Services for generation of electronic marketplace listings using personal purchase histories or other indicia of product ownership

• US 7,389,294 B2
• Filed: 05/09/2002
• Issued: 06/17/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 10/31/2001
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc. (Amazon.com, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Amazon.com, Inc.
• Inventors: Roseman, Neil C., Kotas, Paul, Bezos, Jeffrey P., George, Michael M., Tucker, Emily M., Kenny, Erin B., Blackburn, Jeffrey M., Dalzell, Richard L., Moore, Bruce C., Dilley, Alandra S.
• Primary Examiner(s): RUDY, ANDREW J
• Application Number:
  US10/142,655
• Publication Number:
  US 20030204449A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,231 Days
• Field of Search: 705/27, 705/28, 235/376, 235/380, 707/10, 707/104.1, 709/207, 709/223, 719/310
• US Class Current: 707/781
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/087 Inventory or stock management, e.g. order filling, procurement or balancing against orders
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising

Abstract

An online marketplace system provides various features for assisting users in listing products for sale, locating the listings for a product, and performing related actions. A user wishing to sell a product can browse to an existing description of the product in an electronic catalog and then select an option to create a corresponding listing. If the user previously purchased the product via the system, the user may alternatively select the product from a personal purchase history. The system may also proactively send product-specific listing requests to those predicted to own specific products. To create a listing for a selected product, the user preferably specifies the product'"'"'s condition and a selling price. The pending listings for a product are preferably displayed or summarized on the product'"'"'s detail page in the catalog. In one embodiment, the catalog also servers as a retail sales catalog of an online merchant.

Claims

1. In an online sales system that supports user-to-user sales, a system for facilitating the ability for users to list products for sale to other users, the system comprising:

a browsable electronic catalog of products that includes functionality for users to make online purchases of products;

a purchase history tracking component that maintains purchase histories of users of the system, the purchase histories including identifiers of products purchased from the browsable electronic catalog; and

a marketplace listing creation component that supports an ability for a user to specify a product to be listed for sale by selecting the product from an electronic display of at least a portion of the user'"'"'s purchase history, as maintained by the purchase history tracking component, whereby the user may select a used product unit that was previously purchased from the electronic catalog and is currently in the user'"'"'s physical possession, and add a listing within the electronic catalog for reselling the used product unit;

wherein the marketplace listing creation component further provides an option for the user to specify within the listing at least a current condition of the used product unit and a selling price for reselling the used product unit.

2. The system as in claim 1, wherein the marketplace listing creation component enables the user to list the used product unit for sale in the electronic catalog in association with a preexisting catalog description of a corresponding product, without supplying said preexisting catalog description.

3. The system as in claim 1, further comprising a marketplace listing display component that displays pending marketplace product listings in the electronic catalog in association with corresponding product descriptions that are separate from the marketplace product listings.

4. The system as in claim 1, wherein the marketplace listing creation component suggests to the user a selling price for selling a unit of a product.

5. The system as in claim 1, wherein the electronic display comprises a web form that enables the user to select multiple products to list for sale.

6. The system as in claim 1, wherein the electronic display is provided in an email document sent to the user.

7. The system as in claim 1, wherein marketplace listing creation component further supports an ability for a user to specify a product to be listed for sale by browsing to a description of the product within the electronic catalog and then selecting an option to list a unit of the product for sale, said option displayed in the electronic catalog in conjunction with the description of the product.

8. The system as in claim 7, wherein the option to list a unit of the product for sale is further displayed in the electronic catalog in conjunction with an option to purchase a unit of the product.

9. The system as in claim 7, wherein the option to list a unit of the product for sale is further displayed in the electronic catalog in conjunction with an option to preorder a unit of the product from an unspecified marketplace seller.

11. The system of claim 3, wherein marketplace listing display component presents marketplace product listings associated with a common product on a common product detail page of the electronic catalog, such that a buyer may concurrently view corresponding marketplace product listings from multiple different sellers.

12. The system of claim 1, further comprising a listing request component that transmits an email message to the user to notify the user of an option to resell the product unit, said email message including a selectable link for accessing the marketplace listing creation component.

10. A method of listing a product unit for sale within an online marketplace system that supports user-to-user sales, the method comprising:

purchasing products via the online marketplace system over time to generate a purchase history;

browsing an electronic display of the purchase history to locate a description of a previously purchased product to be re-sold, said previously purchased product being one of a plurality of physical products included within the purchase history;

selecting an option associated with listing the previously purchased product for sale, said option provided within the display of the purchase history;

specifying at least a condition of a unit of the product to be listed for sale; and

receiving from the marketplace system an indication of a suggested price for selling the unit of the product, wherein the suggested price is based at least in part on the specified condition.

13. A method for facilitating user creation of online listings for selling items to other users in a user-to-user sales system, the method comprising:

monitoring user actions performed with respect to an electronic catalog of products to detect a user action that evidences ownership by a first user of a first product represented in the electronic catalog of products, said first product being a physical product;

in response to detection of the user action, transmitting to the first user a message that provides an option to list the first product for sale, said option being selectable by the first user to initiate creation of an electronic user-to-user sales listing;

incorporating into the listing an indication of a selling price and a condition of the first product, as specified by the first user; and

adding the listing to the electronic catalog in association with a preexisting description of the first product.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein adding the listing to the electronic catalog comprises adding the listing to a corresponding product detail page that includes listings posted by other sellers of the first product.

15. The method of claim 13, wherein the user action is a purchase of the first product by the first user.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein the message is transmitted to the first user a selected time period after the purchase of the first product by the first user.

17. The method of claim 13, wherein the user action is a purchase of the first product by a second user as a gift for the first user.

18. The method of claim 13, wherein the user action is an electronic submission by the first user of at least one of the following:

(a) a review of the first product;

(b) a rating of the first product.

19. The method of claim 13, wherein the user action is a purchase by the first user of a second product that supercedes the first product.

20. The method of claim 13, wherein the message is transmitted to the first user within an electronic mail communication.

21. The method of claim 20, wherein the electronic mail communication includes a link to a web page that prompts the first user to enter at least a price and condition of the first product.

22. The method of claim 13, wherein the message is transmitted to the first user within a personalized web page.

23. A computer system configured to perform the method of claim 13.

24. A computer-implemented method of facilitating the generation product listings in a network-based system that supports user-to-user sales, the method comprising:

tracking purchases of products made by a user from an electronic catalog over a period of time to generate a personal purchase history for the user, said purchase history representing purchases of multiple different products;

presenting a display of the purchase history to the user together with an option to select a product from the purchase history to list for sale in the electronic catalog, whereby the user can select previously-purchased products to list for re-sale;

obtaining from the user an indication of a condition and a selling price of a product selected from the display of the purchase history;

generating a listing that indicates at least the condition and the selling price of the product as indicated by the user; and

presenting the listing to other users in the electronic catalog in association with a preexisting catalog description of the product.

25. The method of claim 24, wherein the step of presenting the listing comprises presenting the listing on a product detail page that includes listings from other sellers of said product.

26. The method of claim 24, wherein the product is a physical product that is in the possession of the user.

27. The method of claim 24, wherein the display of the purchase history is provided within a web page transmitted to the user.

28. The method of claim 24, wherein the display of the purchase history is provided within an email message transmitted to the user.