SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR ADAPTIVE MATCHING OF USER PROFILES BASED ON VIEWING AND CONTACT ACTIVITY FOR SOCIAL RELATIONSHIP SERVICES

• US 20100262611A1
• Filed: 06/19/2009
• Published: 10/14/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 06/19/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Plentyoffish Media ULC (Match Group, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Plentyoffish Media Incorporated (Match Group, Inc.)
• Inventors: Frind, Markus
• Granted Patent: US 9,536,221 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 707/748
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/335 Filtering based on additional data, e.g. user or group profiles filtering in web context G06F16/9535, G06F16/9536
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9535 Search customisation based on user profiles and personalisation
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/01 Social networking

Abstract

A method and system which adaptively recommends potential relationships to individual users based on a set of items that are known to be of interest to the user, such as a set of potential matches previously messaged by the user. The system generates the adaptive recommendations using previously-generated user activity that indicates the user'"'"'s preferences of particular attributes.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method of matching a user of an social relationship service and a set of candidate user profiles for viewing and contact comprising:

providing a plurality of candidate user profiles to said user;

recording said user'"'"'s viewing and contact actions in relation to said candidate user profiles;

correlating said user'"'"'s viewing and contact actions to a plurality of user profile attribute values;

identifying a second set of candidate user profiles based upon said correlated profile attribute values; and

providing said second set of candidate user profiles to said user.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein correlating said user'"'"'s viewing and contact actions further comprises correlating user'"'"'s viewing and contact action across multiple browsing sessions.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein correlating said user'"'"'s viewing and contact actions further comprises correlating user'"'"'s viewing and contact action across user'"'"'s entire browsing history.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein the step of providing further comprises displaying said first plurality of candidate user profiles over a distributed network of computers.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein the step of providing further comprises displaying said second set of candidate user profiles over a distributed network of computers.

6. The method of claim 1 wherein said user profile attribute values comprise a range of attribute values.

7. A computer-implemented method of determining the preferences of a user of a social relationship service for candidate user profiles based upon said user'"'"'s viewing and contact histories comprising:

correlating said user'"'"'s viewing and contact history to a plurality of user profile attribute values;

calculating weighting factors for the importance of each user profile attribute; and

using said correlated user preferences and said weighting factors to determine a total ranking score per candidate user profile; and

retrieving and ordering said candidate user profiles from a data store based upon their ranking scores.

8. A computer-implemented method of selecting and displaying user profile records comprising:

correlating a user'"'"'s viewing and selection-for-contact choices with a plurality of attribute values;

querying user profile records within a data store based upon said plurality of attribute values;

9. A computer-implemented method of matching a user of a social relationship service and a set of candidate user profiles for viewing and contact comprising:

providing a plurality of candidate user profiles to said user;

recording said user'"'"'s viewing and contact actions in relation to said candidate user profiles;

correlating said user'"'"'s viewing and contact actions to a plurality of user profile attribute values;

identifying a second set of candidate user profiles based upon said correlated profile attribute values; and

providing said second set of candidate user profiles to said user.

10. The method of claim 9 where the social relationship service is made available across a distributed computer network.

11. The method of claim 10 where the social relationship service is an online dating service.

12. The method of claim 10 where the social relationship service is an online business or professional networking service.

13. The method of claim 10 where identifying a second set of candidate user profiles based upon said correlated profile attribute values further comprises applying an adaptability factor, wherein said adaptability factor limits the number of profiles selected based on correlated profile attribute values.

14. The method of claim 10 where identifying a second set of candidate user profiles based upon said correlated profile attribute values further comprises applying a random sample percentage, wherein said second set of user profiles is augmented with said percentage of randomly selected user profiles.

15. A computer-readable storage medium containing a set of instructions for a computer program comprising:

a display module for providing a plurality of candidate user profiles to said user;

a recording module for recording said user'"'"'s viewing and contact actions in relation to said candidate user profiles;

a correlation module for correlating said user'"'"'s viewing and contact actions to a plurality of user profile attribute values;

a query module for identifying and retrieving a second set of candidate user profiles from a data store based upon said correlated profile attribute values.