METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR PROVIDING RECOMMENDATIONS USING LOCATION INFORMATION

• US 20140244742A1
• Filed: 02/26/2013
• Published: 08/28/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 02/26/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Century Creator International Limited
• Original Assignee: Portaura Group
• Inventors: Yu, Jin, Yu, Xunhui, Wen, Jia
• Granted Patent: US 9,621,600 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/204
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/01 Social networking
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/403 Arrangements for multi-party communication, e.g. for conferences data switching systems for conference H04L12/18; arrangements for connecting several subscribers to a common circuit, i.e. affording conference facilities H04M3/56; television conferencing systems H04N7/15
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/306 User profiles
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/52 specially adapted for the location of the user terminal
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/568 Storing data temporarily at an intermediate stage, e.g. caching
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/02 Services making use of location information
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/029 Location-based management or tracking services
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/21 for social networking applications

Abstract

The present invention is directed to system and method for providing recommendation to users using location information. In various embodiments, the present invention provides system that integrates information from user profiles and user-generated content, which can be obtained from a number of social networks, and merchants, to generate recommendations using location information in conjunction with the context of user profiles from various data sources and/or social networks. In certain embodiments, user generated-contents, user profiles and relationships thereof are collected, integrated, analyzed, and stored to allow them to be useful and usable in making recommendations. There are other embodiments as well.

Claims

1. A method for providing information to one or more users, the method comprising:

storing user profiles for a plurality of users using one or more computer readable medium, the plurality of user profiles comprising a first user profiles for a first user;

receiving a location update from the first user;

processing the location update;

determining whether one or more servers comprise information of interest related to the location update obtained within a predetermined time period;

requesting information of interest from one or more data sources if the one or more servers has no information of interest related to the location update obtained within a predetermined time period, the one or more data sources comprising user data information, the one or more data sources being associated with one or more social networks;

requesting information of interest from the one or more servers if the one or more servers has information of interest related to the location update obtained within a predetermined time period;

processing the information of interest based on the location update and user relationship information related to the first user;

generating recommendations for the first user; and

sending the recommendations to the first user.

2. The method of claim 1 further comprising determining a relevance value using at least the information of interest.

3. The method of claim 1 further comprising the first profiles comprising information related to a plurality of social networks.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein the one or more servers comprise a caching server.

5. The method of claim 1 further comprising storing one the information of interests into a plurality of caching servers.

6. The method of claim 1 where in the one or more data sources include Facebook, Google+, Foursquare, and/or Twitter.

7. The method of claim 1 wherein the recommendations include merchant information.

8. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

determining a relevance value associated with the information of interest;

comparing the relevance value to a predetermined threshold value.

9. The method of claim 1 further comprising receiving a user request for recommendations.

17. The method of claim 9 wherein the recommendations including merchant information.

10. A method for providing information to a merchant, the method comprising:

receiving a request from a merchant over a data communication network;

determining a location from the merchant;

determining whether one or more servers comprise user information obtained within a predetermined time period, the user information comprises location and interest information associated with a plurality of users;

requesting user information from one or more data sources if the one or more servers has no user information obtained within a predetermined time period, the one or more data sources comprising user data information, the one or more data sources being associated with one or more social networks;

requesting user information from the one or more servers if the one or more servers has user information obtained within a predetermined time period;

processing the information of interest based on the merchant request and user relationship information related to the merchant;

generating recommendations for the merchant; and

sending the recommendations to the merchant.

11. The method of claim 10 wherein the one or more servers include three levels of storage modules.

12. The method of claim 10 wherein the information of interest comprises one or more relevance values.

13. The method of claim 10 wherein the one or more servers comprises a caching server.

14. The method of claim 10 further comprising identifying a plurality of users within a proximity of merchant location.

15. The method of claim 10 further comprising sending discount information to the first user, the discount information being associated with the merchant.

16. The method of claim 10 where in the one or more data source includes Facebook server, Google+ server, Foursquare, and/or Twitter.

18. A method for generating recommendations, the method comprising:

processing a user profile stored at a computer readable medium, the user profile comprising information for a first location and a plurality of factors;

retrieving relationship information and content associated with the first user from one or more social network services;

determining a first user preference;

obtaining a metric for generating user recommendations, the metric including relevance factors and factor weights associated with relevance factors;

selecting a first entity associated with the first user using the relationship information;

determining a relevance value using the metric and the relationship information;

comparing the relevance value to a predetermined threshold value; and

generating a recommendation associated with the first entity if the relevance value is greater than or equal to the predetermined threshold value.

19. The method of claim 18 further comprising modifying the metric.

20. The method of claim 18 further comprising obtaining the relationship information from a data warehouse.

21. The method of claim 18 wherein the first entity is a second user or a merchant.

22. The method of claim 18 further comprising:

selecting a second entity associated with the first user using the relationship information;

determining whether to make a recommendation of the second entity to the first user.

23. The method of claim 18 wherein the first user is a merchant.