Purchase notification service for assisting users in selecting items from an electronic catalog

• US 7,082,407 B1
• Filed: 08/19/1999
• Issued: 07/25/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 04/09/1999
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc. (Amazon.com, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Amazon.com, Inc.
• Inventors: McAuliffe, Jon, Spiegel, Joel R., Bezos, Jeffrey P.
• Primary Examiner(s): Smith, Jeffrey A.
• Assistant Examiner(s): HAQ, NAEEM U
• Application Number:
  US09/377,322
• Time in Patent Office: 2,532 Days
• Field of Search: 705/26, 705/27
• US Class Current: 705/26.7
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/00 Commerce
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0603 Catalogue ordering
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0619 Neutral agent
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0625 Directed, with specific intent or strategy
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0631 Item recommendations
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0641 Shopping interfaces
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/08 Auctions
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/01 Social networking

Abstract

A computer service monitors online browsing of an electronic catalog by a user, and notifies the user when a catalog item being accessed is one that has been purchased by an affiliated user, such as a contact or a fellow community member. The notification may include the contact information of the affiliated user, and/or may provide an option to send a message to the affiliated user.

Claims

1. A computer implemented method of assisting users in selecting items to purchase from an electronic catalog of items, the method comprising:

maintaining purchase history data for each of a plurality of users of the electronic catalog;

maintaining community data indicative of user memberships within specific explicit-membership communities that users explicitly join, wherein each of the explicit-membership communities represents a respective subset of a general user population;

monitoring online browsing of the electronic catalog by a first user who is a member of an explicit-membership community to detect that an item accessed by the first user has been purchased by a second user who is also a member of the explicit-membership community, as reflected by the purchase history data and the community data; and

in response to detecting that the item has been purchased by the second user, supplementing a catalog page requested by the first user to include a notification that the item has been purchased by the second user, said catalog page being a page on which the item is displayed.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising, in response to detecting that the item has been purchased by the second user, providing an option to the first user to send a message to the second user.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein providing an option to the first user comprises providing an option to send an instant message to the second user.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the catalog page is an item detail page.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the notification includes contact information of the second user.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the community is a private community.

7. A computer implemented method of assisting users in selecting items to purchase from an electronic catalog of items, the method comprising:

maintaining purchase history data for each of a plurality of users of the electronic catalog;

maintaining personal address book data for each of a plurality of the users;

monitoring online browsing of the electronic catalog by a first user to detect that an item accessed by the first user has been purchased by a second user that is included in a personal address book of the first user, as reflected by the purchase history data and the personal address book data; and

in response to detecting that the item has been purchased by the second user, supplementing a catalog page requested by the first user to include a notification that the item has been purchased by the second user;

wherein the method is performed by a server system that provides functionality for browsing and making purchases from the electronic catalog.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the notification includes contact information of the second user.

9. The method of claim 7, further comprising, in response to detecting that the item has been purchased by the second user, providing an option to the first user to send a message to the second user.

10. The method of claim 7, wherein the catalog page is an item detail page.