Method and system for managing and providing sales data using world wide web

• US 6,850,896 B1
• Filed: 10/28/1999
• Issued: 02/01/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 10/28/1999
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Ventaso, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Ventaso, Inc.
• Inventors: Sommers, Corey, Kelman, Ariel
• Primary Examiner(s): Hapiz, Tariq R.
• Assistant Examiner(s): Irshadullah, M.
• Application Number:
  US09/429,240
• Time in Patent Office: 1,923 Days
• Field of Search: 705/1, 705/7, 705/8, 705/10, 705/11, 705/26, 709/250, 709/129, 707/513, 707200-204, 345/689
• US Class Current: 705/7.32
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/0637 Strategic management or analysis, e.g. setting a goal or target of an organisation; Planning actions based on goals; Analysis or evaluation of effectiveness of goals
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/0639 Performance analysis of employees; Performance analysis of enterprise or organisation operations
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/087 Inventory or stock management, e.g. order filling, procurement or balancing against orders
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0203 Market surveys; Market polls
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/06 Buying, selling or leasing transactions
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0601 Electronic shopping [e-shopping]
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99952 Coherency, e.g. same view to multiple users

Abstract

A method and system for managing sales data. One embodiment is a software application that assists in classification, review and approval of data to be stored in a database for the use of a product supplier or seller. In one embodiment, a method includes storing a plurality of data components as groups of data components in a database, wherein the plurality of data components comprises information relating to products, and information relating to customers. The method further includes assigning a subset of the plurality of users to a content review group (“CRG”), and notifying each user in the CRG to provide input regarding individual data components of a group of data components. Input may include indicating whether data components are accurate, entering comments regarding the data components, entering edits to the data components. The method further includes receiving and storing the input, notifying a content director (“CD”) to review the input. Review may include editing the comments entered, deleting the comments entered, and consolidating the input. At least one of the data components is staged to be stored in a central database, based upon the review.

Claims

1. A method for managing sales data, comprising:

storing a plurality of data components as groups of data components in database, the plurality of data components comprising information relating to a company'"'"'s products or services, information relating to customers, said data components created as reusable textual data components for later reassembly into a larger sales or marketing compilations, wherein a structure of the data components in the database is configured to provide logic that permits reassembly of the data components into at least one of visual data sales or marketing Interfaces and sales or marketing documents;

including sales or marketing information comprising product and services information, product and service capabilities;

strategic vision, competitor information, marketing third-party information, technical definitions, benefit statements, value propositions, customer testimonials, customer success stories, customer requirements with a product, customer reason to buy, solutions offered by sales representatives to customers, analyst comments, competitive comparisons, competitive advantages;

market segment nuances, special industry requirements, a prospect'"'"'s level in the company;

customer quotes, quotes or endorsements;

assigning a subset of the plurality of users to a content review group (“

CRG”

);

notifying each user in the CRG to review content stored in the database and said input data components, and to provide content review input regarding individual data components of a group of data components, wherein the input comprises a least one of the following;

indicating whether data components are accurate;

entering sales and marketing comments regarding the data components; and

entering edits to the data components;

receiving and storing the input;

notifying a content director (“

CD”

) to review the CRG'"'"'s content review input, wherein the review comprises at least one of the following;

editing the comments entered;

deleting the comments entered; and

consolidating the input;

said CD determining if said data component should be stored in a central database;

based upon the determination, storing the reviewed date components in the central database;

in response to a query to the data components in the central database generating real time marketing messages to sales representatives that align each of customer requirements with a product and solution offered by the sales representative and

displaying said messages as a visual data interface or producing as sales or marketing document.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein notifying each user in the CRG comprises:

setting an active group flag for a CRG that is designated to participate in review;

setting an active data component group flag for a data component group that is to be reviewed; and

transmitting an electronic mail (“

e-mail”

) to each user in the CRG having the active group flag set, wherein the e-mail requests each user to participate in reviewing the data component group having the active data component flag set.

3. A system for collecting and managing sales data, comprising:

a central database that stores information relating to a plurality of products available from a plurality of suppliers, wherein the information is input by a plurality of users and is stored as data component groups in the central database, wherein at least a portion of the information associate specific capabilities of products and services with customer requirements for a product or solution;

wherein said data components comprise smaller pieces of the input data at a sub-document level and said data components may be reassembled into larger sales compilations,

input data including information selected from product and services information, product and service capabilities;

strategic vision, competitor information, marketing, third-party information, technical definitions, benefit statements, value propositions, customer testimonials, customer success stories, analyst comments, competitive comparisons, customer requirements, customer reason to buy, solutions offered by sales representative to customers, competitive advantages;

market segment nuances and special industry requirements, a prospect'"'"'s level in the company;

customer quotes, analyst quotes, press quotes and endorsements;

at least one World Wide Web server (“

Web server”

);

a plurality of processors, at least one of which stores an authoring application, comprising,

an administrative module; and

a server component that periodically polls the central database to determine when to notify content review group (“

CRG”

) members requesting review of a data component group to perform quality control review of the data; and

hypertext markup language (“

HTML”

) pages that display data components of the data component group, and receive review input based on a determination from the CRG members that is stored in the database;

said authoring application validating that the content is relevant to end user requirements and is up-to date the content being used in providing real time sales messages to sales representatives that concurrently align customer requirements with a product and solution offered by the sales representative that is displayed as a visual data interface or provided as a sales or marketing document.