System and method for integrated recommendations

• US 9,767,506 B2
• Filed: 03/31/2014
• Issued: 09/19/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 09/24/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Versata Development Group, Inc. (ESW Capital, LLC)
• Original Assignee: Versata Development Group, Inc. (ESW Capital, LLC)
• Inventors: Singh, James, Thier, Neil C., Hyams, Chris, Wilbur, Thomas W.
• Primary Examiner(s): Airapetian, Mila
• Application Number:
  US14/230,759
• Publication Number:
  US 20140214594A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,268 Days
• Field of Search: 705 267
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0631 Item recommendations
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0633 Lists, e.g. purchase orders, compilation or processing

Abstract

A recommendation appliance, system and method are provided for generating and deploying additional web page content or functionality (e.g., retail recommendations) to an existing web page server system. For example, the present invention may be embodied as a reverse proxy server that is inserted as an intermediate network node between a web server and the end users accessing the web server. In this position, the recommendation appliance can introduce recommendation messages to web pages generated by the web server without requiring any modification to the code or architecture of the web server. In addition, the appliance may separately track the transaction activities of end users who receive recommendation messages and the transaction activities of end users who do not receive recommendation messages, so that a comparison of the effectiveness of the recommendations may efficiently be demonstrated without requiring any modification to the code or architecture of the web server.

Claims

1. A server computer system for introducing recommendation messages in a web page server system, comprising:

a first port for communicating with at least one end user computer that comprises a web browser for issuing web page requests and displaying requested web pages;

a second port for communicating with at least one web server computer that generates requested web page content in response to a web page request;

at least one processing device; and

a memory having stored thereon executable instructions and data which, when executed by the at least processing device, configure the server computer system as a recommendation appliance to;

determine a load balanced communication path for a received web page request across one or more communication paths to one or more computing resources;

forward a web page request received from a first end user computer at the first port through the second port and over an identified load balanced communication path to a first web server computer identified in the web page request;

receive at the second port a requested web page comprising original web page content from the first web server computer that is generated in response to the web page request from the first end user computer;

generate at least one purchase recommendation based on a recommendation context that is extracted from the web page request or from the requested web page received from the first web server computer;

modify the original web page content to include the purchase recommendation, thereby generating a modified web page; and

return the modified web page through the first port to the first end user computer.

2. The server computer system of claim 1, comprising a first load balancer server for determining the load balanced communication path, and one or more content modification servers for generating at least one purchase recommendation.

3. The server computer system of claim 1, comprising a first load balancer server for determining the load balanced communication path, and a plurality of content modification servers connected in series for generating at least one purchase recommendation.

4. The server computer system of claim 1, where at least one of the one or more content modification servers modifies the original web page content to include a purchase recommendation as part of the modified web page content, and where at least one of the one or more content modification servers modifies the original web page content to include a selling point message as part of the modified web page content.

5. The server computer system of claim 1, where the server computer system comprises a reverse proxy server.

6. The server computer system of claim 1, where the server computer system comprises a load balancing server and a reverse proxy server for generating the at least one purchase recommendation.

7. The server computer system of claim 1, comprising a combined server for determining the load balanced communication path, and for generating at least one purchase recommendation.

8. A computer-based method of generating recommendations at an integrated recommendation proxy server for potential purchase by a customer, comprising:

receiving a web page request from an client computer;

forwarding the web page request to a web server identified in the web page request;

generating a purchase recommendation based on a recommendation context associated with the web page request;

receiving a requested web page comprising original web page content from the web server that is generated in response to the web page request;

modifying the original web page content to include the purchase recommendation, thereby generating a modified web page; and

returning the modified web page to the client computer.

9. The method of generating recommendations of claim 8, where generating a purchase recommendation comprises selecting from among a plurality of association rules to identify a plurality of candidate recommendations having a trigger that matches the recommendation context associated with the web page request.

10. The method of generating recommendations of claim 8, further comprising modifying the web page request to adapt any part of the web page request that corresponds to previously modified functionality or content such that the web server identified in the web page request can interpret the web page request.

11. The method of generating recommendations of claim 8, further comprising modifying the web page request to adapt any part of the web page request that corresponds to a purchase recommendation included in a previously returned modified web page so that the web server identified in the web page request can interpret the web page request.

12. The method of generating recommendations of claim 8, where the recommendation context comprises order history information associated with a user who issued the web page request.

13. The method of generating recommendations of claim 8, where the recommendation context is selected from the group consisting of current user activity of the customer at the client computer, past activity of other users who have submitted web page requests, order history information, catalog information, and customer order-related information.

14. The method of generating recommendations of claim 8, where modifying the original web page content comprises configuring the modified web page content to display a plurality of purchase recommendations in order of relevance priority.

15. The method of generating recommendations of claim 8, where modifying the original web page content comprises configuring the modified web page content to display a plurality of purchase recommendations using qualitative attribute values.

16. The method of generating recommendations of claim 8, where modifying the original web page content comprises configuring the modified web page content to display a plurality of purchase recommendations using time-variant attribute values.