VIRTUAL SALESPERSON SYSTEM AND METHOD

• US 20130080290A1
• Filed: 06/04/2012
• Published: 03/28/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 06/06/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Versata Development Group, Inc. (ESW Capital, LLC)
• Original Assignee: Versata Development Group, Inc. (ESW Capital, LLC)
• Inventors: Kamm, John W.
• Granted Patent: US 10,176,518 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/26.61
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0281 Customer communication at a business location, e.g. providing product or service information, consulting
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0643 Graphical representation of items or shoppers

Abstract

A virtual salesperson system and method for tablet computers such as Apple'"'"'s iPad can be used by the customer (as opposed to most applications which are for the dealer, or on a central kiosk) to provide the customer a tour of a showroom and each vehicle, highlighting key features and other content at the discretion of the OEM, such as videos tours conducted by their spokesperson. In at least one embodiment, the customer can also search inventory, potentially at this dealer and other ‘friendly’ dealerships with whom this dealer has a trading relationship. Other sales tools such as build and price, payment estimation, etc are available as well.

Claims

1. An apparatus comprising:

a tablet computer having a processor and a memory coupled to the processor, wherein the processor includes code executable by the processor to access data in a database to display a tour of a showroom of products and highlight specific features of one or more of the products and provide content associated with one or more of the products. In an embodiment of the virtual salesperson system and method, an application (as described in the attached PowerPoint presentation) has been developed for tablet computers such as Apple'"'"'s iPad which can be used by the customer (as opposed to most applications which are for the dealer, or on a central kiosk) to provide the customer a tour of the showroom and each vehicle, highlighting key features and other content at the discretion of the OEM, such as videos tours conducted by their spokesperson. In at least one embodiment, the customer can also search inventory, potentially at this dealer and other ‘

friendly’

dealerships with whom this dealer has a trading relationship. Other sales tools such as build and price, payment estimation, etc are available as well

2. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein:

the code is further executable by the processor to allow a user of the tablet computer to search inventory of one or more dealers associated with the showroom.

3. The apparatus of claim 2 wherein:

wherein the code is further executable by the processor to configure a product, price a product, and obtain a payment estimate of the product.

4. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein:

the code is further executable by the processor to;

display videos of products in the showroom;

track which videos were displayed;

determine from at least tracking the videos which products a user of the tablet computer is interested in;

tracking data communication with the tablet computer including one or more payment estimation data;

providing data related to the tracked data communication to a computer system; and

receiving an initial offer aligned with the products determined to be of interest to the user.