Digital Content Provided to a User at a Physical Location

• US 20130166369A1
• Filed: 12/21/2011
• Published: 06/27/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 12/21/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: PayPal, Inc. (PayPal Holdings, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: eBay Inc.
• Inventors: Scipioni, Germn Carlos
• Granted Patent: US 9,754,276 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/14.27
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0207 Discounts or incentives, e.g. coupons or rebates
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0238 at point-of-sale [POS]

Abstract

A method for providing a promotion to a user to do commerce at a physical location includes offering a right to a particular piece of digital content to the user as an incentive to a commercial transaction that occurs at least partly at the physical location, discerning that the user is located at the physical location, and in response to the discerning, interacting with the user to provide the digital content to the user on a mobile device associated with the user.

Claims

1. A method for providing a promotion to a user to do commerce at a physical location, the method comprising:

offering a right to a particular piece of digital content to the user as an incentive to a commercial transaction that occurs at least partly at the physical location;

discerning that the user is located at the physical location; and

in response to the discerning, interacting with the user to provide the digital content to the user on a mobile device associated with the user.

2. The method of claim 1 in which the digital content includes at least one of music, movies, and books.

3. The method of claim 1 in which the mobile device comprises an e-reader and the digital content comprises an e-book, further in which offering the right to the digital content includes allowing the user to access the e-book when the user it at the physical location and disallowing access by the user to the e-book when the user is not at the physical location.

4. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

offering the user a chance to buy the digital content after the user has left the physical location.

5. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

offering the user a chance to access the digital content after the user has left the physical location as part of an additional commercial transaction.

6. The method of claim 1 in which the right to the particular digital content is offered based in part on a loyalty program membership status of the user.

7. The method of claim 1 in which the physical location comprises a brick-and-mortar store that sells physical merchandise.

8. The method of claim 1 in which interacting with the user comprises at least one of:

downloading the digital content to the mobile device; and

streaming the digital content to the mobile device.

9. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

completing the commercial transaction with the user, in which the user must enter into the transaction in order to receive the digital content.

10. A method for participating in a promotion for commerce at a physical location, the method comprising:

receiving an offer for digital content as an incentive to a commercial transaction at the physical location between a user and another party;

being physically present at the physical location; and

interacting with a provider of the digital content to receive the digital content on a mobile device associated with the user conditioned on the user'"'"'s being present at the physical location.

11. The method of claim 10 in which receiving the digital content includes at least one of:

downloading the digital content to the mobile device; and

streaming the digital content to the mobile device.

12. The method of claim 10 in which interacting with the provider comprises:

presenting a user interface to allow the user to select the digital content.

13. The method of claim 10 further comprising:

completing the commercial transaction with the other party .

14. The method of claim 10 in which the mobile device comprises an e-reader and the digital content comprises an e-book, further in which interacting with the provider includes allowing the user to access the e-book when the user it at the physical location and disallowing access by the user to the e-book when the user is not at the physical location.

15. The method of claim 10 further comprising:

receiving an offer of a chance to access the digital content after the user has left the physical location as part of an additional commercial transaction.

16. A mobile device comprising a non-transitory, tangible computer readable storage medium storing a computer program, wherein the computer program contains instructions that when executed perform:

receiving an offer for digital content as an incentive to a commercial transaction between a user and another party at a physical commercial location, the offer received at the mobile device, which is associated with a user;

discerning a physical location of the user;

granting electronic access of the digital content to the user in response to discerning that the user is at the physical commercial location, in which granting electronic access includes interacting with a provider of the digital content to receive the digital content on the mobile device; and

denying electronic access of the digital content to the user in response to discerning that the user is not at the physical commercial location.

17. The mobile device of claim 16 comprising at least one of a laptop computer, a smartphone, an e-reader, and a tablet computer.

18. The mobile device of claim 16 in which the computer program contains instructions that when executed, perform at least one of:

downloading the digital content to the mobile device; and

streaming the digital content to the mobile device.

19. The mobile device of claim 16 in which the computer program contains instructions that when executed, perform:

presenting a user interface to the user to allow the user to select the digital content.

20. The mobile device of claim 16 in which the computer program contains instructions that when executed, perform:

continually or periodically checking a location of the user to discern whether the user is at the physical location; and

granting or denying electronic access to the digital content, as appropriate, in response to the checking.

21. A method for providing a promotion to a user at a physical location, the method comprising:

offering a right to a particular piece of digital content to the user as an incentive to the user to be present at the physical location;

discerning that the user is located at the physical location; and

in response to the discerning, interacting with the user to provide the digital content to the user on a mobile device associated with the user.

22. The method of claim 21 in which the offer is made without obligation for the user to enter into a commercial transaction at the physical location.

23. The method of claim 21 further comprising:

completing a commercial transaction with the user, in which the user must enter into the transaction in order to receive the digital content.