System and Method for Managing Promotional Offers Using a Communications Platform

• US 20110161149A1
• Filed: 12/31/2009
• Published: 06/30/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 12/31/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Growth & Emerging Markets LLC
• Original Assignee: Growth & Emerging Markets LLC
• Inventors: Kaplan, Mark Mitchell
• Granted Patent: US 8,260,662 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/14.17
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0215 Including financial accounts
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0224 based on user history

Abstract

A system and method for managing, distributing, and processing promotional offers is provided. The system includes at least one consumer interface that enables communication between the promotional offer processing system and a plurality of consumers; a consumer information database for storing consumer data for a plurality of consumer profiles; an offer catalog having a plurality of offers; a product catalog having product codes corresponding to products associated with each of the accepted offers; and an offer management module. The offer management module is configured to identify one or more of the plurality of offers to be provided to a consumer; cause the identified offers to be transmitted to the consumer; receive an indication from the consumer that the first consumer has accepted at least one of the provided offers; identify product codes corresponding to products associated with each of the accepted offers; provide the identified product codes to a transaction management system; receive information identifying whether any of the identified product codes were contained in consumer purchase transactions; and process each accepted offer for which the consumer has met the terms for the offer.

Claims

1. A method for processing promotional offers comprising:

obtaining consumer data for at least one consumer, the consumer data including a consumer ID and information identifying a payment method;

accessing an offer catalog having a plurality of offers, each of the offers being associated with one or more products;

identifying one or more of the plurality of offers to be provided to the consumer;

electronically sending the one or more of the plurality of offers to the consumer;

receiving an indication from the consumer that the consumer has accepted a respective one of the provided offers;

accessing a product catalog to identify product codes corresponding to products associated with each of the accepted offers;

providing the identified product codes to a transaction management system associated with the obtained payment method for the consumer;

receiving, from the transaction management system, information identifying whether any of the identified product codes were contained in consumer purchase transactions made using the payment method; and

for each accepted offer, determining whether a consumer has purchased each of the products associated with the accepted offer, and processing the accepted offer if the consumer has purchased each of the associated products.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the consumer ID is a phone number associated with the consumer.

3. The method of claim 2 wherein obtaining the consumer ID includes automatically identifying the phone number from a request message transmitted from a consumer.

4. The method of claim 3 wherein the request message is in the form of an SMS text message.

5. The method of claim 3 wherein the request message is in the form of a voice SMS message.

6. The method of claim 2 wherein the payment method is a credit card, and the transaction management system includes a credit card processing system.

7. The method of claim 6 wherein obtaining the payment method includes accessing the transaction management system to automatically identify a credit card account associated with the obtained phone number.

8. The method of claim 1 wherein electronically sending the one or more of the plurality of offers to the consumer includes sending the one or more of the plurality of offers in an SMS text message.

9. The method of claim 1 wherein electronically sending the one or more of the plurality of offers to the consumer includes sending the one or more of the plurality of offers in an SMS message having text and playable audio corresponding to the text.

10. The method of claim 1 wherein at least one of the accepted offers include an offer for a discount on one or more products purchased by the consumer.

11. The method of claim 10 wherein the consumer data further includes a preferred consumer account.

12. The method of claim 11 wherein processing the accepted offer includes applying the value of the discount associated with the offer as a credit in the preferred consumer account.

13. The method of claim 12 wherein the preferred consumer account is a credit card account.

14. The method of claim 12 wherein the preferred consumer account is an account established by the consumer with a third party consumer account operator.

15. The method of claim 14 wherein the consumer account operator is a wireless service provider for the consumer.

16. The method of claim 12 wherein the preferred consumer account is a virtual debit account.

17. A promotional offer processing system comprising:

at least one consumer interface that enables communication between the promotional offer processing system and a plurality of consumers;

a consumer information database for storing consumer data for a plurality of consumer profiles, the consumer data including information identifying a consumer ID and a payment method for each consumer profile;

an offer catalog having a plurality of offers, each of the offers being associated with one or more terms for obtaining the offer;

a product catalog having product codes corresponding to products associated with each of the accepted offers; and

an offer management module in communication with the at least one consumer interface, the consumer information database, the offer catalog, and the product catalog;

wherein the offer management module is configured to access the offer product catalog, identify one or more of the plurality of offers to be provided to a consumer, the first consumer being one of the plurality of consumers having a consumer profile in the consumer information database;

cause the identified offers to be transmitted to the consumer;

receive an indication from the consumer that the first consumer has accepted at least one of the provided offers;

access the product catalog to identify product codes corresponding to products associated with each of the accepted offers;

provide the identified product codes to a transaction management system associated with the payment method for the first consumer;

receive, from the transaction management system, information identifying whether any of the identified product codes were contained in consumer purchase transactions made by the first consumer using the payment method; and

process each accepted offer for which the first consumer has met the one or more terms for the offer.

18. The system of claim 17 wherein the offer management module is configured to process each accepted offer for which the first consumer has met the terms by applying a discount value associated with the offer as a credit in a credit card account for the first consumer.

19. The system of claim 17 wherein the offer management module is in communication with a third party consumer account operator;

and the offer management module is configured to process each accepted offer for which the first consumer has met the terms by applying a discount value associated with the offer as a credit in an consumer account held by the third party consumer account operator.

20. The system of claim 19 wherein the third party consumer account operator is a wireless service provider.

21. The system of claim 17 further including an interactive media manager module in communication with the offer management module, the interactive media manager module being configured to provided automated interactive communications with the plurality of consumers via a peer-to-peer communication application.

22. The system of claim 21 wherein the peer-to-peer communication application is at least one of an instant messaging application and a social media application.

23. The system of claim 21 wherein the interactive media manager is configured to receive a search term, and in response to receiving the search term, transmit, via the peer-to-peer communication application, one or more offers relating to the search term.

24. The system of claim 23 wherein the interactive media manager is configured to receive indications of acceptance of the one or more offers via the peer-to-peer communication platform.