METHOD FOR ROUTING ELECTRONIC CORRESPONDENCE BASED ON THE LEVEL AND TYPE OF EMOTION CONTAINED THEREIN

• US 20070100603A1
• Filed: 12/18/2006
• Published: 05/03/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 10/07/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Oracle OTC Subsidiary LLC (Oracle Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Oracle OTC Subsidiary LLC (Oracle Corporation)
• Inventors: Gianforte, Greg, Richter, James, Warner, Douglas, Durbin, Stephen
• Granted Patent: US 8,600,734 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 704/9
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/284 Lexical analysis, e.g. tokenisation or collocates
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/107 Computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing]
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising

Abstract

A system, method, and computer program product for determining the emotional content of an electronic correspondence to route or prioritize the information, to set the expectations of a customer support worker, to flag those workers who are using inappropriate language with the customer, or to determine another best course to send the correspondence. In a preferred embodiment, a customer sends an electronic correspondence to a company via email. Emotionally charged words or symbols in each sentence are detected. The message is then given an emotional ranking which is used to determine what future action is most appropriate for the correspondence.

Claims

1. A method for routing electronic correspondence to personnel or entity having a potential interest in the emotional content of the words or symbols within said electronic correspondence, said method comprising:

receiving said electronic correspondence;

analyzing said electronic correspondence to determine an emotional ranking for said correspondence; and

routing said electronic correspondence to one of said personnel or entity more likely having said potential interest without substantially modifying the contents thereof for further action based on said emotional ranking.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein said step of analyzing said electronic correspondence to determine an emotional ranking for said correspondence includes:

tagging said one or more words or symbols of said electronic correspondence with their respective parts-of-speech;

parsing said electronic correspondence into noun phrases and verb phrases; and

applying transformation rules to said electronic correspondence to produce an emotional ranking for said electronic correspondence.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein said further action comprises at least one of the following actions:

routing said electronic correspondence to an appropriate company representative based on said emotional ranking;

prioritizing said electronic correspondence;

setting the expectations of one or more customer support representatives;

flagging said one or more customer representatives who are using inappropriate language with said customer;

or

determining another best course to send said electronic correspondence.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising the steps of:

storing said emotional rankings;

performing mathematical calculations on said emotional rankings to generate statistics; and

generating reports based on said statistics.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein said emotional ranking is conveyed in a numeric range.

6. The method of claim 1 including the step of responding to said electronic correspondence in a manner related to said emotional ranking.

7. The method of claim 1, including the step of assigning an emotional value to said electronic correspondence using a reference data structure.

8. The method of claim 7 wherein said emotion value is in a range that spans from a negative value to a positive value.

9. The method of claim 7, wherein said referenced data structure is a table, spreadsheet, or database having said emotional values associated with predetermined words of emotional content.

10. The method of claim 7, wherein said step of assigning an emotional value to said electronic correspondence using a referenced data structure, further comprises:

determining whether one or more words, phrases, or symbols of said electronic correspondence is located within said referenced data structure; and

retrieving said emotional value based on said one or more words, phrases, or symbols having a match within said referenced data structure.

11. The method of claim 7 wherein said emotion value is reflective of both positive and negative emotions.

12. A method as recited in claim 11 further comprising routing the electronic correspondence as a result of said emotional ranking.

13. A method as recited in claim 11 wherein said emotional ranking is derived by a fuzzy logic reduction process, which reduces the non-linearity of individual work ratings and simplifies the conveyance of information to a user.

14. A method as recited in claim 11 further comprising providing a time-scaled weighting average of a plurality of emotional ranking values of said electronic correspondence, to more accurately reflect recent emotions of the originator of said electronic correspondence.

15. A method in a computing environment for routing an electronic correspondence based on the level and type of information contained within the electronic correspondence, the method comprising:

parsing said electronic correspondence;

assigning one or more values to portions of said electronic correspondence;

utilizing said one or more values to provide an emotional ranking for said electronic correspondence; and

routing said electronic correspondence to personnel having an interest in taking action based on said correspondence as a result of said emotional ranking without substantially modifying the contents thereof.

16. A method as recited in claim 15 further comprising utilizing said emotional ranking to prioritize said electronic correspondence.

17. A method as recited in claim 15 wherein said emotional ranking is derived by a fuzzy logic reduction process, which reduces the non-linearity of individual word ratings and simplifies the conveyance of information to a user.

18. A method as recited in claim 15 further comprising providing a time-scaled weighting average of a plurality of emotional ranking values of said electronic correspondence, to more accurately reflect recent emotions of the originator of said electronic correspondence.

19. A computer readable medium having computer executable instructions for a method for routing an electronic correspondence based on the emotional content of the correspondence, the method comprising the steps of:

receiving an electronic correspondence form a customer containing one or more words or symbols;

assigning an emotional ranking to said electronic correspondence;

routing said electronic correspondence to personnel for a further action based on said emotional ranking without substantially modifying the content thereof; and

responding to said customer in a manner related to said emotional ranking.