Match engine marketing: system and method for influencing positions on product/service/benefit result lists generated by a computer network match engine
First Claim
1. A method of generating a product/service/benefit result list substantially in real time in response to a match request from a PSB seeker using a computer network, comprising:
- maintaining a database including a plurality of PSB listings, wherein each PSB listing is associated with a PSB provider, at least one PSB criteria factor, and a modifiable bid amount that is independent of other components of the PSB listing, the bid amount being associated with at least one of the PSB and the PSB provider, the bid amount corresponding to a money amount that is deducted from an account of a PSB provider associated with the PSB upon receipt of a request of at least one of information about the PSB provider or the PSB itself;
receiving a PSB match request, which includes seeker questionnaire/criteria information, from the PSB seeker;
identifying the PSB listings having PSB criteria which generate a match with the PSB match request;
ordering the identified PSB listings into a PSB result list in accordance with the values of the respective bid amounts for the identified PSB listings;
receiving a retrieval request from the PSB seeker to retrieve information associated with a PSB listing in the result list;
recording a retrieval request event including account identification information corresponding to the PSB provider, to permit maintenance of accurate account debit records.
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Abstract
Enabling advertisers using a computer network such as the Internet and a match engine to submit their offerings to product, service, benefit seeking entities. In some embodiments, a database having accounts for the providers is made available. Accounts contain contact and billing information for an advertiser; and at least one offering having at least a description, a criteria set comprising one or more criterion factors, and a bid amount. An advertiser influences a position of an offering in the advertiser'"'"'s account by first selecting offering relevant criteria. The advertiser enters the criteria and the description into a listing; influencing at least in part the position for the listing within a results page through an online bidding process. This results page is generated in response to a seeking entity query of the match engine. Pay for performance demographic, geographic, psychographic criteria/characteristics targeted directly advertising (frictionless advertising) is enabled.
186 Citations
87 Claims
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1. A method of generating a product/service/benefit result list substantially in real time in response to a match request from a PSB seeker using a computer network, comprising:
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maintaining a database including a plurality of PSB listings, wherein each PSB listing is associated with a PSB provider, at least one PSB criteria factor, and a modifiable bid amount that is independent of other components of the PSB listing, the bid amount being associated with at least one of the PSB and the PSB provider, the bid amount corresponding to a money amount that is deducted from an account of a PSB provider associated with the PSB upon receipt of a request of at least one of information about the PSB provider or the PSB itself;
receiving a PSB match request, which includes seeker questionnaire/criteria information, from the PSB seeker;
identifying the PSB listings having PSB criteria which generate a match with the PSB match request;
ordering the identified PSB listings into a PSB result list in accordance with the values of the respective bid amounts for the identified PSB listings;
receiving a retrieval request from the PSB seeker to retrieve information associated with a PSB listing in the result list;
recording a retrieval request event including account identification information corresponding to the PSB provider, to permit maintenance of accurate account debit records. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 73)
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11. A method of generating a result list substantially in real time in response to a match request from a seeker using a computer network, comprising:
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maintaining a database including a plurality of listings, wherein each listing is associated with a provider and a modifiable bid amount that is independent of other components of the listing, each listing being searchable in response to a received match request;
receiving a match request which includes questionnaire/criteria information from the seeker;
identifying the listings having criteria which generate a match with the match request;
ordering the identified listings into a result list in accordance with the values of the respective bid amounts for the identified listings;
receiving a retrieval request from the seeker to retrieve information associated with a listing in the result list; and
estimating the cost of including a listing in the database for a specified time period upon receiving a request for an estimate from a provider. - View Dependent Claims (12)
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13. A method of generating a result list substantially in real time in response to a match request from a seeker using a computer network, comprising:
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maintaining a database including a plurality of listings, wherein each listing is associated with criteria and a modifiable bid amount that is independent of other components of the listing;
receiving a questionnaire/profile based match request from the seeker;
identifying the listings having criteria which generates a match with the match request;
ordering the identified listings into a result list in accordance with the values of the respective bid amounts for the identified listings;
receiving a retrieval request from the seeker to retrieve information associated with a listing in the result list;
generating a listing activity report including information on retrieval requests received from seekers during a specified time period.
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14. A system for enabling an advertising provider using a computer network to update information relating to a listing within a result list generated by a PSB matching engine comprising:
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a computer system having stored thereon a database having at least one account record for each of a plurality of advertising providers using the computer network, the account record including;
at least one listing corresponding to at least one criterion, a modifiable bid amount that is independent of other components of the listing, a Uniform Resource Locator (URL) corresponding to the address of a document residing on a network server, a description, and a title;
an account balance;
a history of listings included in the advertising provider'"'"'s account record;
payment processing information, wherein said payment processing information is accessible to the computer system and isolated from public access via the computer network; and
a payment history;
programming code for providing the advertising provider with login access in response to authentication, wherein the advertising provider'"'"'s login access grants the advertising provider access to modify the advertising provider'"'"'s account, the advertising provider not being provided with access to modify the accounts of others;
programming code on said computer system for adding money to the account of an advertising provider in substantially real time upon receiving a request from said advertising provider;
programming code on said computer system for adding a listing to an account of an advertising provider in substantially real time upon receiving a request from said advertising provider;
programming code on said computer system for deleting a listing to an account of an advertising provider in substantially real time upon receiving a request from said advertising provider;
programming code on said computer system for modifying in substantially real time the listing of an advertising provider upon receiving a request from said advertising provider;
programming code for generating in substantially real time an activity report for an advertising provider upon receiving a request from said advertising provider;
programming code for receiving a match request from a remote computer, the request including at least one criterion, the request being received over the computer network from the remote computer through a web site that is publicly accessible without authentication;
programming code for generating in substantially real time a result list in response to the match request, the result list including listings from the accounts on the database, wherein the criteria for each listing in the result list generates a match with the match request, the listings in the result list arranged in an order determined at least in part by using the bid amounts of the benefit listings.
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15. A method of enabling a provider to update information relating to a listing on a result list generated by a matching engine, comprising the steps of:
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maintaining an account database having at least one account record for each of a plurality of providers, said account record including at least one listing having criteria and a modifiable bid amount that is independent of the other components of the listing; and
an account identifier;
receiving from a provider a change request for a listing in the provider'"'"'s account;
updating the listing in the provider'"'"'s account record in response to the change request;
determining a position substantially in real time for the updated listing in a result list generated by the matching engine in response to a questionnaire information included match request received from a seeker using the matching engine, where the criteria of the updated listing generates a match with the match request and the position of the updated listing in the result list is determined at least in part by using the bid amount. - View Dependent Claims (16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 48)
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28. A method of enabling a provider using a computer network to update information relating to a listing within a result list generated by a match engine substantially in real time in response to a match request received from a remote computer over the computer network, comprising the steps of:
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maintaining an account database having at least one account record for each of a plurality of providers of the computer network, said account record including an account identifier, and at least one listing having criteria and a modifiable bid amount that is independent of other components of the listing;
providing the provider with authenticated login access, wherein the provider'"'"'s login access permits the provider to modify the provider'"'"'s account record;
modifying listing of the account record upon receiving a request from said promoter; and
generating a result list comprised of listings wherein the criteria for each listing generates a match with the questionnaire/profile included match request, the listings in the result list arranged in an order corresponding in whole or in part to the bid amounts of the listings. - View Dependent Claims (29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 49, 50, 51)
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52. A method of enabling a provider using a computer network to update information relating to a listing within a result list generated by a matching engine, said method comprising the steps of:
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maintaining a database having at least one account record for at least one provider using the computer network, said account record including;
at least one listing, where each listing includes a criteria field having at least one criterion factor, a modifiable bid amount that is independent of the other components of the listing, a Uniform Resource Locator (URL) corresponding to the address of a document residing on a network web server, a description, and a title;
an account balance;
payment processing information for the provider, said payment processing information maintained isolated from public access via the computer network;
payment histories of the provider; and
listing histories of the provider;
providing the provider with login access in response to authentication, wherein the provider'"'"'s login access permits the provider access to modify the provider'"'"'s account record, the provider not being provided with access to modify account records of others;
modifying in real or substantially real time the listing of a provider upon receiving a request from said provider;
receiving a match request, the match request including at least one criterion factor identified by and established from at least one answered question from at least one seeker questionnaire, the match request being received over the Internet from a seeker at a remote computer; and
generating a result list in response to the match request, the result list including listings of the account records on the computer network, wherein the criteria for each listing in the result list generates a match with the match request, the listings in the result list arranged in an order determined using at least in part the bid amounts of the listings. - View Dependent Claims (53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78)
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79. Computer readable code stored on media for collecting and analyzing data describing the bid options available for a PSB provider to determine where in a list for a potential PSB recipient said PSB provider'"'"'s listings will appear, said code comprising a plurality of PSB bid modules, each capable of collecting bid data from PSB providers, determining the location of said PSB provider'"'"'s PSB within a result list, and providing the information necessary to select the location of said provider'"'"'s PSB within said PSB list.
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80. A distributed information match mechanism comprising:
- means for storing a plurality of provider/advertiser registrations;
means for receiving a match request including one or more match criteria from a requesting seeker in a network;
means for resolving said match request against each of a plurality of provider/advertiser registrations to determine one or more matching provider/advertiser registrations each indicating a corresponding provider/advertiser information location;
means for transmitting, at least in part monetarily-ordered, match results to said requesting seeker. - View Dependent Claims (81)
- means for storing a plurality of provider/advertiser registrations;
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82. A method of generating a product, service, benefit result list in real or substantially real time in response to a product, service, benefit, match request from a seeker using a computer network, comprising:
- maintaining a database including a plurality of product, service, benefit listings;
wherein each product, service, benefit listing is associated with a bid and/or payment amount and criteria;
receiving a match request from said seeker;
identifying the product, service, benefit listings having criteria generating a match with said match request;
ordering the identified product, service, benefit listings into a result list in accordance with the values of the respective bid and/or payment amounts for the identified product, service, benefit listings;
receiving a retrieval request from said seeker to retrieve information associated with a product, service, benefit listing in the result list; and
recording a retrieval request event in database corresponding to said seeker'"'"'s retrieval request. - View Dependent Claims (83)
- maintaining a database including a plurality of product, service, benefit listings;
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84. A system for enabling an advertising provider using a computer network to update information relating to a listing within a result list generated by a PSB matching engine comprising:
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a computer system having stored thereon a database having at least one account record for each of a plurality of advertising providers using the computer network, the account record including;
at least one listing corresponding to at least one criterion, a bid amount, a Uniform Resource Locator (URL) corresponding to the address of a document residing on a network server, a description, and a title;
an account balance;
a history of listings included in the advertising provider'"'"'s account record;
payment processing information, wherein said payment processing information is accessible to the computer system and isolated from public access via the computer network; and
a payment history;
programming code for providing the advertising provider with login access in response to authentication, wherein the advertising provider'"'"'s login access grants the advertising provider access to modify the advertising provider'"'"'s account, the advertising provider not being provided with access to modify the accounts of others;
programming code on said computer system for adding money to the account of an advertising provider in substantially real time upon receiving a request from said advertising provider;
programming code on said computer system for adding a listing to an account of an advertising provider in substantially real time upon receiving a request from said advertising provider;
programming code on said computer system for deleting a listing to an account of an advertising provider in substantially real time upon receiving a request from said advertising provider;
programming code on said computer system for modifying in substantially real time the listing of an advertising provider upon receiving a request from said advertising provider;
programming code for generating in substantially real time an activity report for an advertising provider upon receiving a request from said advertising provider;
programming code for receiving a match request from a remote computer, the request including at least one criterion, the request being received over the computer network from the remote computer through a web site that is publicly accessible without authentication;
programming code for generating in substantially real time a result list in response to the match request, the result list including listings from the accounts on the database, wherein the criteria for each listing in the result list generates a match with the match request, the listings in the result list arranged in an order determined using at least in part the bid amounts of the listings. - View Dependent Claims (85, 86, 87)
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Specification