SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR WORD-OF-MOUTH ADVERTISING

• US 20090183112A1
• Filed: 07/25/2008
• Published: 07/16/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 01/16/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: R2 Solutions LLC (Acacia Research Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Yahoo! Inc. (Apollo Global Management, Inc.)
• Inventors: O'Sullivan, Joseph, Higgins, Christopher William, Martinez, Ronald, Davis, Marc
• Granted Patent: US 10,074,093 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/808
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0225 Avoiding frauds
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0241 Advertisements
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/01 Social networking

Abstract

A system and method to facilitate word-of-mouth advertising and sales support associated with displayed media objects on distributed networks is described. The system provides one or more advocates to a network user accessing advertising of a brand, product, or service. One or more of the advocates may be socially related to the user. User interactions with the advocates are facilitated through a real-time communication network, follow-on commercial activity is tracked, and the value of word-of-mouth advocacy is captured and distributed.

Claims

1. A dynamic web page, comprising:

at least one line item, each line item being related to a subject matter of a search request and activatably linked to a different web page;

at least one media object, each media object representing an entity associated with the subject matter of the search request; and

at least one augmenting object, each augmenting object representing an advocate associated with the entity represented by one of the at least one media object and including at least one activatable communication channel with the advocate,

wherein the user interface is a dynamic web page constructed in response to the search request.

2. A dynamic web page as recited in claim 1, wherein the advocate represented by each of the at least one augmenting object is socially connected to a user initiating the search request.

3. A dynamic web page as recited in claim 2, wherein a social connection between an advocate and the user is one selected from the group consisting of ethnicity, age, sex, educational level, educational institutions, economic class, profession, geographic area, expressed user preferences, derived user preferences, and membership in a demographic group.

4. A dynamic web page as recited in claim 1, wherein each of the at least one augmenting object is displayed in close proximity with the media object with whose entity the advocate represented by the augmenting object is associated.

5. A dynamic web page as recited in claim 4, wherein selected ones of the at least one augmenting object are displayed statically, such that they are always visible to the user when the dynamic web page is displayed.

6. A dynamic web page as recited in claim 4, wherein selected ones of the at least one augmenting object are displayed dynamically, such that they are only visible to the user when the user interacts with the associated ones of the at least one media objects.

7. A dynamic web page as recited in claim 1, further comprising:

at least one page augmenting object, each page augmenting object representing an advocate associated with a theme of the dynamic web page and including at least one activatable communication channel with the advocate.

8. A dynamic web page as recited in claim 7, wherein the advocate represented by each page augmenting object is socially connected to a user initiating the search request.

9. A dynamic web page as recited in claim 7, wherein the at least one page augmenting object is displayed in a location selected from the group consisting of a left drawer, a right drawer, a bottom drawer, a left sidebar, a right sidebar, a bottom bar, a toolbar, a tear-off window, a pop-up window, a tabbed window, and a pop-up menu list.

10. A dynamic web page as recited in claim 7, wherein activation of each of the at least one augment object or each of the at least one page augmenting object initiates communication between the user and the advocate represented by the augment object or the page augmenting object.

11. A dynamic web page as recited in claim 1, wherein each of the at least one augment object further includes an affiliation between the advocate represented by the augment object and the entity with which the advocate is associated.

12. A portable device user interface, comprising:

a page, including;

an advertisement; and

at least one augmenting object, each augmenting object representing an advocate associated with a subject matter of the advertisement and including at least one activatable communication channel with the advocate,

wherein activation of each of the at least one augmenting object initiates communication between a user of a portable device on which the portable device user interface is presented and the advocate represented by the augmenting object via the portable device.

13. A portable device user interface as recited in claim 12, wherein the advocate represented by each of the at least one augmenting object is socially connected to the user of the portable device.

14. A portable device user interface as recited in claim 12, wherein each of the at least one augmenting object further includes an affiliation between the advocate represented by the augment object and the subject matter of the advertisement.

15. A portable device user interface as recited in claim 14, further comprising:

a pop-up window that becomes visible when the user interacts with one of the at least one augment object and displays information about the advocate represented by the augment object.

16. A method, comprising:

displaying a page on a portable device, wherein the page includes;

an advertisement; and

at least one augmenting object, each augmenting object representing an advocate associated with a subject matter of the advertisement and including at least one activatable communication channel with the advocate;

receiving a user activation at the portable device of one of the at least one augmenting object; and

initiating communication between the user and the advocate represented by the activated augmenting object via the portable device.

17. A method as recited in claim 16, wherein the advocate represented by each of the at least one augmenting object is socially connected to the user of the portable device.

18. A method as recited in claim 16, wherein each of the at least one augmenting object further includes an affiliation between the advocate represented by the augment object and the subject matter of the advertisement.

19. A method as recited in claim 18, further comprising:

displaying a pop-up window when the user interacts with one of the at least one augmenting object to display information about the advocate represented by the augment object.

20. A method as recited in claim 16, further comprising:

displaying one of the at least one augmenting object visually differently from the other ones of the at least one augmenting object, wherein the advocate represented by the one augment object is a default advocate for the user of the portable device.