Method and system for integrating idea and on-demand services

• US 7,840,413 B2
• Filed: 05/09/2007
• Issued: 11/23/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 05/09/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Salesforce.com, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Salesforce.com, Inc.
• Inventors: Lin, Likuo, Lin, Justin, Yoshida, Norimasa
• Primary Examiner(s): DIXON, THOMAS A
• Application Number:
  US11/801,572
• Publication Number:
  US 20080281610A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,294 Days
• Field of Search: 705/1
• US Class Current: 705/1.1
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising

Abstract

A method and system is provided having a webpage for posting ideas integrated with on-demand customer relationship management. The website associated with the page may be stored in a tenant area of a multitenant database to facilitate maintaining multiple websites for different tenants. A webpage may be sent to a client that includes a plurality of sections, each including at least one idea related to an improvement of a product. Votes may be received for at least one of the plurality of sections. A determination may be made of a Total Qualitative Management Criterion (TQMC) for each section of the website, by applying an increasing function of time to newer votes to enable relative weightings of older votes to diminish over time without requiring computing a decaying time function to determine weightings for each vote. A product modification may be determined based on the TQMC for each section.

Claims

1. A method for providing a web page for posting ideas integrated with an on-demand service, the method comprising:

receiving, at a host system, at least one vote for at least one of a plurality of ideas that were displayed, by a client machine, to a user, on the webpage for posting ideas;

determining, by the host system, a weighting for the at least one vote received from the client machine, based at least in part upon information about the user retrieved from the on demand service;

determining a Total Qualitative Management Criterion (TQMC) for the idea by applying the weighting from the on-demand service to the at least one vote; and

sending, to the client machine, a display of the webpage having at least one idea ranked based on the TQMC.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein determining a Total Qualitative Management Criteria further includes:

applying an increasing function of time to newer votes to enable relative weightings of older votes to diminish over time without requiring computing a decaying time function to determine weightings for each vote.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising providing analytical tools for analyzing a relative desirability of items associated with the ideas.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving a new idea from a user of the webpage having the ideas; and

posting the new idea on the webpage.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving a request from a system of a sponsor of the webpage to remove at least one idea of the plurality of ideas; and

in response, removing the at least one idea.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving a request to replace multiple occurrences of a word on the webpage with another word or phrase; and

in response, replacing the multiple occurrences of the word.

7. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving a request for locating the webpage at a particular domain name; and

in response, locating the webpage at a pre-established URL having that domain name.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

sending to a user of the webpage, tools for reporting to a system of a sponsor of the webpage abuse of the webpage.

9. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

sending tools from a provider of the webpage to a system of a sponsor of the webpage for moderating content on the webpage.

10. The method of claim 1, the webpage being part of a first website provided by a first website providing entity, the method further comprising:

receiving a request from a user to access a part of the webpage that requires logging in;

determining that the user is not logged in; and

sending to the user a login request that is associated with a second website.

11. The method of claim 1, the webpage being part of a first website provided by the host system, which is a host system of a first website providing entity, the method further comprising:

receiving, at the host system of the first website providing entity, information about a second website, which is associated with a host system of a sponsor of the first website; and

configuring a process running on the first host system that is associated with the first website to call a login process that is also called by a process running on the host system of the second website.

12. The method of claim 1, the host system being a host system of a provider of the webpage, the method further comprising sending administrative tools from a provider of the webpage to a system of a sponsor of the webpage.

13. The method of claim 12, the administrative tools including one or more instructions for controlling access to the webpage.

14. The method of claim 12, the administrative tools including one or more instructions for controlling an appearance of the webpage.

15. The method of claim 1, the webpage being part of a first website provided by the host system, which is a host system of a first website providing entity, the method further comprising:

receiving, at the host system of the first website providing entity, a request for locating the webpage at a particular domain name;

in response to the request for locating, locating the webpage at a pre-established URL having that domain name;

receiving a new idea from a user of the webpage;

posting the new idea on the webpage;

in response to one or more requests received from a system of a sponsor of the first website, analyzing a plurality of sections of the webpage for information indicating a relative desirability of features of products associated with the plurality ideas;

receiving a request, via tools for moderating content of the first website, from the system of a sponsor of the website to remove at least one idea of the plurality of the ideas;

in response to receiving the request via the tools for moderating, removing the at least one idea;

receiving, at the host system of the first website providing entity from the system of the sponsor, a request to replace multiple occurrences of a word on the webpage with another word or phrase;

in response to the request to replace, replacing the multiple occurrences of the word;

receiving, at the host system of the provider of the first website from the client machine, via tools for reporting abuse, a report of an abuse of the webpage;

receiving, at the host system of the provider of the first website, a request from a user to access a part of the webpage that requires users to be logged in;

determining that the user is not logged in; and

sending, to a webserver system associated with the sponsor, a login request that is associated with a second website, the login request being for the user.

16. The method of claim 1, the webpage being part of a first website provided by the host system, which is a host system of a first website providing entity, the method further comprising:

sending, to a sponsor'"'"'s system, tools to report abuse of the first website with the first website, the sponsor being a sponsor of the first webpage that is provided by the first webpage providing entity;

receiving at the host system of the first website providing entity from the sponsor'"'"'s system, a request for a choice of a level of service;

sending from the host system, which is associated with a provider of the webpage, administrative tools from the host system of the first webpage providing entity to the system of the sponsor of the webpage;

the administrative tools including at least

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks for controlling access to the webpage, if consistent with the choice of the level of service;

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks for controlling an appearance of the webpage, if consistent with the choice of the level of service;

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks for moderating user interactions, if consistent with the choice of the level of service;

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks for translating text on the webpage from one language to another, if consistent with the choice of the level of service;

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks for causing the first website to appear as part of the second website, if consistent with the choice of the level of service;

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks that cause the first website to invoke a login that is invoked by the second website, if consistent with the choice of the level of service;

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks for analyzing postings on the webpage to determine modifications of one or more products, if consistent with the choice of the level of service; and

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks for downloading data extracted from the postings on the webpage, if consistent with the choice of the level of service.

17. The method of claim 1, the determining of the weighting includes at least retrieving information from a source other than the on-demand service.

53. The method of claim 1, wherein the weighting for the at least one vote is based on the time of the vote, style of voting, or site management selected weightings retrieved from the on-demand service based on an identifying criteria about the user casting the vote prior to being tallied.

56. The method of claim 1, the webpage being part of a first website provided by a first website providing entity, which is a tenant of a multitenant service, the method further comprising:

receiving a request from a user to access a part of the webpage that requires logging in;

determining that the user is not logged in; and

sending to the user a login request that is associated with a second website, that is different from the first website, the second website being associated with the multitenant service.

18. A method for providing a webpage for posting ideas integrated with on-demand customer relationship management, the method comprising:

receiving a webpage at a client machine from a tenant area of a multi-tenant database system, the client machine including at least a monitor, a processor system for implementing the method, a storage system having at least one or more machine readable media storing thereon one or more instructions, one or more instructions for communicating with the server;

the receiving of the webpage includes the processor system accessing the storage system and implementing the one or more instructions,

the webpage for posting ideas including at least a plurality of ideas;

sending from the client machine at least one vote for at least one of the plurality of ideas;

receiving from the multi-tenant database system revisions of the webpage including at least an updated vote; and

displaying by the client machine, the webpage having the at least one idea ranked based on a Total Quality Management Criterion (TQMC) that is based on the vote and on a weighting of the vote.

19. A machine readable medium storing one or more machine instructions for a method comprising:

receiving at a host system, at least one vote for at least one of a plurality of ideas that were displayed, by a client machine, to a user on the webpage for posting ideas;

determining, by the host system, a weighting for the at least one vote received from the client machine, based at least in part upon information about the user retrieved from the on demand service;

determining a Total Qualitative Management Criterion (TQMC) for the idea by applying the weighting from the on-demand service to the at least one vote; and

sending, to the client machine, a display of the webpage having at least one idea ranked based on the TQMC.

20. The machine readable medium of claim 19, wherein determining a Total Qualitative Management Criteria further includes:

applying an increasing function of time to newer votes to enable relative weightings of older votes to diminish over time without requiring computing a decaying time function to determine weightings for each vote.

21. The machine readable medium of claim 19, the method further comprising providing analytical tools for analyzing a relative desirability of items associated with the ideas.

22. The machine readable medium of claim 19, the method further comprising:

receiving a new idea from a user of the webpage having the ideas; and

posting the new idea on the webpage.

23. The machine readable medium of claim 19, the method further comprising:

receiving a request from a system of a sponsor of the webpage to remove at least one idea of the plurality of ideas; and

in response removing the at least one idea.

24. The machine readable medium of claim 19, the method further comprising:

receiving a request to replace multiple occurrences of a word on the webpage with another word or phrase; and

in response replacing the multiple occurrences of the word.

25. The machine readable medium of claim 19, the method further comprising:

receiving a request for locating a webpage at a particular domain name; and

in response locating the webpage at a pre-established URL having that domain name.

26. The machine readable medium of claim 19, the method further comprising:

sending to a user of the webpage, tools for reporting to a system of a sponsor of the webpage abuse of the webpage.

27. The machine readable medium of claim 19, the method further comprising sending tools from a provider of the webpage to a system of a sponsor of the webpage for moderating content on the webpage.

28. The machine readable medium of claim 19, the webpage being part of a first website provided by a first website providing entity, the method further comprising:

receiving a request from a user to access a part of the webpage that requires logging in;

determining that the user is not logged in; and

sending to the user a login request that is associated with a second website.

29. The machine readable medium of claim 19, the webpage being part of a first website provided by the host system, which is a host system of a first website providing entity, the method further comprising

receiving at the host system of the first website providing entity, information about a second website, which is associated with a host system of a sponsor of the first website;

and

configuring a process running on the first host system that is associated with the first website to call a login process that is also called by a process running on the host system of the second website.

30. The machine readable medium of claim 19, the host system being a host system of a provider of the webpage, the method further comprising sending administrative tools from a provider of the webpage to a system of a sponsor of the webpage.

31. The machine readable medium of claim 30, the administrative tools including one or more instructions for controlling access to the webpage.

32. The machine readable medium of claim 30, the administrative tools including one or more instructions for controlling an appearance of the webpage.

33. The machine readable medium of claim 19, the webpage being part of a first website provided by the host system, which is a host system of a first website providing entity, the method further comprising:

receiving at the host system of the first website providing entity a request for locating the webpage at a particular domain name;

in response to the request for locating, locating the webpage at a pre-established URL having that domain name;

receiving a new idea from a user of the webpage;

posting the new idea on the webpage;

in response to one or more requests received from a system of a sponsor of the first website, analyzing the plurality of sections for information indicating a relative desirability of features of products associated with the plurality ideas;

receiving a request, via tools for moderating content of the first website, from the system of the sponsor of the website to remove at least one idea of the plurality of the ideas;

in response to receiving the request via the tools for moderating, removing the at least one idea;

receiving at the host system of the first website providing entity from the sponsor'"'"'s system, a request to replace multiple occurrences of a word on the webpage with another word or phrase;

in response to the request to replace, replacing the multiple occurrences of the word;

receiving, at the host system of the provider of the first website from the client machine, via tools for reporting abuse, a report of an abuse of the webpage;

receiving, at the host system of the provider of the first website, a request from a user to access a part of the webpage that requires users to be logged in;

determining that the user is not logged in; and

sending to a webserver system associated with the sponsor, a login request that is associated with a second website, the login request being for the user.

34. The machine readable medium of claim 19, the webpage being part of a first website provided by the host system which is a host system of a first website providing entity, the method further comprising:

sending to a sponsor'"'"'s system, tools to report abuse of the first website by the first website, the sponsor being a sponsor of the first webpage that is provided by the first webpage providing entity;

receiving at the host system of the first website providing entity from the sponsor'"'"'s system, a request for choice of a level of service;

sending from the host system, which is associated with a provider of the webpage, administrative tools from the host system of the first webpage providing entity to the system of the sponsor of the webpage;

the administrative tools including at least

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks for controlling access to the webpage, if consistent with the choice of the level of service;

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks for controlling an appearance of the webpage, if consistent with the choice of the level of service;

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks for moderating user interactions, if consistent with the choice of the level of service;

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks for translating text on the webpage from one language to another, if consistent with the choice of the level of service;

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks for causing the first website to appear as part of the second website, if consistent with the choice of the level of service;

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks that cause the first website to invoke a login that is invoked by the second website, if consistent with the choice of the level of service;

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks for analyzing postings on the webpage to determine modifications of one or more products, if consistent with the choice of the level of service; and

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks for downloading data extracted from the postings on the webpage, if consistent with the choice of the level of service.

35. The machine readable medium of claim 19, the determining of the weighting includes at least retrieving information from a source other than the on-demand service.

36. A system comprising:

the machine readable medium of claim 19;

a web server for implementing the method stored on the machine readable medium; and

a web database for storing information associated with a website that is associated with the tenant.

54. The machine readable medium of claim 19, wherein the weighting for the at least one vote is based on the time of the vote, style of voting, or site management selected weightings retrieved from the on-demand service based on an identifying criteria about the user casting the vote prior to being tallied.

57. The machine readable medium of claim 19, the webpage being part of a first website provided by a first website providing entity, which is a tenant of a multitenant service, the method further comprising:

receiving a request from a user to access a part of the webpage that requires logging in;

determining that the user is not logged in; and

sending to the user a login request that is associated with a second website, that is different from the first website, the second website being associated with the multitenant service.

37. A system for providing a web page for posting ideas integrated with an on-demand service, the system comprising:

a host system having

a processor system,

volatile memory, and

non-volatile memory;

the non-volatile memory including at least one machine readable medium carrying one or more sequences of instructions for which when implemented causes the processor system to implement a method comprising;

receiving, at a host system, at least one vote for at least one of a plurality of ideas that were displayed, by a client machine, to a user on the webpage for posting ideas;

determining by the host system, a weighting for the at least one vote received from the client machine, based at least in part upon information about the user retrieved from the on demand service;

determining a Total Qualitative Management Criterion (TQMC) for the idea by applying, the weighting from the on-demand service to the at least one vote; and

sending, to the client machine, a display of the webpage having at least one idea ranked based on the TQMC.

38. The system of claim 37, the determination of a Total Qualitative Management Criteria further includes:

applying an increasing function of time to newer votes received from the client machine, to enable relative weightings of older votes to diminish over time without requiring computing a decaying time function to determine weightings for each vote.

39. The system of claim 37, the method further comprising providing analytical tools for analyzing a relative desirability of items associated with the ideas.

40. The system of claim 37, the method further comprising:

receiving a new idea from a user of the webpage having the ideas; and

posting the new idea on the webpage.

41. The system of claim 37, the method further comprising:

receiving a request from a system of a sponsor of the webpage to remove at least one idea of the plurality of ideas; and

in response, removing the at least one idea.

42. The system of claim 37, the method further comprising:

receiving a request to replace multiple occurrences of a word on the webpage with another word or phrase; and

in response, replacing the multiple occurrences of the word.

43. The system of claim 37, the host system being a host system of a provider of the webpage, the method further comprising:

receiving a request for locating the webpage at a particular domain name; and

in response, locating the webpage at a pre-established URL having that domain name.

44. The system of claim 37, the host system being a host system of a provider of the webpage, the method further comprising:

sending to a user of the webpage, tools for reporting to a system of a sponsor of the webpage abuse of the webpage.

45. The system of claim 37, the host system being a host system of a provider of the webpage, the method further comprising:

sending tools from a provider of the webpage to a system of a sponsor of the webpage for moderating content on the webpage.

46. The system of claim 37, the webpage being part of a first website provided by the host system, which is a host system of a first website providing entity, the method further comprising:

receiving a request from a user to access a part of the webpage that requires logging in;

determining that the user is not logged in; and

sending to the user a login request that is associated with a second website.

47. The system of claim 37, the webpage being part of a first website provided by the host system, which is a host system of a first website providing entity, the method further comprising:

receiving, at the host system of the first website providing entity, information about a second website, which is associated with a host system of a sponsor of the first website; and

configuring a process running on the first host system that is associated with the first website to call a login process that is also called by a process running on the host system of the second website.

48. The system of claim 37, the host system being a host system of a provider of the webpage, the method further comprising sending administrative tools from a provider of the webpage to a system of a sponsor of the webpage.

49. The system of claim 48, the administrative tools including one or more instructions for controlling access to the webpage.

50. The system of claim 48, the administrative tools including one or more instructions for controlling the appearance of the webpage.

51. The system of claim 37, the webpage being part of a first website provided by the host system, which is a host system of a first website providing entity, the first website being sponsored by a sponsor, the method further comprising:

receiving, at the host system of the first website providing entity, a request for locating the webpage at a particular domain name that already exists;

in response to the request for locating, locating the webpage at a pre-established URL having that domain name;

receiving a new idea from a user of the webpage;

posting the new idea on the webpage;

in response to one or more requests received from a system of the sponsor, analyzing a plurality of sections for information indicating a relative desirability of features of products associated with the plurality ideas;

receiving at the host system of the first website providing entity a request, by tools for moderating content of the first website, from the sponsor'"'"'s system to remove at least one idea of the plurality of the ideas;

in response to receiving the request by the tools for moderating, removing the at least one idea;

receiving at the host system of the provider of the first website from the sponsor'"'"'s system, a request to replace multiple occurrences of a word on the webpage with another word or phrase;

in response to the request to replace, replacing the multiple occurrences of the word;

receiving, at the host system of the provider of the first website from the client machine, by tools for reporting abuse, a report of an abuse of the webpage;

receiving, at the host system of the provider of the first website, a request from the client machine, which is associated with a user, to access a part of the webpage that requires users to be logged in;

determining that the user is not logged in; and

sending to a webserver system associated with the sponsor, a login request that is associated with a second website, the login request being for the user.

52. The system of claim 37, the webpage being part of a first website provided by the host system, which is a host system of a first website providing entity, the method further comprising:

sending, to a sponsor'"'"'s system, tools to report abuse of the first website by the first website, the sponsor being a sponsor of the first webpage that is provided by the first webpage providing entity;

receiving at the host system of the first website providing entity from the sponsor'"'"'s system, a request for a choice of a level of service;

sending from the host system, which is associated with a provider of the webpage, administrative tools from the host system of the first webpage providing entity to the system of the sponsor of the webpage;

the administrative tools including at least

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks for controlling access to the webpage, if consistent with the choice of the level of service;

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks for controlling an appearance of the webpage, if consistent with the choice of the level of service;

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks for moderating user interactions, if consistent with the choice of the level of service;

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks for translating text on the webpage from one language to another, if consistent with the choice of the level of service;

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks for causing the first website to appear as part of the second website, if consistent with the choice of the level of service;

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks that cause the first website to invoke a login that is invoked by the second website, if consistent with the choice of the level of service;

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks for analyzing postings on the webpage to determine modifications of one or more products, if consistent with the choice of the level of service; and

one or more links for invoking one or more tasks for downloading data extracted from the postings on the webpage, if consistent with the choice of the level of service.

55. The system of claim 37, wherein the weighting for the at least one vote is based on the time of the vote, style of voting, or site management selected weightings retrieved from the on-demand service based on an identifying criteria about the user casting the vote prior to being tallied.

58. The system of claim 37, the webpage being part of a first website provided by a first website providing entity, which is a tenant of a multitenant service, the method further comprising:

receiving a request from a user to access a part of the webpage that requires logging in;

determining that the user is not logged in; and

sending to the user a login request that is associated with a second website, that is different from the first website, the second website being associated with the multitenant service.