Systems and methods relating to a lead distribution engine with quality assessment of lead sources

• US 8,352,306 B2
• Filed: 01/09/2008
• Issued: 01/08/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 01/09/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: AutoWeb, Inc. (California)
• Original Assignee: Autobytel Incorporated
• Inventors: Rose, C. Michael, Mathews, Peter D., Sward, Jeffrey E., Dunkle, Glenn R., Dohoney, John L., Davis, Glenn S.
• Primary Examiner(s): DIXON, THOMAS A
• Application Number:
  US11/971,822
• Publication Number:
  US 20080201204A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,826 Days
• Field of Search: 705/7.29
• US Class Current: 705/7.29
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06395 Quality analysis or management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0201 Market modelling; Market analysis; Collecting market data

Abstract

Lead distribution systems and methods distribute consumer business leads received from lead sources for routing to one or more destinations that use the leads and/or forward the leads to another destination. A quality level is assessed for each lead source, based in part on a percentage of leads from the source that result in a desired business transaction with the ultimate user of the lead. The system identifies a set of most profitable destinations for each lead, while maintaining a desired overall quality level and flow rate of leads routed to each destination. Adjusting the quality ratings of the lead sources may advantageously be used to affect the placement of their leads with destinations.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method of managing the distribution of business leads received from lead sources to lead destinations, comprising:

maintaining a computing system comprising one or more computer processors in communication with computer readable storage, wherein the computing system is configured to route business leads received from lead sources to lead destinations;

maintaining, in computer readable storage, information about a target number of business leads to be routed, for the computing system, to each of a set of lead destinations per a given time period;

tracking, by the computing system, information about an actual number of business leads distributed to each lead destination in the set of lead destinations;

assigning a quality ranking to a lead source, wherein the quality ranking is associated by the computing system with a numerical multiplier; and

in response to receiving an offer of a business lead from the lead source;

identifying, by the computing system, a subset of the set of lead destinations as candidate purchasers for the business lead;

multiplying, by the computing system, the numerical multiplier of the lead source by the target number for each candidate purchaser for the business lead to calculate a modified target number for each candidate purchaser;

removing from the set of candidate purchasers, by the computing system, candidate purchasers to which has already been distributed a number of leads equal to or greater than their modified target number of business leads for the given time period; and

distributing the business lead, by the computing system, to one or more candidate purchasers that remain in the set of candidate purchasers and that have been distributed a number of leads that is less than their modified target number.

2. The computer-implemented method of managing the distribution of business leads of claim 1, further comprising:

temporarily assigning the lead source a numerical multiplier greater than 1.00, to temporarily increase the set of lead destinations to which a lead from the lead source can be distributed.

3. The computer-implemented method of managing the distribution of business leads of claim 1, further comprising:

assigning, by the computing system, one or more lead sources to be included in a target override group; and

in response to electronically receiving, by the computing system, a business lead from a lead source that is in the target override group, refraining from blocking the business lead from being offered to a candidate purchase based on the candidate purchaser'"'"'s target number of business leads for the given time period.

4. The computer-implemented method of managing the distribution of business leads of claim 3, wherein refraining from blocking the business lead from being offered to a lead destination comprises associating a sufficiently large numerical multiplier with the lead source such that a resulting modified target number is greater than a number of leads already distributed to the lead destination.

5. The computer-implemented method of managing the distribution of business leads of claim 1, further comprising:

collecting information about leads that have been distributed by the computing system, including, but not limited to, a percentage of leads received from a given lead source that have resulted in a desired business transaction; and

assigning the quality ranking to the given lead source based, at least in part, on the percentage of leads received from the given lead source that result in the desired business transaction.

6. The computer-implemented method of managing the distribution of business leads of claim 5, further comprising:

continuing to collect information about leads that have been distributed by the computing system to lead destinations, including, but not limited to, an updated percentage of leads received from the given lead source that result in the desired business transaction; and

modifying the quality ranking associated with the lead source in accordance with the updated collected information.

7. The computer-implemented method of managing the distribution of distributing business leads of claim 1, wherein the given time period is a day.

8. The computer-implemented method of managing the distribution of distributing business leads of claim 1, wherein the given time period is a week.

9. The computer-implemented method of managing the distribution of distributing business leads of claim 1, wherein the given time period is a month.

10. The computer-implemented method of managing the distribution of business leads of claim 1, further comprising:

temporarily assigning the lead source a numerical multiplier less than 1.00 to temporarily block more leads from being routed to the lead destinations from the lead source.