Online E-commerce and networking system/generating user requested sponsor advertisements to centralize siloed and distributed user data in the internet and business systems

• US 10,296,920 B2
• Filed: 05/21/2008
• Issued: 05/21/2019
• Est. Priority Date: 05/21/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: James Ian Tonnison, Wenxuan Tonnison
• Original Assignee: James Ian Tonnison, Wenxuan Tonnison
• Inventors: Tonnison, Wenxuan, Tonnison, James Ian
• Primary Examiner(s): Kazimi, Hani M
• Assistant Examiner(s): Ali, Hatem M
• Application Number:
  US12/154,241
• Publication Number:
  US 20090292595A1
• Time in Patent Office: 4,017 Days
• Field of Search: 705 14
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0207 Discounts or incentives, e.g. coupons or rebates
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0215 Including financial accounts
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0279 Fundraising management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/01 Social networking
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/188 Electronic negotiation

Abstract

A new generation online e-commerce and networking system is disclosed. According to the embodiments of the present invention, the system is based at least on: 1) a new digital model of meeting individuals'"'"' work and life needs and integrating entities'"'"' processes to create large online networks that centralize individuals'"'"' siloed and distributed data in the Internet and business systems; and 2) a disruptive and innovative advertising model of associating online advertisements with goods services, activities, and incentives that meet users'"'"' needs to allow users to solicit or request sponsorships so as to significantly improve online advertising response rates, increase membership reach rates of websites, and at the same time, act as a digital nerve or blood system to seamlessly connect Internet web applications and business systems. These are revolutionary technologies to disrupt the traditional isolated access to distributed websites on the Internet and traditional static online advertising technologies, to create a favorable digital infrastructure environment or user-data-interconnected Internet fabric for the rapid acceleration of the next generation Internet.

Claims

1. A service computer system residing on at least one server, useful in an online advertising provider serving webpages offering sponsor advertisements:

said system including a sponsor advertising utility and RAM memory configured to run application programs, further comprising;

at least one processing unit;

at least one input device connected to said processing unit;

at least one display device connected to said processing unit;

at least one communication link connected to the Internet;

at least one database containing data connected to said processing unit, for each of a plurality of webpages associated with user accounts on said system, wherein said each webpage belongs to each of a plurality of users, wherein said each webpage displays at least one active link or button of an advertising object associated with an advertising opportunity of a selected one of a plurality of sponsors, wherein said system belongs to an advertising network capable of serving online advertisements, and wherein said each of a plurality of users, said selected sponsor and

said advertising network are each independent parties with respect to one other;

said processing unit, responsive to instructions from said computer system and configured to;

automatically generate a plurality of sponsor advertisements upon receiving sponsor advertisement data from accounts associated with sponsors recorded in said database;

automatically transform traditional online advertisements into sponsor advertisements upon receiving incentive data from accounts associated with sponsors recorded in said database;

automatically transform online activity data associated with said users, including but not limited to membership level, size of communities, available advertisement space, level of activeness, and level of prior purchasing activities on said computer system and associated single sign-on web applications, into accumulated scores stored in accounts associated with said users;

automatically display said sponsor advertisements in sponsorship web pages of user accounts associated with said users upon said computer system determining accumulated scores stored in accounts associated with said users meet minimum score requirements stored in accounts associated with said sponsors;

automatically activate said sponsor advertisement utility to display sponsor advertisements of said system on external websites, wherein said utility automatically prompt external users to sign in or create new accounts to access said system upon detecting clicks on said sponsor advertisements on external websites by said utility; and

automatically collect and weight sponsor advertisement data by said computer system to generate more effective online advertising measurements on a sponsor advertisement campaign, wherein said measurements utilizing successful purchase data collected further comprising tracking key factors leading to successful purchases, including but not limited to clicks, impressions, notifications and subscriptions, and successful sales data.

2. The service computer system of claim 1, (a) for improving Internet advertisement response rates and for transforming static online advertisements into user interactive online advertisements, said processing unit is further programmed to provide at least one of:

means for receiving solicitation or specific request of sponsorship input from accounts associated with users in said computer system;

means for displaying sponsor lists to a user upon said user searching sponsors by categories, sub-categories or by searching incentive key word(s); and

(b) for combating phony clicks on online advertisements and for centralizing siloed and distributed user data, said processing unit is further programmed to provide at least one of;

means for displaying sponsor lists based on the descending order of bidding price for said user to select item(s) of interest, wherein said sponsor list comprises sponsor advertisements with incentives;

means for automatically comparing accumulated score stored in an account associated with said user with minimum score requirements of said sponsors upon receiving requesting or soliciting sponsorship input from said account associated with said user in said computer system;

means for approving said sponsorships upon said user requesting said sponsorships, and providing associated incentives to said account associated with said user, whereby said accumulated score stored in said account associated with said user on said system meets said minimum score requirements stored in accounts associated with said sponsors; and

means for displaying said sponsor advertisements associated with said sponsors on web pages of said account associated with said user in said computer system, wherein said web pages include single sign-on web application web pages of said account associated with said user, e- commerce web pages, social networking web pages and other web pages associated with said account in said computer system.

3. The service computer system of claim 1 for improving Internet advertisement response rates and for transforming static online advertisements into user interactive online advertisements, wherein said processing unit is further programmed to provide at least one of:

means for receiving data associated with setting up sponsor advertisements from accounts associated with entities within said system;

means for receiving sponsorship solicitation or specific request data from accounts associated with said entities to accounts associated with sponsors;

means for granting sponsorships upon receiving approvals from accounts associated with said sponsors, wherein said sponsorships can be special promotional deals between at least one entity and one sponsor;

means for automatically sending reminders to accounts associated with said entities about approaching expiration of sponsor advertisements;

means for automatically displaying said reminders of expiring sponsor advertisements on account webpages associated with said entities within said system;

means for receiving data of sponsorship deals in accounts associated with said sponsor entities;

means for receiving data of excluding competitors as sponsorship partners in accounts associated with said sponsor entities within said system; and

means for converting existing online advertisements with built-in incentives into sponsor advertisements from accounts associated with online publishers and advertising networks on said system.

4. The service computer system of claim 1 for improving Internet advertisement response rates and for transforming static online advertisements into user interactive online advertisements, wherein said process unit is-further programmed to provide at least one of:

means for automatically assigning sponsor advertisements upon receiving user solicitations or specific requests, wherein said sponsor advertisements are set with expiration time;

means for automatically sending reminders to accounts associated with said users about approaching expiration of sponsor advertisements;

means for automatically displaying said reminders of expiring sponsor advertisements on account webpages associated with said users within said system;

means for automatically renewing recurring sponsor advertisements to be re-displayed after expiration time upon receiving renewal input from accounts associated with said users within said system;

means for automatically displaying said sponsor advertisements on webpages associated with said users upon said utility receiving searching queries by categories, sub-categories, or by searching incentive key word(s) from said accounts associated with said users;

means for automatically matching incentive key word(s) to sponsor advertisements and automatically displaying said sponsor advertisements for selection wherein said matching key word(s) is found;

means for automatically listing said sponsor advertisements in the descending order of bidding price on webpages associated with said users;

means for automatically rotating sponsor advertisements with the same high bidding price to have equal chances of being displayed on prime advertisement locations of said system, wherein said prime advertisement locations are within webpages and community webpages associated with said users on said system;

means for automatically selecting low bidding price sponsor advertisements for display at designated locations of said system, wherein said designated locations may be part of said prime advertisement locations and said low bidding price sponsor advertisements are randomly selected to be displayed for a limited time frame; and

means for displaying comments or ratings about said sponsor advertisements received from accounts associated with said users.

5. The service computer system of claim 1 for centralizing siloed and distributed user data and for improving Internet advertisement response rates, wherein said processing unit is further programmed to provide at least one of:

means for measuring accumulated score associated with said user on said system according to weighed factors, wherein said weighted factors include but are not limited to membership level, size of communities, available advertisement space in communities, available advertisement space in said account associated with said user within said system including single sign-on web application web pages, level of activeness, and level of prior purchasing activities to effectively centralize siloed and distributed user data among Internet websites and business computer systems;

means for measuring effectiveness of an entity'"'"'s real return on investment on an online advertisement campaign associated with said entity on said system, wherein said measurement further comprising but not limited to setting calculated costs of said entity'"'"'s advertisements according to cost per click, cost per thousand impression, cost per action, and cost per time period;

means for measuring effectiveness of said real return on investment using the number of successful purchases, or dollar amount of successful purchases in relation to various cost factors; and

means for measuring effectiveness of an sponsor advertisement campaign associated with said entity through other metrics, including but not limited to number of successful purchases per advertisement dollar, dollar amount of successful purchases per advertisement dollar, number of purchases per click, number of purchases per thousand impressions, dollar of successful purchases per click, dollar of successful purchases per thousand impressions.

6. The service computer system of claim 1, wherein said system is any online e-commerce and networking system using different computer and human languages, and can be presented on any electronic display devices, including computers, laptops, netbooks, cell phones, hand-held devices, and the like;

and wherein said sponsor advertising utility is activated, said system further comprising at least one of;

means for displaying favorite sponsors associated with said users and sponsorship history data associated with said users in user account webpages associated with said users;

means for posting specific sponsorship requests received from user accounts associated with said users within said system;

means for matching specific sponsorship requests from user accounts associated with said user with sponsor offers to present matching result lists to said user account webpages associated with said users; and

means for automatically selecting qualified user accounts-for sponsorships, wherein said user accounts meet sponsorship criteria stored in accounts associated with said sponsors.

7. A method is disclosed, capable of serving webpages offering sponsor advertisements using a sponsor advertising utility residing in an online service computer system and using local devices accessing said online service computer system via at least one online service server:

said method comprising at least one of the steps of;

automatically generating a plurality of sponsor advertisements upon receiving sponsor advertisement data from accounts associated with sponsors on said computer system;

automatically transforming traditional online advertisements into sponsor advertisements upon receiving incentive data from accounts associated with sponsors on said computer system;

automatically transforming online activity data associated with said users, including but not limited to membership level, size of communities, available advertisement space, level of activeness, and level of prior purchasing activities on said computer system and associated single sign-on web applications, into accumulated scores stored in accounts associated with said users via said computer system that resides on said at least one online service server;

automatically displaying said sponsor advertisements in sponsorship web pages of user accounts associated with said users upon said online service computer system determining accumulated scores stored in accounts associated with said users meet minimum score requirement stored in accounts associated with said sponsors;

automatically activating said sponsor advertisement utility to display sponsor advertisements of said system on external websites, wherein said utility automatically prompting external users to sign in or create new accounts to access said system upon detecting clicks on said sponsor advertisements on external websites by said utility; and

automatically collecting and weighting sponsor advertisement data by said computer system to generate more effective online advertising measurements on a sponsor advertisement campaign, wherein said measurements utilizing successful purchase data collected further comprising tracking key factors leading to successful purchases, including but not limited to clicks, impressions, notifications and subscriptions, and successful sales data.

8. The method of claim 7, (a) for improving Internet advertisement response rates and for transforming static online advertisements into user interactive online advertisements, said method further comprising at least one of the steps of:

automatically receiving solicitation or specific request of sponsorship input from accounts associated with users in said computer system;

automatically displaying sponsor lists to a user upon said user searching sponsors by categories, sub-categories or by searching incentive key word(s); and

automatically displaying sponsor lists based on the descending order of bidding price for said user to select item(s) of interest, wherein said sponsor list comprises sponsor advertisements with incentives;

(b) for combating phony clicks on online advertisements and for centralizing siloed and distributed user data, said method further comprising at least one of the steps of;

automatically comparing accumulated score stored in an account associated with said user with minimum score requirements of said sponsors upon receiving requesting or soliciting sponsorship input from said account associated with said user in said computer system;

automatically approving said sponsorships upon said user requesting said sponsorships, and providing associated incentives to said account associated with said user, whereby said accumulated score stored in said account associated with said user on said system meets said minimum score requirements stored in accounts associated with said sponsors; and

automatically displaying said sponsor advertisements associated with said sponsors on web pages of said account associated with said user in said computer system, wherein said web pages include single sign-on web application web pages of said account associated with said user, e-commerce web pages, social networking web pages and other web pages associated with said account in said computer system.

9. The method of claim 7 for improving Internet advertisement response rates and for transforming static online advertisements into user interactive online advertisements, said method further comprising at least one of the steps of:

automatically receiving data associated with setting up sponsor advertisements from accounts associated with entities within said system;

automatically receiving sponsorship solicitation or specific request data from accounts associated with said entities to accounts associated with sponsors;

automatically granting sponsorships upon receiving approvals from accounts associated with said sponsors, wherein said sponsorships can be special promotional deals between at least one entity and one sponsor;

automatically sending reminders to accounts associated with said entities about approaching expiration of sponsor advertisements;

automatically displaying said reminders of expiring sponsor advertisements on account webpages associated with said entities within said system;

automatically receiving data of sponsorship deals in accounts associated with said sponsor entities;

automatically receiving data of excluding competitors as sponsorship partners in accounts associated with said sponsor entities within said system; and

automatically converting existing online advertisements with built-in incentives into sponsor advertisements from accounts associated with online publishers and advertising networks on said system.

10. The method of claim 7 for improving Internet advertisement response rates and for transforming static online advertisements into user interactive online advertisements, said method further comprising at least one of the steps of:

automatically assigning sponsor advertisements upon receiving user solicitations or specific requests, wherein said sponsor advertisements are set with expiration time;

automatically sending reminders to accounts associated with said users about approaching expiration of sponsor advertisements;

automatically displaying said reminders of expiring sponsor advertisements on account webpages associated with said users within said system;

automatically renewing recurring sponsor advertisements to be re-displayed after expiration time upon receiving renewal input from accounts associated with said users within said system;

automatically displaying said sponsor advertisements on webpages associated with said users upon said utility receiving searching queries by categories, sub-categories, or by searching incentive key word(s) from said accounts associated with said users;

automatically matching incentive key word(s) to sponsor advertisements and automatically displaying said sponsor advertisements for selection wherein said matching key word(s) is found;

automatically listing said sponsor advertisements in the descending order of bidding price on webpages associated with said users;

automatically rotating sponsor advertisements with the same high bidding price to have equal chances of being displayed on prime advertisement locations of said system, wherein said prime advertisement locations are within webpages and community webpages associated with said users on said system;

automatically selecting low bidding price sponsor advertisements for display at designated locations of said system, wherein said designated locations maybe part of said prime advertisement locations and said low bidding price sponsor advertisements are randomly selected to be displayed for a limited time frame; and

automatically displaying comments or ratings about said sponsor advertisements received from accounts associated with said users.

11. The method of claim 7 for centralizing siloed and distributed user data and for improving Internet advertisement response rates, said method further comprising at least one of the steps of:

automatically measuring accumulated score associated with said user on said system according to weighed factors, wherein said weighted factors include but are not limited to membership level, size of communities, available advertisement space in communities, available advertisement space in said account associated with said user within said system including single sign-on web application web pages, level of activeness, and level of prior purchasing activities to effectively centralize siloed and distributed user data among Internet websites and business computer systems;

automatically measuring effectiveness of an entity'"'"'s real return on investment on an online advertisement campaign associated with said entity on said system, wherein said measurement further comprising but not limited to setting calculated costs of said entity'"'"'s advertisements according to cost per click, cost per thousand impression, cost per action, and cost per time period;

automatically measuring effectiveness of said real return on investment using the number of successful purchases, or dollar amount of successful purchases in relation to various cost factors; and

automatically measuring effectiveness of an sponsor advertisement campaign associated with said entity through other metrics, including but not limited to number of successful purchases per advertisement dollar, dollar amount of successful purchases per advertisement dollar, number of purchases per click, number of purchases per thousand impressions, dollar of successful purchases per click, dollar of successful purchases per thousand impressions.

12. The method of claim 7, wherein said system is any online e- commerce and networking system using different computer and human languages, and can be presented on any electronic display devices, including computers, laptops, netbooks, cell phones, hand-held devices, and the like;

and

wherein said sponsor advertising utility is activated, said method further comprising at least one of the steps of;

automatically displaying favorite sponsors associated with said users and sponsorship history data associated with said users in user account webpages associated with said users;

automatically posting specific sponsorship requests received from user accounts associated with said users within said system;

automatically matching specific sponsorship requests from user accounts associated with said user with sponsor offers to present matching result lists to said user account webpages associated with said users; and

automatically selecting qualified user accounts for sponsorships, wherein said user accounts meet sponsorship criteria stored in accounts associated with said sponsors.

13. A computer program comprising a non-transitory computer readable storage medium for offering sponsor advertisement:

said computer program comprising computer-executable instructions stored thereon a service computer system, that when executed on a processor, perform at least one of the following steps;

automatically generating a plurality of sponsor advertisements upon receiving sponsor advertisement data from accounts associated with sponsors on said computer system;

automatically transforming traditional online advertisements into sponsor advertisements upon receiving incentive data from accounts associated with sponsors on said computer system;

automatically transforming online activity data associated with said users, including but not limited to membership level, size of communities, available advertisement space, level of activeness, and level of prior purchasing activities on said computer system and associated single sign-on web applications, into accumulated scores stored in accounts associated with said users;

automatically displaying said sponsor advertisements in sponsorship web pages of user accounts associated with said users upon said computer system determining accumulated scores stored in accounts associated with said users meet minimum score requirement stored in accounts associated with said sponsors;

automatically activating said sponsor advertisement utility to display sponsor advertisements of said system on external websites, wherein said utility automatically prompting external users to sign in or create new accounts to access said system upon detecting clicks on said sponsor advertisements on external websites by said utility; and

automatically collecting and weighting sponsor advertisement data by said computer system to generate more effective online advertising measurements on a sponsor advertisement campaign, wherein said measurements utilizing successful purchase data collected further comprising tracking key factors leading to successful purchases, including but not limited to clicks, impressions, notifications and subscriptions, and successful sales data.

14. The computer program of claim 13 (a) for improving Internet advertisement response rates and for transforming static online advertisements into user interactive online advertisements, said computer program further comprising at least one of the steps of:

automatically receiving solicitation or specific request of sponsorship input from accounts associated with users in said computer system;

automatically displaying sponsor lists to a user upon said user searching sponsors by categories, sub-categories or by searching incentive key word(s); and

automatically displaying sponsor lists based on the descending order of bidding price for said user to select item(s) of interest, wherein said sponsor list comprises sponsor advertisements with incentives;

(b) for combating phony clicks on online advertisements and for centralizing siloed and distributed user data, said computer program further comprising at least one of the steps of;

automatically comparing accumulated score stored in an account associated with said user with minimum score requirements of said sponsors upon receiving requesting or soliciting sponsorship input from said account associated with said user in said computer system;

automatically approving said sponsorships upon said user requesting said sponsorships, and providing associated incentives to said account associated with said user, whereby said accumulated score stored in said account associated with said user on said system meets said minimum score requirements stored in accounts associated with said sponsors; and

automatically displaying said sponsor advertisements associated with said sponsors on web pages of said account associated with said user in said computer system, wherein said web pages include single sign-on web application web pages of said account associated with said user, e-commerce web-pages, social networking web pages and other web pages associated with said account in said computer system.

15. The computer program of claim 13 for improving Internet advertisement response rates and for transforming static online advertisements into user interactive online advertisements, said computer program further comprising at least one of the steps of:

automatically receiving data associated with setting up sponsor advertisements from accounts associated with entities within said system;

automatically receiving sponsorship solicitation or specific request data from accounts associated with said entities to accounts associated with sponsors;

automatically granting sponsorships upon receiving approvals from accounts associated with said sponsors, wherein said sponsorships can be special promotional deals between at least one entity and one sponsor;

automatically sending reminders to accounts associated with said entities about approaching expiration of sponsor advertisements;

automatically displaying said reminders of expiring sponsor advertisements on account webpages associated with said entities within said system;

automatically receiving data of sponsorship deals in accounts associated with said sponsor entities;

automatically receiving data of excluding competitors as sponsorship partners in accounts associated with said sponsor entities within said system; and

automatically converting existing online advertisements with built-in incentives into sponsor advertisements from accounts associated with online publishers and advertising networks on said system.

16. The computer program of claim 13 for improving Internet advertisement response rates and for transforming static online advertisements into user interactive online advertisements, said computer program further comprising at least one of the steps of:

automatically assigning sponsor advertisements upon receiving user solicitations or specific requests, wherein said sponsor advertisements are set with expiration time;

automatically sending reminders to accounts associated with said users about approaching expiration of sponsor advertisements;

automatically displaying said reminders of expiring sponsor advertisements on account webpages associated with said users within said system;

automatically renewing recurring sponsor advertisements to be re-displayed after expiration time upon receiving renewal input from accounts associated with said users within said system;

automatically displaying said sponsor advertisements on webpages associated with said users upon said utility receiving searching queries by categories, sub-categories, or by searching incentive key word(s) from said accounts associated with said users;

automatically matching incentive key word(s) to sponsor advertisements and automatically displaying said sponsor advertisements for selection wherein said matching key word(s) is found;

automatically listing said sponsor advertisements in the descending order of bidding price on webpages associated with said users;

automatically rotating sponsor advertisements with the same high bidding price to have equal chances of being displayed on prime advertisement locations of said system, wherein said prime advertisement locations are within webpages and community webpages associated with said users on said system;

automatically selecting low bidding price sponsor advertisements for display at designated locations of said system, wherein said designated locations maybe part of said prime advertisement locations and said low bidding price sponsor advertisements are randomly selected to be displayed for a limited time frame; and

automatically displaying comments or ratings about said sponsor advertisements received from accounts associated with said users.

17. The computer program of claim 13 for centralizing siloed and distributed user data and for improving Internet advertisement response rates, said computer program further comprising at least one of the steps of:

automatically measuring accumulated score associated with said user on said system according to weighed factors, wherein said weighted factors include but are not limited to membership level, size of communities, available advertisement space in communities, available advertisement space in said account associated with said user within said system including single sign-on web application web pages, level of activeness, and level of prior purchasing activities to effectively centralize siloed and distributed user data among Internet websites and business computer systems;

automatically measuring effectiveness of an entity'"'"'s real return on investment on an online advertisement campaign associated with said entity on said system, wherein said measurement further comprising but not limited to setting calculated costs of said entity'"'"'s advertisements according to cost per click, cost per thousand impression, cost per action, and cost per time period;

automatically measuring effectiveness of said real return on investment using the number of successful purchases, or dollar amount of successful purchases in relation to various cost factors; and

automatically measuring effectiveness of an sponsor advertisement campaign associated with said entity through other metrics, including but not limited to number of successful purchases per advertisement dollar, dollar amount of successful purchases per advertisement dollar, number of purchases per click, number of purchases per thousand impressions, dollar of successful purchases per click, dollar of successful purchases per thousand impressions.

18. The computer program of claim 13, wherein said system is any online e-commerce and networking system using different computer and human languages, and can be presented on any electronic display devices, including computers, laptops, netbooks, cell phones, hand-held devices, and the like;

and

wherein said sponsor advertising utility is activated, said computer program further comprising at least one of the steps of;

automatically displaying favorite sponsors associated with said users and sponsorship history data associated with said users in user account webpages associated with said users;

automatically posting specific sponsorship requests received from user accounts associated with said users within said system;

automatically matching specific sponsorship requests from user accounts associated with said user with sponsor offers to present matching result lists to said user account webpages associated with said users; and

automatically selecting qualified user accounts for sponsorships, wherein said user accounts meet sponsorship criteria stored in accounts associated with said sponsors.