Enterprise social media management platform with single sign-on

• US 9,311,679 B2
• Filed: 10/31/2011
• Issued: 04/12/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 10/31/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Hearsay Social, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Hearsay Social, Inc.
• Inventors: Shih, Clara, MacCloy, Robert, Hu, Roger, Jin, Yahui, Garrity, Steve
• Primary Examiner(s): Mejia, Anthony
• Assistant Examiner(s): Shah, Mehulkumar
• Application Number:
  US13/285,207
• Publication Number:
  US 20130110922A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,625 Days
• Field of Search: 709/204, 715/753
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/01 Social networking

Abstract

Managing an enterprise social media management platform includes: receiving a request by a user to perform an action on a social media asset that is maintained at an external social media platform; checking whether the user has permission to perform the action on the social media asset, based at least in part on a mapping of the social media asset and a permission level associated with the user; in the event that the user is determined to have permission to perform the action, allowing the user to proceed with the action on the social media asset; and in the event that the user is determined not to have permission to perform the action, disallowing the user to proceed with the action on the social media asset.

Claims

1. A method, comprising:

receiving, at an enterprise social media management platform, a request by a user to perform an action on a social media asset that is maintained at an external social media platform, wherein the social media asset is associated with the user'"'"'s account on the enterprise social media management platform;

redirecting to an external corporate server the request that is received at the enterprise social media management platform to perform the action on the social media asset that is maintained at the external social media platform, the enterprise social media management platform being separate from the external social media platform, and the external corporate server being separate from the external social media platform;

authenticating the user based on an external corporate account of the user on the external corporate server to which the request is redirected;

in the event that the authentication is successful;

determining, using a computer processor of the enterprise social media management platform, whether the user has permission to perform the action on the social media asset maintained at the external social media platform, based at least in part on a mapping of the social media asset and a permission level associated with the user;

in the event that the user is determined to have permission to perform the action on the social media asset maintained at the external social media platform;

proxying by the enterprise social media management platform the request by the user with the external social media platform by modifying the request to appear as a request originating from a different user, wherein the different user is associated with the social media asset and with a previously stored credential that is a credential used to access the social media asset, the previously stored credential being stored on the enterprise social media management platform that redirected to the external corporate server the request to perform the action on the social media asset,

automatically sending by the enterprise social media management platform the previously stored credential associated with the different user to the external social media platform to authenticate the user on the external social media platform, and

allowing the user to proceed with the action that does not exceed the permission level of the user on the social media asset; and

in the event that the user is determined not to have permission to perform the action, disallowing the user to proceed with the action on the social media asset.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the user'"'"'s account is linked to a plurality of social media assets on a plurality of external social media platforms.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the user is logged into the enterprise social media management platform using the external corporate account of the user on the external corporate server, the external corporate account being different from the social media account.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein whether the user has permission to perform the action on the social media asset maintained at the external social media platform is configured on the external corporate server.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein whether the user has permission to perform the action on the social media asset is configured using Active Directory on the external corporate server.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

monitoring activities on the external social media platform;

identifying an inappropriate activity by a user of the external social media platform; and

determining a user identity on the enterprise social media management platform that corresponds to the identified user of the external social media platform.

7. The method of claim 1, further comprising sending an access request to the social media asset platform, the access request comprising a credential of the user on the external social media platform.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising determining a corporate hierarchical position associated with the user.

9. The method of claim 8, further comprising recommending to the user content that corresponds to the corporate hierarchical position.

10. The method of claim 8, further comprising assigning the social media asset to the corporate hierarchical position.

19. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

determining, at the enterprise social media management platform, a corporate hierarchical position of a user within a corporate hierarchy;

recommending social media content to the user according to the corporate hierarchical position of the user within the corporate hierarchy, including;

determining based at least in part on the corporate hierarchical position of the user, among available social media content that is generated on one or more social media sites and that is configured to be appropriate for respective sets of users according to their organizational hierarchy, the social media content that is configured to be appropriate for users having the corporate hierarchical position; and

sending the social media content that is determined based at least in part on the corporate hierarchical position of the user to the user.

20. The method of claim 1, wherein the request is encoded as a Universal Resource Locator (URL) request that includes identification information about the user'"'"'s employer organization.

11. A system, comprising:

a processor configured to;

receive, at an enterprise social media management platform, a request by a user to perform an action on a social media asset that is maintained at an external social media platform, wherein the social media asset is associated with the user'"'"'s account on the enterprise social media management platform;

redirect to an external corporate server the request that is received at the enterprise social media management platform to perform the action on the social media asset that is maintained at the external social media platform, the enterprise social media management platform being separate from the external social media platform, and the external corporate server being separate from the external social media platform;

authenticate the user based on an external corporate account of the user on the external corporate server to which the request is redirected;

in the event that the authentication is successful;

determine whether the user has permission to perform the action on the social media asset maintained at the external social media platform, based at least in part on a mapping of the social media asset and a permission level associated with the user;

in the event that the user is determined to have permission to perform the action on the social media asset maintained at the external social media platform;

proxy the request by the user with the external social media platform by modifying the request to appear as a request originating from a different user, wherein the different user is associated with the social media asset and with a previously stored credential that is a credential used to access the social media asset, the previously stored credential being stored on the enterprise social media management platform that redirected to the external corporate server the request to perform the action on the social media asset,

automatically send the previously stored credential associated with the different user to the external social media platform to authenticate the user on the external social media platform, and

allow the user to proceed with the action that does not exceed the permission level of the user on the social media asset; and

in the event that the user is determined not to have permission to perform the action, disallow the user to proceed with the action on the social media asset; and

a memory coupled to the processor and configured to provide the processor with instructions.

12. The system of claim 11, wherein the user'"'"'s account is linked to a plurality of social media assets on a plurality of external social media platforms.

13. The system of claim 11, wherein the user is logged into the enterprise social media management platform using the external corporate account of the user on the external corporate server, the external corporate account being different from the social media account.

14. The system of claim 11, wherein whether the user has permission to perform the action on the social media asset maintained at the external social media platform is configured on the external corporate server.

15. The system of claim 11, wherein whether the user has permission to perform the action on the social media asset is configured using Active Directory on the external corporate server.

16. The system of claim 11, wherein the processor is further configured to send an access request to the social media asset platform, the access request comprising a credential of the user on the external social media platform.

21. The system of claim 11, wherein the request is encoded as a Universal Resource Locator (URL) request that includes identification information about the user'"'"'s employer organization.

17. A method for managing an enterprise social media management platform, comprising:

determining, at the enterprise social media management platform, a corporate hierarchical position of a first user within a corporate hierarchy, wherein the first user has a similar position in the corporate hierarchy as a second user, the corporate hierarchical positions of the first and second users within the corporate hierarchy being maintained at a corporate server that is external to the enterprise social media management platform;

recommending social media content to the second user according to the determined corporate hierarchical position of the first user within the corporate hierarchy, including;

determining, at the enterprise social media platform, based at least in part on the corporate hierarchical position of the first user that is maintained at the corporate server that is external to the enterprise social media management platform, among available social media content that is generated on one or more social media sites and that is configured to be appropriate for respective sets of users according to their organizational hierarchy, the social media content that is configured to be appropriate for users having the corporate hierarchical position of the first user; and

assigning hierarchical positions to the available social media content;

sending the social media content that matches the determined corporate hierarchical position of the first user to the second user for the second user to take action with respect to the social media content on the one or more social media sites.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein

determining the social media content that is configured to be appropriate for users having the corporate hierarchical position includes matching an assigned hierarchical position of a piece of available social media content with the corporate hierarchical position of the first user.