COMPETITIVE ADVERTISING AND SALES INFRASTRUCTURE

• US 20120271720A1
• Filed: 07/02/2012
• Published: 10/25/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 04/19/1999
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: PayPal, Inc. (PayPal Holdings, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Enpulz LLC
• Inventors: Bennett, James D., Winslade, Christopher C.
• Granted Patent: US 8,464,943 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/14.69
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/20 Point-of-sale [POS] network systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0207 Discounts or incentives, e.g. coupons or rebates
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0222 During e-commerce, i.e. online transactions
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0224 based on user history
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0235 constrained by time limit or expiration date
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0239 Online discounts or incentives
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0244 Optimization
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0251 Targeted advertisements
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0253 During e-commerce, i.e. online transactions
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0255 based on user history
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0257 User requested
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0261 based on user location
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0269 based on user profile or attribute
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0601 Electronic shopping [e-shopping]
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0605 Supply or demand aggregation
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0611 Request for offers or quotes
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0613 Third-party assisted
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0625 Directed, with specific intent or strategy
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0641 Shopping interfaces
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/03 : Credit; Loans; Processing thereof
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/04 : Trading; Exchange, e.g. stocks, commodities, derivatives or currency exchange
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/08 : Insurance

Abstract

A system for online sales with automatic rebate and coupon redemption provides customers making online purchases to automatically retrieve and redeem all applicable rebates and coupons during an online purchase. Purchase orders from customers are selectively fulfilled and products are shipped to the customers either by the system for online sales with automatic rebate and coupon redemption or by other merchant or manufacturer environments. The system makes purchases from merchants or manufacturers using all applicable coupons and rebates and then sells the products to the customers, passing the savings to them. The system automatically retrieves coupons and rebates for items in a shopping cart during the activity of an online purchase at an electronic mall or an online merchant site and to retrieve manufacturer'"'"'s and merchant'"'"'s coupons prior to an online purchasing activity for subsequent submission to an online merchant during a subsequent purchasing activity.

Claims

1. A central portal system supporting a plurality of buyers and a plurality of independent sellers, the central portal system comprising:

a first central service that couples with a plurality of independent sales portals of the plurality of independent sellers to receive first data and send second data, both the first data and the second data being associated with a plurality of competing advertisement posts;

the first central service interacting with a central database to store the first data, the first central service receiving from a first of the plurality of independent sales portals of a first of the plurality of independent sellers via a program interface at least a portion of the first data constructed from contents of a first database of the first of the plurality of independent sellers, the program interface at least in part providing a common mapping interface between the central database and the first database to support data synchronization;

a second central service that couples with a plurality of buyer computers of the plurality of buyers to offer competitive advertising based on selections from the plurality of competing advertisement posts; and

the second central service vectoring a first of the plurality of buyer computers to the first of the plurality of independent sales portals and assessing a fee for performing the vectoring.

2. The central portal system of claim 1, wherein the first data comprises product data.

3. The central portal system of claim 2, wherein the first data further comprises pricing data.

4. The central portal system of claim 3, wherein the pricing data comprises pricing data for product offerings of differing sellers.

5. The central portal system of claim 2, wherein the first data further comprises product availability data.

6. The central portal system of claim 1, wherein the first data further comprises seller rating data.

7. The central portal system of claim 1, wherein the second central service supports searching of the central database by the plurality of buyer computers.

8. The central portal system of claim 7, wherein the supported searching is across multiple product categories.

9. The central portal system of claim 7, wherein the supported searching further includes category browsing.

10. A seller'"'"'s sales portal supporting a plurality of buyers, the seller'"'"'s sales portal comprising:

an independent seller'"'"'s database that stores a plurality of groups of advertisement post data, a first group of the plurality of groups of advertisement post data corresponding to a seller'"'"'s first sales item;

an interface through which content of a competitive multi-seller database can be synchronized with that of the seller'"'"'s database, the synchronization supporting up to date, remote, and competitive web page offerings based at least in part on the first group of the plurality of groups of advertisement post data;

a management service responsive to changes made to the seller'"'"'s database by managing a synchronization process via the interface; and

a seller'"'"'s portal that, in response to vector linkage requests received via the competitive web page offerings, delivers seller'"'"'s web page offerings to the plurality of buyers via a plurality of buyer computers, the seller'"'"'s portal being assessed a fee associated with each of such vector linkage requests.

11. The seller'"'"'s sales portal of claim 10, wherein the seller'"'"'s web page offerings comprise product data.

12. The seller'"'"'s sales portal of claim 11, wherein the seller'"'"'s web page offerings further comprise pricing data.

13. The seller'"'"'s sales portal of claim 12, wherein the pricing data comprises pricing data for product offerings.

14. The seller'"'"'s sales portal of claim 11, wherein the seller'"'"'s web page offerings further comprise product availability data.

15. The seller'"'"'s sales portal of claim 10, wherein the seller'"'"'s web page offerings comprise seller rating data.

16. The seller'"'"'s sales portal of claim 10, wherein the seller'"'"'s portal supports searching of the competitive web page offerings by the plurality of buyer computers.

17. The seller'"'"'s sales portal of claim 16, wherein the supported searching is across multiple product categories.

18. The seller'"'"'s sales portal of claim 16, wherein the supported searching further includes category browsing.

19. A method performed by a central advertising system that supports a plurality of competing sellers, the method comprising:

receiving a plurality of groups of advertisement posting data from a plurality of independent seller systems;

supporting a first service via first selections from the plurality of groups of advertisement posting data, the first service being performed with interaction with a web search portal;

supporting a second service via second selections from the plurality of groups of advertisement posting data, the second service being performed with interaction with a competitive sales portal; and

supporting a third service via third selections from the plurality of groups of advertisement posting data, the third service being performed with interaction with non-sales web page servers.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein the groups of advertisement posting data comprise product data.

21. The method of claim 20, wherein the groups of advertisement posting data further comprise pricing data.

22. The method of claim 21, wherein the pricing data comprises pricing data for product offerings.

23. The method of claim 20, wherein the groups of advertisement posting data further comprise product availability data.

24. The method of claim 19, wherein the groups of advertisement posting data comprise seller rating data.

25. The method of claim 19, wherein the first service supports searching of the groups of advertisement posting data by a plurality of buyer computers.

26. The method of claim 25, wherein the supported searching is across multiple product categories.

27. The method of claim 25, wherein the supported searching further includes category browsing.

28. A method performed by a central advertising system that supports a plurality of competing sellers, the method comprising:

receiving first data relating to a plurality of advertisements via a browser interface from a plurality of seller personal computers;

receiving second data at least indicative of selections via the browser interface from a set of predefined ad elements;

receiving third data relating to the plurality of advertisements via a program interface from a plurality of independent sales portals; and

providing a secure management interface through which information associated with the plurality of advertisements is delivered.

29. The method of claim 28, wherein the first data comprises product data.

30. The method of claim 29, wherein the first data further comprises pricing data.

31. The method of claim 30, wherein the pricing data comprises pricing data for product offerings of differing sellers.

32. The method of claim 29, wherein the first data further comprises product availability data.

33. The method of claim 28, wherein the first data further comprises seller rating data.

34. The method of claim 28, further comprising supporting searching of the first data.

35. The method of claim 34, wherein the supported searching is across multiple product categories.

36. The method of claim 34, wherein the supported searching further includes category browsing.