Systems and methods for monitoring events associated with transmitted electronic mail messages

• US 20030233412A1
• Filed: 06/14/2002
• Published: 12/18/2003
• Est. Priority Date: 06/14/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Mindshare Design, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Mindshare Design, Inc.
• Inventors: Smith, Steve, Rayner, Douglas P.
• Granted Patent: US 7,139,801 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/206
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/107 Computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/00 User-to-user messaging in packet-switching networks, transmitted according to store-and-forward or real-time protocols, e.g. e-mail
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/234 for tracking messages

Abstract

Various systems and methods provide users with the ability to track, detect, record analyze and report various events associated with the life of an electronic mail message delivered to any recipient. Some of the events that may be tracked by the systems and methods of the preferred exemplary embodiment include identification of when a recipient views a message and clicks on any web page links contained within the message. In accordance with another aspect of the preferred exemplary embodiment of the present invention, the systems and methods provide a simple mechanism for storing, monitoring and accessing information relating to various events that have transpired with respect to a large volume of electronic mail messages. Electronic mail message list may also be automatically generated with the data acquired by the systems and methods of the present invention.

Claims

1. A method of monitoring events associated with the transmission of an electronic mail message comprising the steps of:

transmitting an electronic mail message with an identifier code contained within the message;

directing a recipient to an intermediate response server and thereafter creating a link between a recipient and a destination site;

storing information which provides a correlation between the identifier code and the act of creating the link in a bitmap.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of storing information includes a step of generating the logical “

or”

of the identifier code and a location in the bitmap.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising a step of dynamically sizing the bitmap to be sufficiently large to accommodate the storage of a largest received identifier code.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising a step of temporarily storing received identifier codes in a buffer and thereafter storing the information in the bit map after a predetermined period of time.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising a step of temporarily storing received identifier codes in a buffer and thereafter storing the information in the bit map after a predetermined number of codes have been received.

6. A system for monitoring events associated with the transmission of an electronic mail message comprising:

a means for transmitting an electronic mail message with an identifier code contained within the message;

a means for directing a recipient to an intermediate response server prior to creating a link between the recipient and a destination site; and

a means for storing information correlating the identifier code and the act of creating the link in a bitmap.

7. The system of claim 6, wherein the means for storing information includes means for generating the logical “

or”

of the identifier code and a location in the bitmap.

8. A method of storing information pertaining to an electronic mail message comprising the step of:

transmitting electronic mail messages to a plurality of recipients, wherein the electronic mail messages each contain an identifier code;

generating a link between a user and a destination site with the identifier code embedded in the request for the link; and

storing information pertaining to the identifier code at the destination site in a bitmap.

9. The method of storing information of claim 8, further comprising a step of generating an electronic mail message list based on a correlation between a plurality of identifier codes and corresponding electronic mail addressess.