities.

These days we know that doctors are human.  They have limited knowledge, can make mistakes and are heavily lobbied by pharmaceutical companies to push certain drugs and treatments over others.  This doesn’t mean doctors aren’t experts, just that we can now get second, third, fourth and fifth opinions to weigh in with what a doctor suggests.

If you have a child with autism you’ll be joining Trust Communities based around autism.  If you surf you’ll be in a Trust Community with surfers.  You may even be in both of these communities depending on your interests.

You’ll participate as a community member.  This will increase your trust in other community members, it will increase their trust in you and you will all support each other.  People in Trust Communities benefit from the community.  People who ignore Trust Communities will be left behind in a cloud of confusion as to why they’re not experiencing the same benefits that Trust Community members receive.

This is where we are headed.  In the coming years the measurable difference will be between those with a static website broadcasting information and those with a thriving ecosystem based on their creation of, and participation in, niche trust communities.  Which one will you have?