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Group Formation and Dynamic Pricing for E-Commerce in Social Networks

  • US 20140244420A1
  • Filed: 05/05/2014
  • Published: 08/28/2014
  • Est. Priority Date: 11/17/2009
  • Status: Active Grant
First Claim
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1. A computerized method for facilitating sales of goods to subscribers to a social network platform, the method comprising the steps of:

  • receiving, at an application server, an electronic message from a subscriber to a social network platform, the message including desired auction parameters of a proposed purchase of an item, the parameters including a final auction time;

    providing the desired auction parameters to an initial set of automated auction engines, each being associated with a respective seller;

    iteratively receiving, from at least a subset of the initial set of auction engines, offers to fulfill the proposed purchase, wherein each iteration comprises programmatically-calculated updated auction parameters increasingly favorable to the subscriber until at least one engine has provided a set of auction parameters;

    distributing over an electronic network the set of auction parameters to additional subscribers to the social network platform, thus allowing the additional subscribers to respond with respective indications of interest in joining the proposed purchase;

    receiving at the application server indications of interest to join the proposed purchase from at least a subset of the additional subscribers; and

    upon receipt of the indications of interest from the subset of the additional subscribers, notifying an updated set of automated auction engines, each being associated with a respective seller, of the indications of interest to join the proposed purchase and iteratively receiving, from at least a subset of the updated set of automated auction engines, offers to fulfill the proposed purchase, wherein each iteration comprises programmatically-calculated interim auction parameters increasingly favorable to the additional subscribers and satisfying a seller-specific objective function constrained by one or more seller-specific parameters, until a stopping criteria is met.

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