Digital Trust: Why Entrepreneurs Should Invest

As the lack of verifiable content and identity on the Internet remains a widely acknowledged concern, (e.g., deepfakes, ransomware, AI hallucinations), it’s odd that solutions to such problems have yet to go viral. But that’s arguably because entrepreneurs—an important player—have yet to truly be brought into the fold, and they absolutely should be.

As thought leaders in the digital trust and crypto fields with our own dedicated practice, we believe that entrepreneurs can be a key factor in pushing the adoption of digital trust forward, particularly because there’s financial value to be gained in their doing so.

In this article, we’ll detail why digital verifiability represents a valuable opportunity for entrepreneurs— including exactly how you can go about monetizing this yet unexplored avenue—so that those looking for a new market to break into will understand all the merits of this one.

An Open Call to Entrepreneurs: Monetize Digital Trust

To this point, adoption of digital trust remains slow, but even still, progress has already been made:

1. Service providers are building robust identity and verifiable content tools;
2. Governments and standards bodies are discussing and establishing standards and protocols; and
3. Proofs of concepts have been deployed and proven dependable and scalable.

Yet we aren’t seeing the viral expansion of new applications supporting verifiable credentials and content, and to do so, we say the market needs entrepreneurs to get involved.

Of course, we understand that entrepreneurs and business investors need to see a clear business case with revenue streams that scale to realize multiple times their investment in financial return and perceived business value—you want to know the answer to Kevin O’Leary of Shark Tank fame often says: “How do you MAKE MONEY?”

5 Opportunities to Monetize Digital Trust Investment

And, in fact, there is a business case for verifiable digital content and identity—it is possible to monetize digital trust. More specifically, we believe the following are areas where verifiable identity and content technology could create value:

The Challenges of Monetizing Digital Trust

These are all possible avenues ripe for return on investment, but we want to paint an honest and complete picture—proof-of-concept trials regarding digital trust revealed that consumers:

• Still fear privacy invasion;
• Misunderstand the technology; and
• Distrust large-scale technology vendors and governments.

To overcome those fears and truly financially capitalize on the use of verifiable identity and content technology, entrepreneurs will also need to educate buyers of the value and create viral (celebrity) streams of endorsements that support global acceptance.

3 Strategies for Marketing Digital Trust

1. Make the Right Type of Pitch

Traditional and simple market pitches of “security is good for you” won’t be enough in the new marketplace, especially among the younger segments of the population living life driven by smartphones. Rather, you’ll need to identify and push an immediate and tangible benefit that appeals to those who depend on everything digital to improve their lives while reducing fear of the unknown—until a mandate emerges from an authority directing them to do so, this is the only way that consumers will pay for verified content.

2. Prioritize a Convenient User Experience Within Your Product

To promote faster adoption, you’ll need to ensure users can experience first-hand time savings or interactions free from redundant scrutiny over their identity and rights, which means building ease-of-use directly into verifiable content technology applications. These could include:

• Shorter lines for service for trusted identity holders—similar to TSA Pre-Check or CLEAR lines at the airport
• Transactions with less friction (e.g., without the litany of security questions when calling a bank)
• Financial incentives for identity and content that are “verified”

Innovative techniques like these will be required until a tipping point of acceptance is realized.

3. Take Advantage of the Current Governance Situation

Though there’s been movement toward standards for verifiable content and identity in the EU, Canada, UK, Australia, and even the country of Bhutan—which launched a nationwide digital identity initiative last year—authoritative mandates will take more time to come through, but that delay creates a unique opportunity.

Entrepreneurs who seize early adopter status amidst the current governance conditions of the market can generate revenue by taking an “ask for forgiveness rather than permission” approach—of course, this would be best done if greater trust can be realized by all participants in a given solution that is made to be adaptable to emerging standards.

Moreover, as these standards continue to take shape, entrepreneurs who get involved now will position themselves to directly influence government leaders and regulators seeking proven business cases when adopting frameworks.

Taking an Entrepreneurial Approach to Digital Trust

Like with any endeavor, investing in digital trust will be a gamble. But at least on this path, there are clear opportunities and pockets of digital society where the confidence in the source and content of digital communication, objects, and assets can be monetized. How much is it worth? We call on entrepreneurs to find those scenarios and take the risk.

As the adoption of digital trust continues, we at Schellman are committed to realizing the promise of verifiable identity and content technology by holding players accountable and helping them remain compliant with governance requirements through our assessments. If you have any further questions regarding these concepts—or if you’d like to discuss ideas regarding the acceleration and accountability of this technology—contact us today.