Method and system for directly targeting and blasting messages to automatically identified entities on social media

• US 8,380,803 B1
• Filed: 11/18/2011
• Issued: 02/19/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 10/12/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Dun & Bradstreet Corp., DUN & Bradstreet Incorporated (Dun & Bradstreet Corp.), Hoover's Incorporated (Dun & Bradstreet Holdings, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Credibility Corp. (Dun & Bradstreet Corp.)
• Inventors: Stibel, Jeffrey M., Stibel, Aaron B.
• Primary Examiner(s): Zele, Krista
• Assistant Examiner(s): CHOUDHURY, AZIZUL Q
• Application Number:
  US13/300,360
• Time in Patent Office: 459 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 709/206
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0201 Market modelling; Market analysis; Collecting market data
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0255 based on user history
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/01 Social networking
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/08 Annexed information, e.g. attachments
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/212 using filtering or selective blocking
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/52 for supporting social networking services
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/72436 for text messaging, e.g. short messaging services [SMS] or e-mails
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/42382 Text-based messaging services in telephone networks such as PSTN/ISDN, e.g. User-to-User Signalling or Short Message Service for fixed networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4786 e-mailing message switching systems, e.g. electronic mail systems H04L51/00
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4788 communicating with other users, e.g. chatting arrangements for providing for computer conferences, e.g. chat rooms, to substation in data switching networks H04L12/1813; distributed application using peer-to-peer [P2P] networks H04L67/104
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99931 Database or file accessing
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99933 Query processing, i.e. searching
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99935 Query augmenting and refining, e.g. inexact access
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99937 Sorting
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/9994 Distributed or remote access
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99941 Database schema or data structure
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99945 Object-oriented database structure processing

Abstract

Some embodiments provide a communication tool that directly sends messages to accounts of different entities across different social media sites by automatically identifying and associating the accounts of the entities when the entities are referenced in the contents of the messages. Such identification and association is performed without the message originator manually specifying the accounts as intended recipients for the messages. The communication tool also automatically sends messages to different social media accounts of the message originator. The communication tool also blasts messages to an information aggregator that aggregates messages to develop a database from which the messages that target a particular entity can be presented irrespective of whether the particular entity has registered an account with any social media site, irrespective of which social media site the messages are originally destined for, and irrespective of whether a recipient is explicitly specified for the messages by the message originator.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method comprising:

providing an interface for composition of a message for distribution across social media;

processing a message composed in said interface, wherein processing the message comprises (i) extracting a plurality of fragments from the message, (ii) querying an entity database by comparing at least one fragment of the message against a plurality of known entity names in said entity database in order to identify a name of at least one entity that matches to the fragment of said message by a specified threshold, wherein the at least one entity is not specified as a recipient for the message, and (iii) retrieving identification information for the at least one identified entity from the entity database;

querying a set of social media sites using the identification information for the at least one entity;

identifying any accounts that the at least one entity that is identified by the identification information has registered at each site of the set of social media sites as a result of the querying, wherein said identifying identifies at least one account that the at least one entity has registered at a particular social media site of the set of social media sites;

obtaining an identifier for the identified account from the particular social media site;

linking the identifier to the message such that the identified account is automatically specified as a recipient for the message; and

passing said message to the account of the identified entity using the obtained identifier without an originator of said message identifying the account of the identified entity.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein querying the entity database comprises matching a fragment of said message that contains identification information to identification information of a known entity.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the identification information comprises at least one of a name, a telephone address, a mailing address, and an email address for said entity.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein querying the set of social media sites using the identification information comprises matching the identification information of the entity to identification information that is associated with an account at the particular social media site.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein said identifier is a first identifier and the particular social media site is a first social media site, the method further comprising obtaining a second identifier for an account that the identified entity has registered at a second social media site, linking the second identifier to the message such that the account at the second social media site is automatically specified as a recipient for the message, and passing said message to the first account of the identified entity using the first identifier and the second account of the identified entity using the obtained second identifier without the originator of said message identifying the first and second accounts.

6. The method of claim 1 further comprising receiving a set identifiers for a set of accounts that the originator has registered at a set of different social media sites and passing said message to each account of the set of accounts of the originator.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein passing said message comprises (i) accessing an account that the message originator has registered at the particular social media site and (ii) passing said message to the account of the identified entity from the account that the message originator has registered at the particular social media site using a messaging format of the particular social media site.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein passing said message comprises passing said message to the account of the identified entity from an account at the particular social media site that is not registered by said message originator using a messaging format of the particular social media site.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein linking said identifier comprises at least one of automatically embedding said identifier in said message and automatically setting said identifier as a destination recipient for said message.

10. The method of claim 1 further comprising providing configuration settings for the message originator to specify the set of social media sites from a plurality of social media sites that said message may be passed to, and wherein the set of social media sites comprises the particular social media site.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein the identifier for the identified account comprises at least one of a username and account handle.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein each of said providing, processing, querying, identifying, obtaining, linking, and passing are performed by a communication tool that runs on a network enabled device of the message originator.

13. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium with an executable program stored thereon, said program for blasting messages across a set of social media sites, wherein said program instructs a microprocessor to perform sets of instructions for:

providing a messaging interface in which to compose a message;

processing said message as it is entered in said messaging interface, wherein the set of instructions for processing the message comprises (i) a set of instructions for extracting a plurality of fragments from the message, (ii) a set of instructions for querying an entity database by comparing at least one fragment of the message against a plurality of known entity names in said entity database in order to identify a name of at least one entity that matches to the fragment of said message by a specified threshold, wherein the at least one entity is not specified as a recipient of said message, and (iii) a set of instructions for retrieving identification information for the at least one identified entity from the entity database;

querying the set of social media sites using the identification information;

identifying any accounts that the at least one entity has registered at each site of the set of social media sites, wherein said set of instructions for identifying identifies at least one account that the at least one entity has registered at a particular social media site of the set of social media sites;

obtaining an identifier for the identified account from the particular social media site; and

disseminating said message to the at least one account using the obtained identifier without a message originator identifying the at least one account.

14. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 13, wherein the set of instructions for disseminating said message comprises sets of instructions for (i) accessing an account of the message originator at a social media site that the at least one account is registered at and (ii) disseminating said message from said account of the message originator using a messaging format of the social media site.

15. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 13, wherein the set of instructions for disseminating said message comprises sets of instructions for (i) accessing an account that is associated with a communication tool executing said program at a social media site that the at least one account is registered at and (ii) disseminating said message from said account using a messaging format of the social media site.

16. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 13, wherein the program further comprises a set of instructions for linking the identifier to said message such that the identified account is automatically specified as a recipient for the message.

17. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 13, wherein the program further comprises a set of instructions for producing a configuration interface for selecting the set of social media sites from a plurality of social media sites from which to identify the at least one account.

18. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 13, wherein the program further comprises a set of instructions for producing a configuration interface for specifying at least one account that the message originator has registered at the set of social media sites.

19. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 18, wherein the program further comprises a set of instructions for disseminating said message by posting said message to the at least one account that the message originator has registered at the set of social media sites.