Planning a vacation getaway, to purchase a new cell phone, or wondering what the hottest Christmas gift is for an eight year old? Why not turn to your social network – your contacts on Gmail, Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and Friendfeed for advice? According to socialnomics.com 78% of consumers trust peer recommendations and only 14%  trust advertisements.

We have all plugged in search queries into Google and other search engines and been frustrated by the results. Social Search, which is any search aided by a social interaction or a social connection, has not translated well to the internet medium. It is because search is a private activity and people are not comfortable letting everyone in their social network know what they searched for. Remember the Facebook “Beacon” fiasco?

Early social search pioneers like Eurekster, founded in 2004, have experimented with many approaches as well, prior to the development of their technology. “Swicki” enables a user to build and customize a vertical community around a particular topic. With the collaboration between groups of people searchers can obtain quicker and more relevant results than a generic search engine.

Google recently launched Social Search a product that allows users to search relevant public content from within their social circle indexed by Google from social sites. This means your search query may now include opinions, and other information related to the search term from within your social network. You need to be set up with a Google profile but from there it is quite simple to get your own Personalized Search Results.

Let’s say you are interested in going to Hawaii but don’t know which island to go to or where to stay. In the old days a travel agent would provide you the options. Today a search on the internet is the norm. But plugging in Hawaii on Google or Bing to obtain a list of places, reviews and histories, does not satisfy your query. This is because you are really searching for advice. Your search can only be sufficed through a Social Search.

Google Social Search acts as a type of conduit and taps into your network, grabbing public information from contacts who have travelled and written about Hawaii which is then displayed as part of your search results.

There is no question social search is taking us in some exciting directions. Companies like Google and Microsoft along with a whole host of smaller innovators like Eurekster and Spoke are constantly making changes to fine tune search relevancy. Our social connections will very likely influence our search results. However, there is a balance to be found between algorithmic and human search. Opt-In will be very important.

Social Search is being called the next revolution in search. It will be fascinating to watch this race play out. The fine line between privacy and performance will continue to be tested.