As someone who looks to build awareness for a company in an early-stage market, I often find myself often trying to answer this question.

Is credibility judged in accuracy, authority, or something else? External validation from an authoritative source? And if so, who — and how — is it judged?

Some possible criteria for judging credibility:
• Endorsements/Testimonials
• Accredidation/Certification
• Previous work/Experience
• Source/Publication
• Inbound links/number of citations
• Web rank/popularity

I spent my weekend a professor in applied sciences who has been immersed in academia for nearly three decades, following “publish or perish” as one of the guiding principles. Yet in academia, it’s not just the act of researching and writing a thought-provoking piece of work, it’s publishing that work in what’s deemed a credible outlet. Those credible publishing outlets coming the form of peer-reviewed journals – a group of similarly credentialled individuals from other academic institutions who weigh in and assert that the contributor’s work has some sort of merit.

Both in and outside of academia, the internet and web have changed how we learn. We can connect with one another, share, create, and recommend information directly.

We no longer depend on the traditional media institutions as the sole sources for content. Now we’re indundated with information, but the question is how do we sort through and value that content? Is it by the publisher? Is it by the creator’s background? In academia and beyond, peer review still prospers, but with social networks, we can now connect to and interact with influencers from across our fields, our industry, or just those who we admire, with a few clicks.

It’s not just the democratization of creation that the web and social networks have achieved, but the democratization of access to the “influencers” in all of our industries. Now, with the proper data, we can analyze social connections and web traffic to start to show patterns in how people find, use, and share content. So does the link economy of sharing online content change how we build and become considered credible?

From Andrew Rondeau on Problogger based on a theory by Graham Taylor: A model for building credibility as a blogger:

I don’t agree with this breakdown — do you? Tell me: what makes an individual, organization, or brand credible in your mind?