Providing called number characteristics to click-to-dial customers

• US 8,090,085 B2
• Filed: 05/28/2010
• Issued: 01/03/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 10/12/2005
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: AT&T Corporation (AT&T, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: AT&T Intellectual Property I LP (AT&T, Inc.)
• Inventors: Di Fabbrizio, Giuseppe, Gupta, Narendra K.
• Primary Examiner(s): Sing, Simon
• Application Number:
  US12/790,649
• Publication Number:
  US 20100239076A1
• Time in Patent Office: 585 Days
• Field of Search: 379/88.17
• US Class Current: 379/88.17
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/27475 using interactive graphical means or pictorial representations
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/06 Recording class or number of calling , i.e. A-party or called party , i.e. B-party
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/83 Notification aspects
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/8351 before establishing a communication
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/8353 during the communication
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/84 Types of notifications
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/844 Message, e.g. SMS
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/846 optical, e.g. icon
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2215/81 Notifying aspects, e.g. notifications or displays to the user
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2215/8108 before establishing a communication
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2215/8112 during the communication
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2215/8129 Type of notification
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2215/8137 Message, e.g. alphanumeric text, SMS, MMS, EMS or www-based messaging service
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2215/8141 Optical, e.g. flashing indication of a lamp, icon, soft-key or symbol
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 7/003 Click to dial services

Abstract

A system and method to provide content and call attributes for a destination phone number using a click-to-dial connection includes accepting a query, retrieving links to a document, and searching through cached data using the query to identify relevant or destination number information. If no match is found, the method continues with accessing the document identified by the link for identifying relevant number information and creating a click-to-dial icon to link to the relevant numbers included in the relevant phone number information identified by the query. Next, a popup box for content relevant to the click-to-dial icon and a click feature on the popup box are created to retrieve call destination attributes for viewing by a user. Further, computer instructions create at least one communication connection between two communication devices after viewing call destination attributes.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method, comprising:

identifying, via a computing device, a phone number of an icon presented to a user of a web page;

in response to the icon being selected by the user via a selection of a first type, providing, via the computing device, call destination attributes of the phone number for presentation to the user; and

subsequently, in response to the icon in addition being selected by the user via a selection of a second type, responsive to the user having viewed the call destination attributes, initiating, via the computing device, a call to the phone number.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the selection of the first type is made via positioning a cursor over the icon;

and the selection of the second type is made via clicking on the icon.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the selection of the second type includes the selection of the first type.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the call destination attributes are presented in a popup box.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

retrieving the call destination attributes from a database in content data storage, in response to the selection of the first type.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the phone number is determined based at least in part on the web page.

7. The method of claim 6, further comprising:

determining the phone number based on real traffic records.

8. The method of claim 6, further comprising:

retrieving, via the computing device, a document according to a link in the web page; and

scanning the document to determine the phone number.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the web page comprises search results obtained in response to a query;

and the scanning of the document to determine the phone number comprises selecting the phone number from a plurality of phone numbers identified from the document based on relevancy to the query.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein selecting is based at least in part on proximity ranking.

11. The method of claim 9, wherein scanning comprises identify information having a phone number relevant to the query to identify candidates for the phone number of the icon.

12. The method of claim 11, further comprising:

finding, via the computing device, the information in cached data, wherein retrieving and scanning are performed if the information is not found in the cached data.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein the icon floats over web pages presented to the user;

and the method further comprises;

linking, via the computing device, the phone number to the icon in response to the phone number being identified based on the web page.

14. The method of claim 1, wherein the call is to connect a first communication device of the user to a second communication device at the phone number.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein each of the first communication device and the second communication device are the same type of device selected from the group comprising a computer, a personal digital assistant, a voice over Internet protocol phone, a public switched telephone network phone, a soft phone and a cell phone.

16. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

providing, via the computing device, a list of previous calls made to the phone number, in response to the selection via the selection of the first type.

17. The method of claim 1, wherein the call destination attributes comprise one of:

an indication of a type of the phone number, a name of a person, and an identification of an affiliation of the person.

18. The method of claim 1, wherein the call destination attributes comprise a suggested time to call the destination number.

19. A tangible computer-readable medium storing instructions that, when executed by a computing device, cause the computing device to perform a method, the method comprising:

identifying a phone number of an icon presented to a user of a web page;

in response to the icon being selected by the user via a selection of a first type, providing call destination attributes of the phone number for presentation to the user; and

subsequently, in response to the icon in addition being selected by the user via a selection of a second type, responsive to the user having viewed the call destination attributes, initiating, via the computing device, a call to the phone number.

20. A computer system, comprising:

a processor configured to present to a user of a web page an icon having a phone number;

wherein the processor is further configured to, in response to the icon being selected by the user via a selection of a first type, present call destination attributes of the phone number to the user; and

wherein the processor is further configured to, subsequently, in response to the icon in addition being selected by the user via a selection of a second type, responsive to the user having viewed the call destination attributes, initiate a call to the phone number.