Note: Descriptions are shown in the official language in which they were submitted.
SYSTEM THAT ACTIVATES MONETIZATION AND APPLIES A PAYMENT METHOD
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
[001] One or more embodiments of the invention are related to the fields of
data processing,
electronic communication systems, digital advertising, referral reward systems
for example as
related to electronic commerce. More particularly, but not by way of
limitation, one or more
embodiments of the invention enable a system that activates monetization and
applies a payment
method, for example that utilizes at least one computer and at least one
application specifically
programmed to identify a reward available to a user and to apply a payment
method based on
contents of an application user interface.
DESCRIPTION OF THE RELATED ART
[002] Several technology platforms exist for digital promotion of advertisers,
brands, products,
and services. However, these existing platforms fail to address digital word-
of-mouth promotion,
or peer-to-peer digital communications, where one consumer or user promotes or
mentions a
brand, product, merchant or service to one or more other users. Existing
platforms include affiliate
networks, social marketing, referral marketing, and influencer marketing. None
of these existing
platforms adequately address digital word-of-mouth promotion.
[003] Affiliate networks are designed for professional content creators and
digital publishers.
These networks are not appropriate for digital word-of-mouth promotion,
because consumers are
generally unable or unwilling to participate in the potentially painstaking
processes required to
join an affiliate network, and to perform the steps involved in utilizing an
affiliate network.
[004] Social marketing platforms are typically limited to display of
advertisements on social
networks. As such these platforms are not actually "social" since they do not
directly involve
communications between consumers; instead ads simply appear adjacent to social
interactions,
sometimes utilizing optimization software, for example to make the ads
contextually relevant to
the social interaction.
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[005] Referral marketing platforms generally involve customized, one-off
campaigns on behalf
of an individual advertiser. These platforms are not built as a platform for
digital word-of-mouth
promotion across multiple products, services, or brands.
[006] Influencer marketing platforms enlist influencers with large audiences
for one-off
campaigns. These platforms do not address true digital peer-to-peer word-of-
mouth referrals
among family and friends, for example.
[007] There are no known platforms that provide practical and effective
digital word-of-mouth
referral capabilities in digital communications. There are no known platforms
that are unobtrusive,
automatic, simple, easy to use, intuitive, and that fit naturally within a
peer-to-peer social dialogue.
There are no known platforms that apply to essentially all prominent digital
channels that people
use to communicate with friends, family, and colleagues, such as social media,
messaging
applications, email, and SMS. There are no known platforms that easily enable
people to embed
trackable referral links within their digital communications with peers,
provide rewards to the
referrers, including cash-based incentives, and that provide a broad range of
coverage of things the
user recommends. There are no known platforms that integrate naturally within
social dialogues
and are helpful to the recipient, transparent, and non-promotional.
[008] Some existing systems facilitate insertion of referral links into
specific documents, such as
blogs or web pages. These systems may for example be tools provided by
affiliate networks, or
plugins for web publishing tools such as WordPress . A significant limitation
of these systems is
that they are coupled to specific applications or use cases. There are no
known systems that
integrate referral generation into general-purpose user input methods, such
that the referral
generation capability can be used across multiple applications or use cases.
[009] There are also no known systems that provide a transparent method of
detecting referrals
within message content, inserting trackable referral links into communications
with no action
required on the part of the sending or receiving users, that protects the
privacy of the sending and
receiving users, and that rewards message intermediaries for inserting
relevant referral links into
messages.
[0010] There are also no known systems that analyze images to determine
appropriate referral
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links associated with the images, and that track usage of these referral links
to monetize the images.
[0011] There are existing systems that monitor a user's browsing session and
present options to
earn cashback or discounts when the user browses an eligible page or product.
Examples include
Amazon Assistant and Swagbucks0. However, these systems do not support
sharing of referral
links with other users, and earning commissions or credits when these other
users use the referral
links to make purchases or perform other actions. There are also no known
systems that
automatically activate monetization when a user is about to purchase an item,
and that also select
and apply a payment method and enter payment information automatically to
enable a purchase.
[0012] For at least the limitations described above there is a need for a
system that activates
monetization and applies a payment method.
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BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0013] One or more embodiments described in the specification are related to a
system that
activates monetization and applies a payment method. Embodiments of the system
may monitor
the user interface content of an application such as a web browsing session to
detect URLs or other
content that can be referred to one or more recipients; the sender of the
referral may receive a credit
when a recipient uses the referral link. Embodiments of the invention may also
analyze images to
enable communication intermediaries or users to integrate referrals to
participating merchants into
communications; recipients of these referrals may digitally access the
referred merchant, and the
system may provide a credit to the referrer or a communications intermediary
if a recipient
completes a transaction with the referred merchant. Referral generation may be
integrated into a
mobile device operating system or application or may be integrated within a
server or messaging
gateway through which messages are conveyed, so that the referral capability
may be used across
multiple applications and for multiple use cases. A communications
intermediary may be for
example: a provider or operator of a communications channel or service; a
provider or operator of
a communications link or service anywhere in the path of a message between a
sender or receiver;
or a provider or operator of a messaging gateway or platform that may receive,
store, forward,
route, convey, direct, resend, transform, format, analyze, combine, filter,
translate, edit, post,
display, or otherwise handle any communication or message.
[0014] One or more embodiments of the invention include a database of one or
more of
participating merchants, a referral matcher that generates referrals to these
merchants, and a
referral tracker that tracks when a referral results in a transaction. The
referral matcher may receive
input from a referring user, for example as part of a communication generated
by this referring
user; it may then analyze this input to identify one or more products,
services, merchants, brands,
or promotions in the database that match the input. The referral matcher may
then automatically
generate a referral link and may insert this referral link into the
communication. The referral
matcher may automatically insert the referral link into the communication, or
the referral matcher
may prompt the referring user or receiving user to agree to the insertion of
the referral link and
may then insert the referral link into the communication. The referral link
may also incorporate
an identifier of the referring user or the communications intermediary, so
that the referral may be
tracked. A recipient, or receiving user, of the communication, may use the
referral link to access
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a website or "site" or commerce site associated with the referred merchant. If
the recipient
performs a task, for example a transaction on this commerce site, the referral
tracker generates a
credit for the successful referral. This credit may be collected from the
referred merchant. All,
none or a portion of the credit may be remitted to or otherwise associated
with the referring user
or communications intermediary.
[0015] One or more embodiments of the system may analyze input associated with
any type of
digital communication, including for example, without limitation, a text
message, an email
message, a communication via a social media site, a posting on a message
board, a communication
via a messaging app, a Twitter message, a Facebook0 post, a SnapchatO
message, a voice
message, a voice signal that is converted to text, a video message, a picture
message, a
communication via Facebook0, a communication via social media, a communication
via a
shopping site, a communication via a message board, a posting to a product
review service, a
digital communication, a comment posted to a digital media service, and a
communication via a
messaging application.
[0016] In one or more embodiments, a communication from a referring user may
include or may
be generated by sharing of information via a share button or other sharing
capability. A share
button may for example be a native share button in a web browser or mobile
operating system
(such as i0S0 or Android ), or it may be a button or an icon on a website or
on any other
document or application.
[0017] In one or more embodiments, a referral tracker may generate a feedback
message to the
communications intermediary or referring user that indicates that a recipient
has executed a
transaction as a result of the referral. In addition to or instead of
feedback, the referral may
generate a credit to the communications intermediary or referring user, which
may for example be
a monetary payment or another type of reward. In one or more embodiments, the
referral credit
may be provided to a group of users. In one or more embodiments, the referral
credit may be
shared with the recipient as a result of executing the referred transaction.
In one or more
embodiments, the referral credit may be a donation to another organization,
for example a non-
profit or charitable organization, made for example on behalf of the referring
user.
[0018] Input into a referral matcher may be obtained from any type of physical
device, application,
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utility, or software program, or combination thereof, and it may be in any
format. For example, in
one or more embodiments the referral matcher may be coupled to a physical or
virtual keyboard
used by the referring user, and it may accept and analyze keystrokes obtained
from this keyboard.
In one or more embodiments, the referral matcher may be coupled to an image
capture device,
such as for example a camera on a mobile device; the referral matcher may
analyze images to
determine matching products, services, merchants, brands, or promotions.
Images may be for
example, without limitation, images of barcodes (linear and 2D codes such as
QR codes), or images
of a product. In one or more embodiments, the referral matcher may be coupled
to an audio input
device, such as for example a microphone on a mobile device; the referral
matcher may perform
voice recognition and analysis to determine matching products, services,
merchants, brands, or
promotions for example associated with the inferred reference in the
communication. In one or
more embodiments, the referral matcher may be coupled to software which
analyzes content such
as voice, images or video; the referral matcher may analyze this content in
any manner to determine
matching products, services, merchants, brands, or promotions for example
associated with the
inferred reference in the communication
[0019] In one or more embodiments, the referral matcher may be coupled to a
messaging service,
communications platform, network, gateway, server or other application which
conveys, transmits,
routes, directs, receives, stores, forwards, resends, transforms, analyzes,
combines, filters,
translates, formats, edits, posts, displays, or otherwise handles messages or
communications of any
type or types. A message may contain for example, without limitation, any type
or types of content
such as any combination of text, image, voice, audio, video, animations, code,
software, links,
URLs, website addresses, attachments. The referral matcher may perform
analysis of content that
is being transmitted to detect matching products, services, merchants, brands,
or promotions for
example associated with the inferred reference in the communication.
[0020] In one or more embodiments, the referral matcher may be coupled to a
social media
service, digital media service or messaging application, such as for example,
without limitation,
Facebook0, WhatsAppO, Twitter , Yelp or Snapchat0; the referral matcher may
perform
analysis of content that has been input to such an application to determine
matching products,
services, merchants, brands, or promotions for example associated with the
inferred reference in
the communication.
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[0021] In one or more embodiments, the referral matcher may be coupled to the
recipient's device,
an application used by the recipient, a messaging gateway or network through
which messages are
conveyed to the recipient's device; the referral matcher may perform analysis
of content that is
conveyed to the recipient to determine matching products, services, merchants,
brands, or
promotions for example associated with the inferred reference in the
communication.
[0022] In one or more embodiments, a referring user may be able to select text
(or other items) in
a communication, and initiate a search for listings in the merchant database
matching the selection.
[0023] One or more embodiments may use language processing and analysis
techniques to
identify words, phrases, text strings, or other elements in the input that are
associated with one or
more products, services, merchants, brands, or promotions in the database.
These techniques may
include for example, without limitation, natural language processing,
collaborative filtering,
artificial intelligence, affect analysis, type-ahead, predictive analytics,
machine learning,
recommendation engine, and personalization engine. One or more embodiments may
process and
analyze any other types of content, such as images, video, audio, speech,
links, code, URLs,
website addresses, links to mobile applications, or animations, to identify
items that are associated
with one or more products, services, merchants, brands, or promotions in the
database. For
example, image processing may identify images of items that are associated
with entries in the
database or with categories of entries. As an illustration, images in a
message may be processed
by a neural network or other classifier to identify the types of items in the
images; if a message
contains images of a car, for instance, database entries corresponding to car
sales or car rentals
may be matched and one or more associated referral links may be inserted into
the message.
[0024] If multiple merchants in a database are identified by the referral
matcher as potential
matches, based on the communication between the users, the system may ask the
referring user to
select from among the multiple matches. In one or more embodiments, the system
may select a
specific merchant automatically. Selection of a merchant may be based on any
factor or factors
on which merchants may be rated, scored, measured, or compared, including for
example, without
limitation, the size or amount of the referral credit associated with each
merchant, the location of
the merchant, the availability of inventory, speed of fulfillment of orders,
ratings or reviews related
to the merchant, or the price of the product or service offered by the
merchant. The referring user
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and receiving user may both set preferences that for example invoke a strategy
pattern to determine
the merchant to provide a referral to, or to generate an ordered list of
merchants. For example, the
system may automatically select the merchant having the largest referral
credit, or automatically
select the merchant having the lowest price, quickest delivery time, etc. In
one or more
embodiments, the referral may be made based on the recipient's preferences, so
that the recipient's
favorite merchant's may be inserted into a list presented to the referring
user and/or by the
receiving user in one or more embodiments. In one or more embodiments, the
referral may be
made based on business rules determined by the communication intermediary.
Other strategy
instances may be utilized to correlate the preferences of the referring user
with the preferences of
the receiving user to find the most appropriate referral as well.
[0025] One or more embodiments may incorporate settings which enable the
referring user or the
receiving user to control the frequency and manner in which the referral
matcher presents matching
merchants and may prompt the referring user or receiving user to agree to the
insertion of the
referral link.
[0026] In one or more embodiments, a referral link may initially direct a
recipient to an
intermediate server or system; this intermediate server may then redirect the
recipient to a target
destination related to the referral. The intermediate server may perform
additional processing to
determine which target destination is appropriate or optimal for the referral.
For example, without
limitation, in one or more embodiments the referral matcher executing on a
referring user's device
or coupled with a network or messaging gateway may perform an initial match
that simply
identifies that a relevant product, service, brand, or merchant exists, or
that selects a broad category
or grouping of potentially matching products, services, merchants, brands, or
promotions. The
referral link associated with this initial match may direct the recipient to
the intermediate server,
which may then perform an additional matching step to select a specific
merchant, site, page, or
other destination to complete the referral. The redirection link generated to
this final destination
may contain the same or similar tracking information (such as an identity of
the referring user or
communication intermediary) so that the referrer or communication intermediary
may obtain credit
for a successful referral. The redirection link may direct the recipient for
example to any or all of
a web site, another server, another intermediate server, a web service, a
specific web page, an
application, a URL, or a URI. A potential benefit of this two-stage matching
process using an
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intermediate server is that the database accessible to the referral matcher
can be smaller, and does
not need to be updated in real time. The processing for the initial match may
also be faster and
less resource intensive and may reduce the latency of the creation and
transmission of the message.
The matching and final selection process on the intermediate server may access
more detailed
information on products, service, or merchants, including potentially
information that is updated
in real time (such as merchant bids for referrals). This second stage of
matching and selection may
also utilize more computing resources available on a server or a network of
servers.
[0027] One or more embodiments may provide or access a dashboard or other
reporting system
which enables the communication intermediary or referring user to access
information about the
referral links sent, and may include, without limitation, information
regarding the amount of
referral credit earned, the identity of the recipients which conducted
transactions, the identity of
the merchants with which transactions have occurred as a result of their
referrals, and the
communications platforms through which the referrals were sent.
[0028] One or more embodiments may present a referrer profile page which may
be public facing,
and which may display brand, product and service referrals with referral
links. In one or more
embodiments, this enables a more graphical interface for receiving users to
select referrals that
generate rewards for the referrer. In one or more embodiments, a communication
may be
generated that includes a link to a site that allows for graphical selection
of a particular merchant
for example by the receiving user.
[0029] One or more embodiments may include a mechanism which enables the
referring user,
while on a web page, to select the URL or other indicator of such web page,
and create a referral
link to that page which may include an identifier of the referring user, so
that the referral may be
tracked, and enable the referring user to insert this referral link into a
digital communication.
[0030] In one or more embodiments, a referral link may be, may contain or may
lead to a coupon
for a product or service, instead of or in addition to a link to a site. The
coupon may be for example
in the form of a code, a printable document, a UPC code, a QR code, a
promotional code, a ticket,
an image, or another identifier. The recipient may use the coupon for example
for either online or
offline transactions; in an offline transaction, the recipient may for example
transact with a via an
interaction which does not get tracked via a link to a site.
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[0031] In one or more embodiments, referral links may be added by a
communication
intermediary in a communication path between a sender and receiver. The
intermediary may
receive a communication from the sender to a receiver. The communication may
contain any or
all of an identifier of the sender, an identifier of the receiver, and a
communication body. The
intermediary may transmit the communication or any portion thereof to a
computer that executes
a referral matcher. For example, the referral matcher may execute on a network
gateway or on a
server as a web service. The referral matcher may be coupled to the
communication intermediary
(and associated messaging gateway) associated with the sender, the recipient
or both. The referral
matcher may analyze the communication to determine whether there are any
matches to listings in
the referral database. When a match is found, the referral matcher may
transform the
communication to insert a referral link to a site or other resource associated
with the matched item
from the database. The link may also contain an embedded referral tracking
code that identifies
the referrer, which may be any combination of the sender, the receiver, or the
intermediary. The
transformed communication may be returned to the communication intermediary,
which transmits
it along the communication path to the receiver. If a receiver uses the link
and completes an
associated task (such as a purchase), a referral tracker may receive a
notification of the transaction
with the embedded referral tracking code, and credit the referrer for the
transaction.
[0032] In one or more embodiments, when a match is found, the referral matcher
may convey to
the communication intermediary instructions as to how to transform the
communication to insert
a referral link to a site or other resource associated with the matched item
from the database and
embed a referral tracking code that identifies the referrer, which may be any
combination of the
sender, the receiver, or the intermediary. The communication intermediary may
then execute the
instructions and transmit the transformed communication along the
communication path to the
receiver.
[0033] A communication intermediary may be for example, without limitation,
one or more of a
communications carrier, a wireless provider, a cellular provider, a network
provider, an internet
service provider, a social media platform, a messaging service, a telephone
service provider, a
broadband service provider, a Wi-Fi provider, an email service, a text message
service, a mobile
application, a software application, a chat service, an application which
conveys, transmits,
receives, routes, forwards, stores, directs, edits, filters, or formats
communications, or a gateway
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between any types of devices, networks, routers, or nodes. A communication may
be or may
contain for example, without limitation, one or more of a message, a text
message, an email
message, a voice message, a video message, a website link, a link to a mobile
application, a picture
message, a transcribed message, a communication via social media, a
communication via a
shopping site, a communication via a message board, a posting to a product
review service, an
encrypted message, a digital communication, a comment posted to a digital
media service, and a
communication via a messaging application. In one or more embodiments, the
receiver of a
message may use a referral link by performing one or more of a tap, click,
gesture, response, user
interface interaction and verbal command. The associated task may be one or
more of a click,
view, visit, transaction, purchase, reservation, subscription, sign-up,
submission, software
installation, download, inquiry, content consumption, survey completion, and
participation in a
digital interaction.
[0034] In one or more embodiments, the referral link may link for example,
without limitation, to
one or more of a website, a software application, an e-commerce service, a
merchant shopping
cart, a mobile application, a computer application, a store, a redirector, a
link-tracking service, an
affiliate network, a video player, a coupon or coupon code, a promotion or
promotion code, a
discount code, a transaction code, a mapping service and a URL. The listings
in the referral
database may be for example, without limitation, one or more of a product, a
service, a brand, a
merchant, a name of a merchant, a name of a web site, a name of a product, a
name of a service, a
location, a review, a rating, a product number, a model number, a description,
a picture, an image,
a diagram, a barcode, a UPC number, an RF code, an activity, a keyword, a
phrase, a product
category, an SKU, an instruction, a suggestion, a solution, an information
source, a person, an
organization, and a professional. The database may be for example, without
limitation, one or
more of a file, library, catalog, directory, open graph, real-time web search,
cached web search
result and data feed.
[0035] In one or more embodiments, the processing performed by the referral
matcher may
determine whether content such as a word, phrase, text string, URL, website
link, website address,
link to a mobile application, domain name, image, audio or video component, or
code in the
communication body corresponds to a listing in the referral database; if so,
the link may replace
or be inserted around that matching content. In one or more embodiments,
processing may also
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perform sentiment analysis to determine the sentiment in the communication
towards the matched
item.
[0036] In one or more embodiments, the referral matcher may have a
configurable closeness-of-
match parameter that determines how closely the communication must correspond
to a database
item in order to generate a referral link.
[0037] In one or more embodiments, processing may also determine whether a
communication
indicates a subcategory associated with a matched item. Subcategories
associated with database
listings may include for example, without limitation, one or more of a size, a
style, a model, a type,
a sub-brand, a feature, a name, a category, a quality, a stock keeping unit, a
characteristic, a color,
a date, a time, a location, and a quantity. If subcategory data is identified
in a communication, the
referral link may include this data, for example by linking to a specific web
page or by
incorporating URL parameters in the link.
[0038] In one or more embodiments, a referral credit may be provided to one or
more of the
communication intermediary, the sender and the recipient. The sender's and
recipient's identity
may be encoded to protect privacy before it is passed to the referral matcher.
[0039] In one or more embodiments, either or both of the sender or receiver of
a message may be
able to send a message to opt-out of having referral links added to
communications. For senders
or receivers who opt out, the referral matcher may not add links to messages
for those users. One
or both of the sender or receiver may be able to send a message to modify
communications
preferences that affect when, how, or how frequently referral links are added,
how they are used,
or how they are displayed.
[0040] In one or more embodiments, when a referral matcher identifies more
than one possible
site that corresponds to a listing that is a match in a communication body, it
may select a site based
on a performance metric, such as for example, without limitation, the amount
of referral credit
associated with the site, a price associated with the site, a degree of
similarity between the site and
the communication, a transaction conversion rate associated with the site, a
defined set of business
logic associated with the site, how closely characteristics of the sender or
receiver correspond to
the site, proximity of the site to the sender or receiver's location, a
location associated with the
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site, a speed of fulfillment associated with the site, a review score, a
popularity score, or a rating
score associated with the site.
[0041] In one or more embodiments, the referral link may link to an
intermediate server, and the
intermediate server may select a final destination when a message recipient
clicks on or otherwise
interacts with a referral link, and may then redirect the recipient to that
final destination. To select
a destination from multiple possible destinations, destinations may be
compared on a performance
metric such as the metrics described above.
[0042] In one or more embodiments, matching against a referral database may be
performed for
any image contained in a message or otherwise shared or transmitted from a
sender to a receiver.
Processing of an image to determine whether a positive match exists may
include detecting
components in the image and determining a type of each component, analyzing
each component,
and synthesizing component analyses to form a descriptor of the image. The
descriptor may then
be compared to the listings in a referral database. In one or more
embodiments, an optional
validation of a tentative match may be performed. (This validation step may
not be performed in
one or more embodiments or embodiments, or it may be performed only in certain
situations.)
Validation may include retrieving a second image associated with the matched
item, and
comparing this second image to the original image to form a confidence score.
When and if
validation is performed, a referral link may be generated for the image if the
confidence score
exceeds a threshold. Any of the steps for image analysis, matching, and
referral link generation
and presentation may be performed on the sender's device, the receiver's
device, a device used by
the sender to encrypt all or a portion of a communication, a device used by
the receiver to decrypt
all or a portion of a communication, any communication intermediary in the
communication path
between the sender and receiver, or any combination thereof.
[0043] One or more embodiments may obtain or accept content from an
application user interface,
and may match this content against the referral database to generate a
referral link. For example,
without limitation, in one or more embodiments the application may be a web
browser, and the
content from the web browsing session may be one or more of the URL of the
page a user is
browsing, text, image, code, icon and logo. Content may or may not be visible
to the user. Content
may be analyzed using for example, without limitation, one or more of machine
learning, text
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parsing, image analysis, audio analysis, artificial intelligence, keyword
matching and natural
language processing. If there are multiple matches, a user may indicate which
match to utilize, or
a match may be selected automatically based for example on previously defined
user preferences.
The system may insert the referral link into a communication from the browser
user to one or more
recipients. If a recipient takes an action associated with the referral link
(such as a purchase), the
referral tracker may attribute this action to the referring user and record a
transaction (such as
credit) for the referring user.
[0044] In one or more embodiments, the referral matcher may obtain content by
receiving events
from the operating system when the user interface of the application changes.
The application
may be for example a mobile application. The operating system may be for
example a mobile
device operating system, and the events may be generated by accessibility
services of the operating
system. Content analysis may include processing of these events to obtain view
elements of the
user interface, including potentially hidden but machine-readable elements.
These view elements
may be compared to the listings in the referral database. View elements may
include for example,
without limitation, one or more of URL, text, image, icon, logo, code, SKU,
product identifier,
application identifier, merchant identifier. For example, for a web browser
application, the view
elements may include the URL of the address bar of the browser. Events may be
filtered to locate
view elements with text that matches a pattern for a URL. They may be further
filtered for view
elements with an identifier that matches an expected identifier of the browser
address bar.
[0045] When the referral matcher finds a match between application user
interface content and an
entry in the referral database, it may present a share and earn option to the
user. When the user
selects this option, the referral manager may present a sharing menu to the
user with one or more
sharing methods to share the referral link, such as email, text message, and
social media sites or
services. It may also present a cash back option to the user that generates
the referral link and
redirects the application to that link, thereby effectively letting the user
use the referral link himself
or herself.
[0046] One or more embodiments of the invention may enable a system that
activates
monetization and applies a payment method. The system may have a payment
methods database
that includes one or more payment methods associated with a user. Each payment
method may
14
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
include one or more of a credit card, a debit card, a gift card, a digital
wallet, a funds transfer
service, a debt financing product, an installment payment service, a bank
account. Each payment
method may also include user checkout information that may include one or more
of a name, a
user identifier, an address, a billing address, a shipping address, a phone
number, an email address,
a password, an expiration date, a security code. The system may have a
merchant database with
listings that include one or more of a product, a service, a brand, a
merchant, a name of a merchant,
a name of a web site, a name of a product, a name of a service, a location, a
review, a rating, a
product number, a model number, a description, a picture, an image, a diagram,
a barcode, a UPC
number, an RF code, an activity, a keyword, a phrase, a product category, an
SKU, an instruction,
a suggestion, a solution, an information source, a person, an organization, a
professional. Each
listing may also have one or more shopping cart descriptors, each of which
includes one or more
of a URL, a web page element, a page title, a header, a calculation, an input
field, a control, a text
element, an image element. The system may have an offers database that
includes one or more
monetization offers. Each monetization offer may be associated with one or
more listings in the
merchant database. Each monetization offer may include for example one or more
of a coupon, a
cashback rate, a discount, a promotion, a savings, a reward, a bonus, a
payment, a commission.
The system may have a computer or server that executes specific instructions
to implement a
referral matcher, a payment assistant, and a referral tracker. The referral
matcher and payment
assistant may be coupled to an application used by the user. The referral
matcher may determine
when the application is performing a shopping activity associated with a
listing in the merchant
database, and it may detect a monetization offer in the offers database that
is associated with this
listing; it may then generate a referral link or referral code based on the
monetization offer. The
payment assistant may enter or offer to enter information into the application
associated with a
payment method in the payment methods database; this information may include
the user checkout
information associated with the payment method. The payment assistant may also
update the
application to include or reference the referral link or referral code when
the application makes a
payment associated with the listing. The referral tracker may record a
transaction associated with
the monetization offer associated with the referral link or referral code when
the application makes
a payment associated with the listing.
[0047] In one or more embodiments the referral link or referral code may
include an identity of
one or more of the user, the listing, a merchant, an intermediary.
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
[0048] In one or more embodiments the payment assistant may obtain a single
use payment
identifier linked to the payment method, and it may enter this single use
payment identifier into
the application.
[0049] In one or more embodiments the payment assistant may also present the
payment method
to the user and prompt the user to confirm selection of this payment method.
[0050] In one or more embodiments the referral tracker may also notify one or
more of the user,
the listing, the merchant, and the intermediary of the transaction associated
with the monetization
offer. It may notify any or all of the user, the listing, the merchant, and
the intermediary when one
or more of the coupon, the cashback rate, the discount, the promotion, the
savings, the reward, the
bonus, the payment, and the commission has been activated. It may notify any
or all of the user,
the listing, the merchant, and the intermediary when one or more of the
coupon, the cashback rate,
the discount, the promotion, the savings, the reward, the bonus, the payment,
and the commission
has been earned.
[0051] In one or more embodiments the referral tracker may also share a
portion of the
monetization offer with one or more of the user, the listing, the merchant,
and the intermediary.
16
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0052] The above and other aspects, features and advantages of the invention
will be more
apparent from the following more particular description thereof, presented in
conjunction with the
following drawings wherein:
[0053] Figure 1 shows an example of a user using an embodiment of a messaging
gateway
monetization system that accepts input from a referring user and automatically
determines or
otherwise infers merchants associated with products and/or services to refer
based on the input,
i.e., to match referrals with the input, and insert the referral into a
message to a recipient that
contains a trackable product or service referral.
[0054] Figure lA shows a variation of the example of Figure 1, where the
referral matching
system operates in a manual mode that requires user action before showing
suggested referrals.
[0055] Figure 2 continues the example of Figure 1, showing the recipient
receiving and using the
referral, and the system crediting the referrer for the successful referral.
[0056] Figure 3 shows illustrative options of the types of credits and
notifications the referral
system may provide to the referrer.
[0057] Figure 4 illustrates an embodiment that allows a user to select text in
a social media
posting, and search for referrals matching the selected text.
[0058] Figure 5 illustrates an embodiment that generates a referral using a
share button.
[0059] Figure 6 illustrates an embodiment that matches an image captured by a
camera (such as a
barcode or an image of a product) and that generates a referral based on this
image.
[0060] Figure 7 illustrates an embodiment that uses natural language
processing to identify words
in a communication that may infer or otherwise match one or more merchants,
and that presents a
choice of matching merchants to the user.
[0061] Figure 8 shows an illustrative process flow for an embodiment of a peer-
to-peer trackable
referral system, where the input used for the referral lookup is obtained from
a keyboard.
17
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
[0062] Figure 8A shows a variation of the process flow of Figure 8, where a
referral link directs
a recipient to an intermediate server that makes a final selection of a
referral destination, and
redirects the recipient to that destination.
[0063] Figure 9 shows illustrative alternative embodiments for obtaining input
that may be used
to generate a referral.
[0064] Figure 10 shows illustrative alternative embodiments for identifying
potential referrals.
[0065] Figure 11 shows illustrative alternative embodiments for information
sources that may be
used for a database of merchants for potential referrals.
[0066] Figure 12 shows a variation of the process flow of Figure 8, where
input for a referral is
received from an image instead of from a keyboard.
[0067] Figure 13 shows a variation of the process flow of Figure 8, where a
referral is initiated
via a share button.
[0068] Figure 14 shows a variation of the process flow of Figure 8, where a
referral is initiated
when a user selects text or a URL and searches for matching potential
referrals.
[0069] Figure 15 shows an illustrative system with a referral matcher that
operates at a gateway,
rather than on the sender's device, and that identifies a communication
intermediary as the referrer.
[0070] Figure 15A shows a variation of the embodiment of Figure 15, where both
the sender and
the intermediary are identified as referrers.
[0071] Figure 15B shows another variation of the embodiment of Figure 15,
where the gateway
that invokes the referral matcher is associated with the receiver's
communications carrier rather
than with the sender's communications carrier.
[0072] Figure 15C shows another variation of the embodiment of Figure 15,
where a sender copies
a URL into a message, and the referral matcher identifies an entry in the
referral database that
matches this URL.
[0073] Figure 15D shows another variation of the embodiment of Figure 15,
where the referral
18
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
matcher generates transformation instructions that are executed by the
communications
intermediary to modify a message to insert a referral link.
[0074] Figure 16 continues the example of Figure 15 to illustrate crediting
the referring
communication intermediary when the recipient clicks the link and makes a
purchase.
[0075] Figure 17 shows an illustrative embodiment that performs sentiment
analysis on a message
to avoid adding a link to a target that the message refers to negatively.
[0076] Figure 17A shows an illustrative embodiment that analyzes the context
of a matching item,
such as nearby words or phrases, to determine whether to a referral link.
[0077] Figure 18 shows an illustrative embodiment that provides a configurable
degree of
closeness of match for the referral matcher.
[0078] Figure 18A shows an illustrative embodiment with multiple sites that
match a database
listing; the referral matcher selects a specific site from the multiple
options based on performance
metrics such as the reimbursement for a successful referral.
[0079] Figure 19 illustrates an embodiment that searches a message for
subcategory information
related to a primary target in order to generate a more specific referral
link.
[0080] Figure 20 shows an illustrative embodiment that lets a sender opt-out
of having referral
links added by a communication intermediary.
[0081] Figure 21 shows an illustrative flowchart of steps that may be used to
analyze images and
generate referral links based on this analysis.
[0082] Figure 22 shows analysis of an illustrative image and generation of a
referral link for this
image.
[0083] Figure 23 shows a variation of the example of Figure 22 where multiple
items from the
referral database match the image, and a prioritization and selection step is
performed to determine
which match or matches to use for referral links.
[0084] Figure 24A shows an illustrative embodiment of the invention that
monitors a web
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
browsing session on a mobile device, and that offers a user an option to share
a web page URL
when it detects a match to the referral database.
[0085] Figure 24B shows other elements of the user interface of Figure 24A
that may be analyzed
for matches to the referral database.
[0086] Figure 25 continues the example of Figure 24A to illustrate share
options presented to a
user when the user decides to share a web URL.
[0087] Figure 26A shows an illustrative sequence diagram for actions that may
be performed in
an embodiment of the system that monitors a mobile device web browsing
application.
[0088] Figure 26B shows a generalized sequence diagram for a system that
analyzes content from
a mobile application and that generates referrals from matches to this
content.
[0089] Figure 27 shows an illustrative process for extracting a web page URL
from user interface
events received from a mobile operating system.
[0090] Figure 28 shows an embodiment of the invention that detects when a user
interface of an
application requests payment information, and that selects a payment method
from a database of
payment options and a reward associated with the item the user is purchasing.
[0091] Figure 29 continues the example of Figure 28 to illustrate how the
system populates
payment information based on the payment method selected by the system and
confirmed by the
user.
[0092] Figure 30 continues the example of Figures 28 and 29 to illustrate how
the system tracks
the referral for a reward when the user makes payment using the payment method
selected in
Figure 28 and the payment information populated in Figure 29.
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
[0093] A system that activates monetization and applies a payment method will
now be
described. In the following exemplary description, numerous specific details
are set forth in order
to provide a more thorough understanding of embodiments of the invention. It
will be apparent,
however, to an artisan of ordinary skill that the present invention may be
practiced without
incorporating all aspects of the specific details described herein. In other
instances, specific
features, quantities, or measurements well known to those of ordinary skill in
the art have not been
described in detail so as not to obscure the invention. Readers should note
that although examples
of the invention are set forth herein, the claims, and the full scope of any
equivalents, are what
define the metes and bounds of the invention.
[0094] Figure 1 shows an illustrative embodiment of the invention,
illustrating the generation of
a referral for example as part of a peer-to-peer communication. (Figure 2,
described below,
continues this example to show how a referral is processed by the system when
used by a recipient.)
User 101, the referring user, uses mobile device 102 to generate a
communication to one or more
other users. In this example, user 101 composes a text message to user 121.
One or more
embodiments may integrate referrals into any type of communication and
independent of the
application used, including but not limited to text messages, emails, SMSs,
voice messages, picture
messages, video messages, chat messages, Twitter messages, Instagram0
messages, messages
sent via messaging platforms including for example without limitation
WhatsAppO, SnapchatO
or Facebook0 Messenger, and postings on any websites or services including for
example, without
limitation, social media sites such as Facebook0, TumblrO, Google+0, YouTube ,
Vine ,
PinterestO, Flickr0, or LinkedIna In one or more embodiments users may use any
type or types
of devices to send or receive communications and to generate, receive, or use
referrals, including
but not limited to a mobile device such as device 102. For example, without
limitation, users may
use mobile devices, cell phones, smartphones, tablets, laptop computers,
notebook computers,
desktop computers, server computers, smart speakers, smart watches, wearable
devices,
communication devices built into vehicles, smart glasses, augmented reality
devices, content
management systems, virtual reality devices, or networks of any of these
devices. Users generating
referrals may use the same devices or different devices from those used by
users receiving and
using referrals.
21
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
[0095] A referring user and a receiving user may each be any person, system,
organization, group
of persons, robot, application, business, or agency that communicate in any
manner over any
medium. For example, without limitation, a referring user may be an
individual, a professional
content creator, an editor, an author, or a business. A user may be acting on
his or her own behalf,
or on behalf of a business, an organization, or an agency. Recipients of a
communication from a
referring user may be peers, family, friends, known or unknown persons or
groups, readers,
business contacts, or followers of a feed or blog. Recipients may be
individuals or they may be
groups or audiences of any size and composition. Although the term receiving
user is used in the
singular in certain scenarios herein, receiving user means one or more users
that receive a
communication from the referring user.
[0096] In the example shown in Figure 1, user 101 is typing a message with the
cursor 105 midway
through a word. The user types the message using a virtual keyboard 104 as
utilized in one or
more embodiments on the mobile device or electronic device 102. In this
embodiment, the system,
which includes virtual keyboard 104 accepts the input, here text characters
and transmits the text
characters to a referral matcher 110. Referral matcher 110 receives input from
the virtual keyboard
104, and may suggest potential referrals based on the keystrokes received from
the keyboard. The
referral matcher may execute directly on the mobile device 102, or it may
execute on another
device (such as a server or a cloud or Internet accessible service) remote
from the mobile device
102, or any combination thereof. The referral matcher 110 accesses a database
111. The database
may contain for example, without limitation, products, services, merchants,
brands, promotions,
locations, places of business, stores, events, persons, performers, or any
related characteristics. In
one or more embodiments, a computer or server that executes the specific
instructions to
implement the referral matcher may also host the database or in other
embodiments, the database
may be remote to the computer that hosts the database. In one or more
embodiments, the referral
matcher may access any number of data sources to identify potential referrals.
These data sources
may be local to the mobile device (or other device) 102, or remote from the
mobile device (for
example, on a server accessible via the Internet or via any other network
connection). Database
111 may contain any information that may be used to locate or create a
referral, or to select from
or prioritize among multiple matching merchants, such as for example, without
limitation, the
name or names of a merchant, the name or names of a web site, the name or
names of products or
services, brand names, the location of merchants, reviews or ratings of
products, services, or
22
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
merchants, product numbers, SKU numbers, model numbers, descriptions,
pictures, images,
diagrams, barcodes, UPC numbers, RF codes, the amount a merchant pays for
referrals,
information on any promotions, or any data derived from or related to any of
this information,
including any generic categories that may infer one or more merchants, for
example airline or
flight or fly to infer a particular merchant that provides air travel
services.
[0097] Database 111 may for example include information about and
characteristics of merchants,
such as merchant names, ratings, reviews, conversion rates, locations, and
hours. A merchant may
be for example, without limitation, a company, organization, individual, or
other entity that makes,
sells, or distributes products or services available for a user to purchase,
consume, or enjoy. A
merchant may be for example, without limitation, a retailer, a service
provider, an e-commerce
service, a sales agent, a salesperson, a manufacturer, or a distributor. A
merchant may be
associated with an intermediary. Database 111 may for example include
information about one or
more intermediaries. An intermediary may be for example, without limitation,
an agency, a
marketing firm, an affiliate network, a referral marketing provider, or any
other individual or entity
that represents a merchant and to which a link may be directed or through
which a link may be
redirected. Database 111 may for example include information about products
and services, such
as the products and services provided by a merchant or an intermediary. This
information may
include for example, without limitation, product names, descriptions,
alternate references (for
example "flights to Denver"), pricing, and inventory availability. Products
and services may be
for example, without limitation, any good that a user can purchase, enjoy, or
consume; these may
be physical products, virtual products (such as digital content, movies,
music, or other formats),
or services. Database 111 may for example include information on one or more
brands, such as
for example, without limitation, a trade name of a product, service,
manufacturer, marketer, or
retailer. Database 111 may for example include information on one or more
promotions, such as
for example, without limitation, information regarding discounts, special
sales, cash-back offers,
and new user rewards, which a merchant may offer relating to sales of its
products and services.
[0098] In the example of Figure 1, referral matcher 110 analyzes keystrokes
from virtual keyboard
104 and compares these keystrokes to the names and other information in
database 111, and
determines that item 107 is a potential match. In a simple example, "Acm" may
be compared to
any items in database 111 that being with "Acm" such as "Acme", "Acme
Airlines" or that is
23
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
associated with an acronym for text in the database, i.e., "ACM" that
standards for "Association
of Computing Machinery". In other embodiments, words such as "flight" may be
associated in
database 111 with all merchants that are airlines. Any schema may be utilized
to provide potential
matches and contain any number of associations for each merchant, product or
service to compare
with. It therefore provides this item as a suggested completion for the
virtual keyboard input. The
virtual keyboard application may also provide other suggested completions such
as completion
106, which may not correspond to a referral. Suggested referrals may be
identified for example
using an icon such as icon 108. If the user 101 selects the suggested referral
107, which may be
performed in one or more embodiments with a single tap on the suggested
referral, a referral link
124 with this referral may be generated and placed into the message 123. In
other embodiments,
the link may be automatically inserted based on preferences or any strategy
pattern employed by
the system. After the user completes and sends the message, user 121 receives
the message on
device 122. The message 123 includes the referral link 124 generated by the
referral matcher 110.
[0099] In the example shown in Figure 1, the virtual keyboard application
linked to the referral
matcher 110 is used as input for a text messaging program. This same virtual
keyboard application
may be used universally with any other applications or services on mobile
device 102, providing
the same referral matching capabilities for these other applications or
services without requiring
altering each and every different communication application to including the
trackable referral
generation capability of embodiments of the invention. This flexibility
illustrates a benefit of the
system in providing a potentially general-purpose referral capability that may
be used across
multiple applications and services. For example, without limitation, the same
keyboard 104 with
referral icon 108 and referral matcher 110 may be used for an email
application, a web browser, a
chat application, a blogging application, a publishing application, a word
processing application,
or any other application used by user 101. In any of these applications, the
referral matcher may
analyze input from the keyboard and suggest potential referrals to be embedded
in
communications. This universal ability to generate trackable referrals
regardless of the application
in use in a peer-to-peer setting is unknown in the art and makes referral
generation and tracking
pain free and extremely easy to use for referring users.
[00100] In one or more embodiments, the referral matcher may be incorporated
into an "app
extension," including but not limited to a keyboard extension. This app
extension may for example
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
provide enhanced or alternate capabilities for user input features. For
example, for a keyboard
extension, the system may provide enhancements or replacements for keyboard
features such as
auto-correction, spell-checking, auto-completion (of words or phrases, using
for example
predictive text analysis), and databases of words and phrases such as a
lexicon, dictionary, or
thesaurus. In one or more embodiments, the referral matcher may be integrated
within or coupled
to an "app extension," including but not limited to a keyboard extension, such
as for example
Swiftkey0, i0S0, Swype0 or Gboard0; the referral matcher may perform analysis
of content that
is input to such an app extension to determine matching products, services, or
merchants, brands,
or promotions for example associated with the inferred reference in the
communication. For
example, for a keyboard extension, the referral matcher may provide an
alternate or
complementary dictionary or lexicon for auto-completion, auto-correction,
predictive text or spell-
checking. In this example, the referral matcher may analyze input from a
referring user, it may
then analyze this input to identify one or more products, services, merchants,
brands, or promotions
in the database that match the input. The referral matcher may then
automatically generate a
referral link and may insert this referral link into the communication. The
referral matcher may
automatically insert the referral link into the communication, or the referral
matcher may prompt
the referring user to agree to the insertion of the referral link and may then
insert the referral link
into the communication.
[00101] The scenario illustrated in Figure 1 is an example of the system
working in "auto mode,"
where referral matches are automatically presented to the user as they are
discovered by the referral
matcher. One or more embodiments may also support a "manual mode," where the
matcher 110
for example may work in the background but may not automatically show
suggestions to the user
101. Instead, in manual mode, the keyboard or another element of the system
may provide an
indication or cue to indicate to the user 101 that there is a potential match.
Figure lA illustrates
an example of an embodiment operating in manual mode. User 101 configures the
system to
switch from automatic mode 1A01 to manual mode 1A01a. (This configuration may
be performed
for example using a settings screen or any other method of modifying the
configuration of the
referral system or the keyboard.) As the user uses virtual keyboard 104 to
type input 1A02 as part
of a message, the referral matcher may operate in the background to locate
potential referrals
related to the message, but it may not display these referral matches unless
and until the user
requests to see them. Text completion suggestions such as 1A04 may not contain
referral
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
suggestions initially; instead they may be simple text completions for the
current word 1A03,
rather than referral lookups. However, the referral matcher may provide an
indication that it has
located one or more matching referrals, in this example by changing the
appearance of icon 108a
(compared to the original icon 108 in Figure 1). For example, without
limitation, icon 108a may
flash, blink, change color, change size, change shape, or otherwise change any
aspect of its
appearance as a notification of potential referrals. This changed icon signals
to the user that
potential referrals are available for review. In manual mode, the user 101 may
for example single
tap the icon 108a to indicate that the user wants to see the potential
referral or referrals. In this
illustrative example, the referral matcher locates two potential referrals,
one for an airline and one
for a hotel, by scanning and analyzing the input 1A02. A first tap on icon
108a shows the first
potential referral 1A10 in the word completion area of the virtual keyboard.
The user may for
example tap on this referral 1A10 to insert it into the message 1A02. In this
case, the appearance
of icon 108b shows that there are more potential referrals. If the user taps
icon 108b again, a
second referral 1A11 is displayed. Again, the user may tap this suggestion
1A11 to insert the
referral into the message 1A03. Icon 108c returns to its "normal" state (as in
Figure 1), indicating
that there are no more potential referrals that have been located in this
message text. This example
is illustrative; one or more embodiments may use any type of user interface to
present referral
match suggestions to a user either automatically or in response to user
actions. For example, a
user interface may show all possible referral matches to a user
simultaneously, instead of cycling
through them as illustrated in Figure 1A. One or more embodiments may also
provide options for
a user to select among several referrals, which may for instance correspond to
different product
categories. For example, the word "china" in a message may refer to the
product category
porcelain, or the country (which may suggest referrals related to travel); in
one or more
embodiments, the system may prompt the user to select between these options
(although in some
cases, embodiments of the system automatically determine the appropriate
product category by
analyzing the message context or historical data regarding the user's inputs).
[00102] One or more embodiments of the invention may analyze the user's input
and manipulate
the input to transform or augment references to items into any type of
reference or trackable link.
For example, the system may replace or augment an explicit item reference or
an implicit item
reference with one or more of: a hyperlinked version of the same content, a
URL immediately
after the matching content, a footnote-style reference to the item, or with
any other format that
26
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
contains a trackable link or similar reference. In each case, the system may
replace or augment
the contents of the message while keeping the original meaning of the content
intact. In one or
more embodiments, replacing or augmenting of message contents may be done
automatically,
either as the message is generated or prior to transmitting the message. In
one or more
embodiments, the system may offer to optimize the user's communication before
it is sent,
potentially at the user's explicit request. This optimizing of the user's
communication may for
example augment the communication such that a reference to an item includes
characteristics that
include tracking and attribution (such as the user ID and the item in the
database).
[00103] Figure 2 continues the example of Figure 1. User 121 first receives
message 123
containing referral link 124, as described above. The referral link may for
example contain a link
to a website or site or an e-commerce site corresponding to the referred
merchant, product, or
service. One or more embodiments may use any type or types of links or
references, including for
example, without limitation, a hyperlink, a URL, a shortened URL, a full URL,
an image, a sound,
a video, a short code, or a hashtag. In the example shown in Figure 2 the link
is a hyperlink for
illustration. In one or more embodiments, this hyperlink may link to an
intermediate web site or
server, for example, which may be used for tracking or accounting, and which
may then forward
the user to the appropriate e-commerce site. In the example of Figure 2,
receiving user 121 selects
referral link 124, which takes the user to the website 202 (or to a similar
service or application).
User 121 may activate the referral link 124 via any method, including for
example, without
limitation, a click, a tap, a verbal command, a gesture, or any other action
or prompt. The referral
link 124 includes URL 201 that has the address of the e-commerce site (or to
another server that
then forwards to this e-commerce site), along with a parameter that identifies
the referring user.
This URL format is illustrative; one or more embodiments may embed any desired
information
into a referral link in any desired format. For example, without limitation,
URL 201 may encode
or include any combination of one or more of an identifier that identifies the
sending user, the
characteristics of the content that the user input, the matching item from the
database, a merchant
to which the recipient is directed, the context within which the content was
input, and the
application that the user used to input the content.
[00104] URL 201 may be formatted in any desired manner, using any desired
encoding scheme
or schemes to embed the desired information. For example, the system may
include within the
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
database a set of URL formatting rules or templates which may identify the
technical requirements
for URLs or encoded information for each merchant, product, service, brand,
promotion,
intermediary or type of reference made by the user. When the system creates a
link, the system
may perform a lookup within the URL formatting rules to determine and execute
the appropriate
URL structure to successfully send the recipient to the correct site or coupon
with functioning
tracking and attribution. The URL may be constructed to send the recipient to
a deep-link within
the merchant site which corresponds with the reference made by the user and
which may include,
for example and without limitation, a product detail page, search result or a
category page. The
URL may be constructed to map the user's input to an item and merchant URL
prefix so that the
merchant can receive the intent of the user. For example, the user may input
"strappy sandals at
BigMegaStore" and the system would generate a URL with a link to the merchant
site (such as
www.bigmegastore.com) and a reference to "strappy sandals" within the URL, for
example via a
search term.
[00105] User 121 may then interact with site 202 to purchase goods or services
or perform other
transactions. When the user completes a transaction, for example using button
203, referral tracker
210 receives this information and credits the referring user with the
successful referral. In one or
more embodiments, information relating to completed transactions may be
obtained from one or
more third parties, including for example the merchant, an affiliate network,
a credit card
processor, or other system. For example, the website 202 may transmit a
message to a referral
tracker server with the URL 201 (so that the original referrer can be
identified); this message may
also include any additional details of the transaction. The referral tracker
210 may determine the
amount and type of referral credit 211, based for example on the amount of the
transaction and on
specific arrangements with the e-commerce merchant for referrals. The referral
tracker may then
collect this credit from the referring merchant 212, and transmit this credit
to the original referring
user 101 (possibly net of a fee to the referral system provider). In one or
more embodiments, the
computer or server that executes referral matcher 110 may also execute or
otherwise host referral
tracker 210. In other embodiments, a distributed architecture may be utilized
and multiple
computers may implement the referral matcher 110 and referral tracker 210. Any
cookie based
technique or any other technique may be utilized to provide referral tracking
so that for example a
receiving user may use a link or otherwise purchase a product or service at a
later date and still be
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
tracked as taking an action because of the referral, so that the referral
tracker may credit the
referring user.
[00106] In one or more embodiments, any or all of the functions of the
referral tracker 210 may
be provided by third-party systems or services. For example, without
limitation, these third-party
systems or services may provide some or all aspects of tracking, attribution,
payment processing,
calculation of referral credits earned, or reconciliation.
[00107] In the example illustrated in Figure 2, link 124 leads directly to a
merchant site at URL
201. A site referred to via a link may be for example, without limitation, a
website, a mobile
application, a desktop application, a server, an automated communications
platform, a call center,
or a salesperson (for example via telephone, online chat, text communication,
or any other form of
communication). In one or more embodiments, a link may route through an
intermediate server,
which may perform functions such as for example, without limitation:
determining which
merchant or merchants provide the item; prioritizing which merchant site the
system should direct
the recipient to; identifying a promotion or coupon for a product, service,
brand, or merchant; and
prioritizing which merchant coupon to make available to the recipient. In one
or more
embodiments, when a recipient activates a link the system may generate and
present to the recipient
a coupon. The coupon may be for example in the form of a code, a printable
document, a UPC
code, a QR code, a ticket, an image, or another identifier. The recipient may
use the coupon for
example for offline transactions, in which the recipient transacts with a
merchant (physically,
verbally, or digitally) via an interaction which does not get tracked via a
link to a site. The system
may present the coupon in any desired format, including for example in a
printable document, a
virtual document, or in an audio or video format.
[00108] One or more embodiments may provide a referral credit for any type of
action or event
that results from a referral, including but not limited to a purchase
transaction as shown in Figure
2. For example, without limitation, a referral credit may be provided for a
completed transaction
by a recipient, for a recipient clicking on a link, for a recipient consuming
any product or service,
or for a recipient taking an action after clicking on a link, such as signing
up for or joining a
program or service, requesting information, enrolling, applying, registering,
subscribing, or
installing or downloading an application. Any type of transaction may be
tracked and credited,
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
including offline transactions that may for example include a purchase at a
physical store,
consumption of products or services offline (for example at a restaurant, a
physical therapy site,
or a live entertainment site). Transactions may include for example, without
limitation, purchases,
clicks, downloads, submittals, installs, sales inquiries, views, rentals, one-
time purchases,
recurring purchases, and subscriptions.
[00109] When a user completes a creditable transaction, a merchant associated
with the
transaction may owe a fee. The fee may be in any form including for example,
without limitation,
money, credit, points, discounts, cash-back, or membership status. The
merchant (or their agent
or intermediary) may remit the fee or fees to the system. The system may then
remit all or a portion
of the remitted fees to the user, to the recipient, or to another designee
that the user or recipient
may designate (such as a charity, organization, or individual). Remitting may
occur via any mode,
depending on the nature of the fee, and may include for example, without
limitation, ACH, EFT,
wire transfer, a check, a digital wallet, Bitcoin or other digital currency,
crediting a credit or debit
card or gift card, remittance via online payment providers such as PayPal and
Venmo0, crediting
points to a loyalty program, and providing a discount code for future
purchases.
[00110] In one or more embodiments, a referral credit may be provided to any
person, persons,
groups, or organizations, including but not limited to the original referrer.
A referral credit may
be monetary, or it may take any other form such as an award, a gift of goods
or services, a credit
against previous expenditures, or a credit for future expenditures or usage.
Figure 3 illustrates
several options for referral credits; these options are illustrative and are
not limiting. Referral
tracker 210 may issue a monetary credit 302 to the original referrer. It may
generate a feedback
message 301 to the referrer, which may for example inform the referrer when a
referral has been
used by a recipient; feedback messages may also provide the referrer with
aggregate information
on all activity resulting from the referrer's referrals. Feedback messages may
include information
such as the time of a recipient's transaction, the recipient's transaction
amount, the referral fee
amount earned, the rate of links sent to conversions (i.e., a quality score
for a user), and a settlement
status change. One or more embodiments may also provide an account profile or
account summary
view accessible to the referring user, such as a user dashboard, where the
user may view
information such as details of referrals, resulting clicks, transaction,
credits, payments, products,
services, or merchants referred, conversion rates for referrals, analysis and
suggestions which aid
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
in optimizing future referrals, and preference settings. A user dashboard may
also provide
mechanisms to control the modes in which fees are remitted or stored, such as
for example by
physical check, ACH, international wire, local bank transfer, cash pickup,
PayPa10, Venmo0, pre-
paid debit card, or gift card. Referral tracker 210 may generate a referral
credit 303 in the form of
a donation to an organization, for example which may or may not be made in the
name of the
referrer or may otherwise be associated with the referrer. In one or more
embodiments referrals
may be tracked on a group basis; for example, referral tracker 210 may
generate aggregate referral
credits 304 to a group (or on behalf of a group) based on activity resulting
from referrals by any
or all members of the group. In one or more embodiments, a referral credit may
also be shared
between a referring user and the receiving user (such as referring user 101
and receiving user 121
in Figure 1.)
[00111] In one or more embodiments, the system may enable a user to create (or
may
automatically create) an interface (a "user page") that aggregates content and
links that a user has
input into an application via the system. The user may be able to curate the
links on the user page
and may be able to make the user page available or point recipients to their
user page (for example
via sharing of a URL or via any other digital communication). If a recipient
activates a link on a
user page, the link may lead to a merchant site or generate a coupon with
which the recipient may
transact and generate a fee for the user (as described above).
[00112] In one or more embodiments, the system may provide a merchant
dashboard that may for
example include settings, bidding controls, reporting, and other features that
enable a merchant to
manage its interactions with the system and with users of the system, and to
manage promotional
programs.
[00113] In one or more embodiments, the system may enable a referrer to refer
a new user to use
the system or to use an application into which the system is integrated. The
referrer may be an
individual, company, organization, application, or other entity. The tracking
code or other aspect
of the system may encode a user ID to enable tracking of links generated by
user content, so that
when a user who uses the system as the result of a referral from a referrer
earns a fee, the referrer
may earn a portion of such fees, and the system may automatically remit the
referral fee to the
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
referrer. Referrers who refer new users to the system may therefore earn a
portion of the resulting
fees generated by these new users.
[00114] Figure 4 illustrates an embodiment that allows a user to select text
or other items and to
initiate a search for potentially matching products, services, or merchants
for referrals. In this
example, the user is communicating via a posting 402 on a social media site
401. Any other user
who reads the posting may receive this communication, and may thereby receive
and use referrals
embedded in the posting. The user types the posting and selects text 403, and
then initiates a
search for matching referrals by pressing icon 404, which may for example be
integrated into a
virtual keyboard or otherwise made available to the application used for
creating or reviewing the
posting. The referral matcher 110 matches the selected text 403 to the
merchant database 111, and
generates a referral link 201 that is inserted into the posting 402. The
display name of the referral
link may remain the same, such as remaining the selected text 403; one or more
embodiments may
modify the display name of the referral link in any desired manner, for
example as necessary to
comply with policies or technical requirements of the communications channel
being used. In one
or more embodiments, a user may be able to select and match any information,
including for
example, without limitation, text, documents, files, web pages, URLs, images,
or message threads,
and may be able to initiate a search by the referral matcher against any of
this information.
[00115] In one or more embodiments, the referral matcher may perform a search
for matches
continuously in the background, and it may display the results of these
background searches when
the user explicitly indicates that he or she wants to see the matches. For
example, the user may
tap an icon such as icon 404 in Figure 4 in order to see matching referrals.
Referral matches may
be determined based on user selected text (as shown in Figure 4), or based on
automatically
detected relevant content (as shown in Figure 1), or on any combination
thereof. In an "auto
mode," matching referrals may be shown to the user automatically as they are
located, as shown
in Figure 1. In a "manual mode," matching referrals may be shown on request.
In one or more
embodiments, a user may be able to view multiple matching referrals on
request, for example by
successively tapping on an icon to see the next match in the list. As an
illustration, for message
402 in Figure 4, if the system is in manual mode, a first tap on icon 404 may
present a suggestion
of Acme Airlines, while a second tap on icon 404 may present a suggestion of a
hotel in Tahoe.
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[00116] Figure 5 illustrates an embodiment that allows a user to generate a
referral link using a
share button or a similar sharing capability. User 101 is browsing website
501, for example while
making or planning a purchase. The user decides to share the website, and
possibly also share
specifics of the user's browsing (such as potential purchases), by pressing
the share button 502.
This share button may for example present a sharing menu 503 to the user,
which offers multiple
ways to share the current context. In one or more embodiments, the system may
provide a referral
sharing option 504 as an option in this sharing menu. When the user presses
the referral button
504, the referral matcher 110 may examine the current context that is being
shared, and may
determine whether any items from database 111 match this context. If a match
is found, it may
for example be inserted as a referral link 505 into a message, which the user
may then complete
and send to any desired recipient or recipients. In one or more embodiments,
matching of the
context to potential referrals and generation of referral links may be
combined with sharing via
any other method, such as via a text, email, messaging app, or a social media
site.
[00117] In one or more embodiments, sharing of a website URL or other
information may be done
first via a sharing button, and then the option to convert this link to a
referral link may be presented
in the messaging application that shares the link. For example, if user 101
selects the email icon
from sharing menu 503, an email application may appear allowing the user to
compose a message
with the link to site 501. In this email application, the user may have an
option to convert this
website link to a referral link, for example by pressing a referral icon such
as icon 504 that may
appear in the email application, or, in the event that the application
launches a virtual keyboard,
by pressing a keyboard icon.
[00118] In one or more embodiments, sharing of a referral related to a website
may be performed
directly using a button or icon that generates a referral link to that
website, or to a similar site
related to the website. For example, without limitation, any website may
incorporate a "refer"
button or icon. When a user presses or otherwise accesses this button or icon,
a referral link may
be created for a merchant related to the website, where the referral link also
identifies the user
making the referral. This referral button or icon may be analogous for example
to a PinterestTM
pin button, but instead of "pinning" a link to the website, the referral
button or icon generates a
referral link to the website that will generate a referral credit to the
referring user when and if
another user accesses the referral link and completes a transaction.
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
[00119] Figure 6 illustrates an embodiment that supports input of an image
into a referral
matching process. The system may match any image or any data derived from an
image with the
items in a merchant database to obtain potential referrals that match the
image. The image may
be for example, without limitation, a barcode (either a 1D barcode or a 2D
barcode such as a QR
code), an image containing a product name or product identifier, a picture of
a product, or one or
more frames from a video containing a product. In the example shown in Figure
6, user 101 uses
mobile device 102 to compose a message to a recipient. The user wants to
insert a referral link to
a product, and therefore presses image capture button 601 to initiate image
capture 602, for
example via a camera integrated into device 102 or accessible via device 102.
This image may be
for example, without limitation, a QR code 603 that identifies the product,
service, or merchant
being referred, or a picture 604 of the product, service, or merchant. The
image capture 602
provides the captured image or images to the referral matcher 110, which
compares the captured
image or images to information in the merchant database 111. Comparison and
matching of
images may in one or more embodiments use external databases or services, such
as for example
a lookup service for barcodes or an external database of product images. If a
match is located, the
referral matcher may generate a referral link 124 and insert this link into
the message 123
transmitted to the message recipient 121. In one or more embodiments, a
barcode or QR code
application may execute on electronic device 102 and the information obtained
from the barcode
or QR code may be utilized to index into database 111 to determine a
corresponding merchant. In
other embodiments, any image processing based application that can recognize
objects may be
utilized to determine a product or product category that is utilized to search
database 111 for.
[00120] In one or more embodiments of the invention, any type of input may be
provided to the
referral matcher, including but not limited to text input and image input. For
example, without
limitation, input into the referral matcher may include sounds of any type or
voice commands, and
the referral matcher may for example use voice recognition or any type of
audio processing to
recognize the input and compare it to items in the merchant database. Input
may also include data
captured by any type of sensor, scanner, or reader. For example, one or more
embodiments may
allow a user to use an RFID reader to read an RFID tag that identifies a
potential referral.
[00121] In one or more embodiments, the referral matcher may use language
processing and
analysis techniques to understand the user's input and to determine matching
merchants. These
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
techniques may include for example, without limitation, artificial
intelligence, natural language
processing, collaborative filtering, type-ahead, predictive analytics, machine
learning,
recommendation engine, personalization engine, or any combinations thereof.
Figure 7 illustrates
an embodiment where the referral matcher 110a has a natural language processor
(NLP) 705
integrated into or accessible to the referral matcher. The user's input 701 is
provided to the natural
language processor 705, either automatically as the user types or in response
to the user pressing
a referral button such as 704. In this illustrative example, the NLP subsystem
705 recognizes the
phrase 702 as relating to airline travel, and therefore searches the merchant
database 111a for
airlines. Figure 7 also illustrates that in one or more embodiments the
merchant database may be
categorized, indexed, or organized in any desired manner to facilitate
referral matching; for
example, database 111a has airline merchants 706 identified as a particular
product group. In this
example, the natural language processor also detects that phrase 703 in the
user's input 701
indicates the user's likely destination for air travel. Therefore, the NLP
subsystem 705 determines
that the user is discussing context 707, which includes both the product
category (airlines) and the
likely destination. All contextual information from analysis of the user's
input may be used to
select one or more matching referrals. Virtual keyboard 104 may be utilized
with the microphone
instead of directly manually typing as per Figure 1 and also Figure 7 for
example.
[00122] Continuing the example shown in Figure 7, in this case the referral
matcher 110a
determines that there are multiple possible merchants that match the user's
input. When multiple
merchants match the input, the system may either automatically make a
selection of a merchant to
refer, or it may ask the user to make a selection. (One or more embodiments
may use combinations
of these methods.) Figure 7 illustrates an embodiment that asks the user to
select which merchant
to refer. Once the referral matcher has determined matching merchants, the
system presents screen
710 to the user and asks the user to select one of the matching merchants.
(This screen 710 is
illustrative; one or more embodiments may present matching options to a user
in any desired
format and sequence.) In one or more embodiments, the referral matcher may
provide additional
information to assist in making the selection. For example, in Figure 7 the
selection screen 710
contains table 711 that shows the matching merchants along with the referral
credits offered by
each merchant. Table 711 also shows the price from each merchant for travel to
the destination
707 determined by NLP subsystem 705. This example illustrates how the complete
context 707
determined by the NLP subsystem may be used to determine an appropriate or
potential referral,
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
or to assist the user in making a selection from multiple matches. The user
may select a particular
merchant from table 711 and generate a referral link 201a using button 713.
Other user interface
options may include for example tapping a selected merchant in the table to
generate a referral to
that merchant, or tapping a button or icon to prompt the matcher to prompt the
matcher to display
a list of alternate matching merchants, or in some cases alternative product
categories when the
input has matches in multiple categories (such as a book title that has also
been made into a movie
and a board game).
[00123] Although Figure 7 illustrates an example where the user makes a
selection of a referral,
in one or more embodiments the system may automatically select a referral
based for example on
the referral credit, the price of the product or service offered, or on any
other factors. One or more
embodiments may include a bidding system whereby merchants bid for referrals,
for example by
offering referral credit rates or other rewards. In one or more embodiments,
the bidding system
may be dynamic, in that referral credit information may be obtained for each
transaction, for
example whenever a referral matcher or a user is making a selection among
merchants to generate
a referral.
[00124] One or more embodiments may include a merchant bidding system through
which
participating merchants may compete with other participating merchants to be
positioned higher
in the prioritization of referrals. A merchant may include, without
limitation, a retailer, e-
commerce provider, service provider, advertiser, aggregator, broker, agency,
promoter, or a party
acting on their own behalf or on behalf of another party. Any of the following
techniques may be
utilized. Embodiments of the system may provide merchants with a self-service
system for placing
bids. Merchants may bid on a variety of matching characteristics including,
without limitation,
brand, product, service, keyword, phrase, product category, SKU or other
product coding.
Merchants may bid based on bidding strategies including, without limitation,
referral fee
percentage, fixed amount of reward, bounty for leads, price per click, bounty
for installation of
application or software, or another action performed by a recipient who has
utilized a referral link
to the merchant. Embodiments of the system may include a bidding platform that
may provide the
merchant with multiple modes of bidding including, without limitation, manual
mode (with which,
for example, merchant sets a specific bid price for a specific product
referral) or automatic mode
(with which, for example, merchant designates a daily budget and time period
and the system
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
adjusts the referral fee bid automatically to deliver the most referrals
possible within the
merchant's designated budget and time period). The merchant may specify bid
pricing or referral
limits based upon specific characteristics of the sender or recipient(s)
including, without limitation,
the sender or recipient's geography or, demographics, sender or recipient
transaction history, input
type used by sender, device type used by sender or recipient, communication
channel through
which the referral link was sent, or any combination thereof. The merchant may
set limits on bids
placed and may set time period for which the limits apply. Limits may include
(without limitation)
maximum amount of referral credits paid (for example a daily budget), maximum
number of
referrals received or other limits. Embodiments of the system may enable the
merchant to set
dynamically priced bids, such that the bid amount adjusts, which may be
automatic, depending
upon factors such as, without limitation, time of day, level of demand,
inventory availability,
climate changes, competitive pricing dynamics relating to other merchants,
specificity or other
characteristic of the sender's input which generated the referral, number or
rate of referrals already
received or paid by the merchant, or other characteristics of sender or
recipient such as any of those
mentioned above (e.g., geography, user demographics, communication channel
utilized, etc.).
Embodiments of the system may provide merchants with a dashboard which may
provide, without
limitation, account settings, preference settings, payment setting, reporting,
data and analysis,
bidding controls, account management services and communication tools.
Embodiments of the
system may implement any of these techniques for example at least at Figure
11, step 1112.
[00125] Figure 8 shows an illustrative process flow for selected steps in the
referral process, for
a scenario and embodiment in which input is obtained from the user via a
keyboard. These steps
are illustrative; one or more embodiments may execute different steps,
additional steps, or may
execute any of the steps shown in Figure 8 in a different order or in
parallel. In step 801, the
system accepts input as the user provides the input via keystrokes using a
virtual keyboard
connected to a communications app. In one or more embodiments, the virtual
keyboard may
contain or be linked to a referral matcher for example over any type of local
or remote
communications channel; this referral-aware keyboard may for example be usable
with any
application that accepts keyboard input, (which again may include spoken words
via the
microphone). By integrating the referral matcher with the keyboard, one or
more embodiments
enables universal general-purpose referral generation capability for any
communication initiated
by the user.
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
[00126] In step 802, the referral matcher may use artificial intelligence,
natural language
processing, or similar techniques to parse and understand the user's input. It
may then select a
matching item in the database, and suggest this referral to the user. A
matching item may be any
type of information for which a referral or recommendation may be relevant,
including for
example, without limitation, a product, a service, a brand, a merchant, an
activity, an instruction,
a suggestion, a solution, an information source, a person, and organization, a
professional, or any
combination thereof. The suggestion may be integrated into the keyboard app,
for example as a
suggested word completion. At step 803, the system may accept input from the
user that may then
tap on the suggested referral to accept it, which triggers step 804 that
creates and inserts a referral
link into the communication. The referral link may for example contain a
hyperlink to a merchant
(or to an intermediary), along with a tracking code that identifies the
referring user.
[00127] Once the message containing the referral link is transmitted to the
recipient, the system
may execute additional steps such as steps 805 through 809, for example when
and if the recipient
uses the referral link to access a merchant site or to make a purchase. In
step 805, if the recipient
accesses the referral link, the link may in one or more embodiments initially
pass through an
intermediate server, prior to redirecting the recipient to the merchant's
site. This server may for
example track the referral, and it may place tracking information such as
cookies on the recipient's
device. A cookie may for example have a duration that last for multiple days,
thereby providing
credit to the referrer if the recipient transacts at another time other than
the initial click of the link.
The cookie may also provide credit if the recipient subsequently goes directly
to the merchant site
without using the referral link. In cases where the recipient's device does
not accept cookies (many
mobile phones do not), one or more embodiments may use other techniques such
as device UID
and IP address to associate a recipient's subsequent transactions with the
original referral link. In
one or more embodiments, the referral link may lead the recipient to a site or
user interface control
that may link to one or more merchants, rather than to an intermediate server
that automatically
forwards to a merchant site. For example, without limitation, the referral
link may lead the
recipient to a jump page, an interstitial web page, a pop-up, or an overlay.
This link destination
may show a range of information related to the referral link, including for
example product
descriptions, product or merchant locations, a list of matching merchants from
which the recipient
can select, images, videos, or any other information related to the referral.
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[00128] In step 806, the system accepts input from the recipient who proceeds
to the merchant's
site using the referral link. If the recipient makes a purchase or other
transaction on this site, the
system's referral tracker records the transaction. In step 807, a notification
may be sent to the
referring user by the system. In step 808, the referral tracker collects a
referral credit from the
merchant, which is then remitted in step 809 to the referring user. In one or
more embodiments,
some or all of the steps of tracking, attribution, collection, and payment may
be performed by
third-party services or systems.
[00129] In one or more embodiments, determining a destination (such as an e-
commerce site or a
product page) for a referral may be performed in two (or more) stages. Figure
8A shows an
illustrative process flow for an embodiment that uses two-stage matching to
direct a recipient to a
referral destination. Initially in step 802, as in Figure 8, the referral
matcher determines a match
for the user's input, and in step 804 the system generates a link with the
match information.
However, in one or more embodiments the initial match in step 802 may not
identify a final referral
destination, but may instead identify only general information such as the
existence of a matching
product, service, or merchant, or a general category or group of products,
services, or merchants
that may match the user's input. For example, the initial referral matching
step may identify that
a user communication mentions a flight, but it may not identify a particular
airline to fulfill this
flight. In these situations, the initial referral link generated in step 804
may direct the recipient to
an intermediate server that performs additional processing and matching in
step 8A05 to select a
final destination for the referral; the intermediate server may then redirect
the recipient of the
referral link to this final destination. When the recipient is redirected, the
recipient arrives in step
8A06 at a final referral destination (such as an e-commerce site), where the
recipient can perform
actions that result in a referral credit to the referring user (as described
above with respect to Figure
8). The final destination may be for example, without limitation, a web site,
web page, application,
URL, URI, web service, or more generally any physical or virtual destination
or service that
completes the referral.
[00130] A potential benefit of the process flow illustrated in Figure 8A is
that the initial referral
matching step 802 can be relatively "lightweight" and may for example require
only a relatively
small database of products, services, and merchants. Moreover, this database
for the initial
matching may not need to be updated in real time to reflect dynamic
information that may
39
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
determine the best match for a referral. Because the final matching stage 8A05
is performed on
the intermediate server, it can access a more complete and up-to-date database
of information,
including for example dynamically updated bids from merchants on referrals. It
may also access
more powerful computing resources to execute computationally intensive
algorithms. The
intermediate server can use any desired strategy or prioritization algorithms
to determine which
merchant to send a recipient to. For example, without limitation, the
intermediate server may rank
merchants by any or all of price, availability, user ratings or reviews, level
of inventory, proximity
to a user, speed of fulfillment, or size of referral credit offered to the
referring user.
[00131] Figure 8A illustrates a two-stage referral matching process flow. One
or more
embodiments may generalize this process to perform referral matching in any
desired number of
stages, using any desired number of servers and databases to process
information and determine a
final destination associated with a referral link.
[00132] The process flow shown in Figure 8 uses keyboard input as illustrative
input into the
referral process. As described above, other forms of input may be accepted by
one or more
embodiments. Figure 9 illustrates several other input method options that may
be supported by
one or more embodiments of the referral system. In addition to keyboard input
option 901 (as
shown in Figure 8), input may be obtained from a camera scanning any type of
code, e.g., barcode
902, from a share button option 903, from a user selection of text or a URL
904, from a button 905
that grabs a current URL, from a camera scanning a product image 906, from
images or audio
obtained from GoogleTM glasses 907, from a link or button placed on any
website 908, from add-
ons or extensions for other keyboards 909, from an application that integrates
with a physical
keyboard 910, from voice input 911, or from type ahead, predictive word
suggestions, or glide
typing applications 912. These input methods are illustrative; one or more
embodiments may
obtain input of any type, in any format, from any device, service, subsystem,
or application.
[00133] As a first illustrative example, which corresponds to keyboard input
option 901, the
system may be integrated into a mobile device virtual or soft keyboard input
method or service.
The system may monitor input content from this soft keyboard and interpret
through analysis when
the user has referenced an item. When the user completes the input of a
reference to an item (or
to an entire communication with references in it), the system can offer to
optimize the user's
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
communication before it is sent. The system may do this automatically or at
the user's specific
request.
[00134] As a second illustrative example, which corresponds to voice input
option 911, the system
may be integrated into a mobile device or a smart speaker application. The
system may for
example monitor words as the user speaks them and perform analysis of the
content to identify
references to items. Before the user sends the communication, the user may
have the system
optimize the communication. This optimization may be done automatically or
upon the user's
explicit request. When the system optimizes the communication, it augments the
communication
such that the reference to an item includes characteristics that include
tracking and attribution (such
as the user ID and the item in the database).
[00135] As a third illustrative example, which corresponds to camera input
option 906, the system
may be integrated into a camera within a mobile device. When a user uses a
mobile device camera
the system may analyze the image in order to determine whether the image
matches an item in the
database. If the image matches an item in the database, the system may prompt
the user to share
the image in a digital communication and the system may transform or augment
the image to
include a link or to make the image clickable (with a link embedded therein),
either automatically
or with a prompt from the user.
[00136] In one or more embodiments, a referral matcher or any related module
of the system may
analyze any type of existing content or new content that is input by a user
into any application, in
order to monetize a communication between the user and one or more recipients.
The referral
matcher may be built into an application or may connect to any application via
any technical
interface, such as for example, without limitation, a local SDK, a remote API,
a set of user interface
components, or a back-end system to integrate any other interface or
interfaces. An application
to which the system connects may be any software, system, device, application,
or technology that
enables a user to input content or to share content with a recipient.
Applications may for example
provide communications via any digital platform, such as, without limitation,
peer-to-peer
communications, social media, services, messaging applications, e-commerce
services, digital
media, digital content, images, videos, audio, product reviews, chat rooms, or
published content.
Applications may incorporate or integrate with devices or services such as for
example, without
41
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
limitation, a physical keyboard, a virtual keyboard, a mobile device or
application or software, an
image capture device or software, an audio/video capture device or software, a
kiosk, a scanner,
an RFID reader, a microphone, a vehicle, a smart speaker, smart glasses, an
augmented reality
device or software, a virtual reality device or software, an automated
personal assistant, a
smartphone, a computer, a server, a tablet, a notebook, a laptop, and any
software or hardware
embedded within any such device or service or subsystem.
[00137] Content accepted by, analyzed by, or transformed by the system may
include content of
any type or types, in any format of formats, including for example, without
limitation, text, data,
code, information, images, voice, video, and RFID.
[00138] A user providing input to the system may be for example, without
limitation, any
individual, content creator, group, company, organization, system, subsystem,
bot, app,
application, server, or service. The system may assign a unique user ID to
each user. A user may
interact directly with the system or may interact (either knowingly or
unknowingly) via an
integration of the system into an application that the user is using, or via a
plug-in for an application
or service that the user uses. A recipient may be for example, without
limitation, one or more
individuals, companies, organizations, or entities that hear, view, read or
otherwise receive the
content that is input by a user or one or more links generated by the system.
In one or more
embodiments, a user and a recipient may be the same individual or entity.
[00139] In one or more embodiments, the system may analyze the content of a
communication
using any desired methods or technologies, including for example, without
limitation, natural
language processing, artificial intelligence, or image recognition. This
analysis may for example
determine explicit references to items in the database, or implicit intent or
context from which
items in the database may be inferred.
[00140] As an alternative to the input method options illustrated in Figure 9,
which may for
example connect the referral matcher locally with a communications
application, one or more
embodiments may allow a user to "fetch" a link from a remote service. For
example, a user may
create content and send this content to a remote service, via for example a
text, email, in-app
communication, Facebook0 post, or instant message. The system may provide or
integrate with
this remote service, and may analyze the content received to identify matches
to items. The system
42
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
may then convert matching content to links and insert the reformatted content
with these links
directly into a digital communication as specified by the user or the system
may send the
reformatted content with these links back to the user. The user may then
insert the reformatted
content including the links into digital communications. For example, as a
variation of the scenario
illustrated in Figure 7, a user may create a message with the content "Flight
to Tahoe" and send it
(via email for example) to a remote matching service. The matching service may
then generate
the link 201 (in Figure 7) and insert the link into a digital communication or
send the link back to
the user, who can then insert the link into any desired message. When a
recipient receives the link,
it functions similarly to links generated via virtual keyboards or other input
methods.
[00141] Figure 10 shows illustrative options for keyword matching or similar
functionality that
may be used to identify potential referrals within the user's text input or
other input. Matching
options may include for example artificial intelligence 1001, natural language
processing 1002,
type-ahead 1003, spell-checking 1004, prompts for text when the user presses a
referral button or
icon 1005, predictive typing 1006, personalization based on past typing or
preferences 1007, and
processing using a recommendation engine 1008. Additional options may include
for example,
without limitation, collaborative filtering, affect analysis, predictive
analytics, and machine
learning.
[00142] When multiple potential matches or referrals are identified, one or
more embodiments
may employ business strategies and algorithms to prioritize among the
alternatives, thereby
determining which merchant, merchant site, or coupon to present to the
recipient. This
prioritization may for example analyze any factor or factors, such as for
example, without
limitation: sender characteristics, such as the sender's item preferences
(either explicitly provided
or implicitly derived) and the sender's message intent or sentiment
(determined for example via
NLP or hashtag analysis); recipient characteristics, such as the local time
zone, location, and
previous behavior including item preferences (explicitly provided or
implicitly derived); item
characteristics, such as price, availability, discount amount, brand
reputation, and product delivery
speed; merchant characteristics, such as conversion rate, payout amount, and
reputation analysis;
and bidding platform characteristics, such as payout amount and settlement
period.
43
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
[00143] Figure 11 shows illustrative options for data sources that may provide
data for a merchant
database. A merchant database may contain information on merchants and on any
products or
services offered by merchants or by any sellers. The system may aggregate
items into the database
using any of several methods, including for example, without limitation,
automated fetching of
content made available by merchants or other intermediaries, manual input by
system
administrators or users, direct self-service input by merchants, input via a
bidding platform,
automatic creation of new items obtained by scanning and analyzing user input,
and dynamic
search of the web or other databases for matching items or brands that are not
currently in the
database. Data may be obtained directly from merchants 1101 and e-commerce
sites 1102, or
indirectly from content aggregators 1103. Content retrieved from merchants or
intermediaries may
include for example, without limitation, product catalogs, SKUs, image files,
merchant affiliations
with networks or other intermediaries, promotion units (including banner ads)
for merchants or
specific products, and URLs with deep-links to product detail pages for
example. Data may be
obtained via APIs 1104 or by using web crawlers / scrapers 1105. Data may be
obtained from
user-input and user-generated content 1106, from a user-specified list, user
favorites, or user
history 1110. Databases may be network-connected 1107, embedded within the
software 1108, or
reachable via web search 1109. Data may be obtained from aggregate listings
from affiliate
networks 1111. Data may be obtained from a dynamic bidding system 1112, where
merchants for
example may bid by specifying a referral fee. Data in the database may be
ranked in any desired
manner, for example by user reviews/ratings, third party ratings, or user
preferences 1113. Data
may be obtained from external databases or services indexed for example by
SKUs, barcodes, or
any other identifier of a product, service, or merchant. The system may use
artificial intelligence
or other methods to identify, within user input, content such as keywords,
terms describing items,
or new products and services; the system may then automatically (or via a
prompt to a system
administrator) create items in the database that match the newly identified
items. These examples
are illustrative; one or more embodiments may obtain data on merchants,
products, services,
referral fees, merchant locations, the availability of inventory, ratings or
reviews related to
merchants, products, or services, prices, or any attributes of these items
from any desired data
source, in any desired format.
[00144] Figure 12 illustrates a variation of the flowchart of Figure 8, where
input is obtained from
an image rather than from a keyboard. In step 1201, the user captures an image
such as a barcode,
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
QR code, or a product image, for example using a camera integrated into or
reachable via a user's
device, or by selecting a previously captured or otherwise accessible image on
the user's device or
accessible via a network connection. In step 1202, the referral matcher
analyzes the image to
determine which products, services, or merchants match the image, and it may
suggest this referral
to the user. The remaining steps in this process flow may be similar to those
described with respect
to Figure 8.
[00145] Figure 13 illustrates a variation of the flowchart of Figure 8, where
input is obtained via
a share button instead of or in addition to from a keyboard. In step 1301, the
user uses a share
button to share an item; the share button may for example launch a "share
sheet" with sharing
options that depend on the item being shared. The shared content is then
analyzed in step 802, and
additional steps in the process flow may be similar to those described with
respect to Figure 8.
[00146] Figure 14 illustrates a variation of the flowchart of Figure 8, where
input is obtained from
a user selection instead of from keystrokes of a keyboard as the user types.
In step 1401, the user
selects text, a URL, or any other item, within any application. In step 1402,
the referral matcher
analyzes the selected information to identify one or more matching products,
services, or
merchants in the database; it may then present the match or matches to the
user as a suggestion,
for example as part of a keyboard app. In another variation, the matcher may
work continuously
in the background to match the user's input, and may respond with suggestions
only when the user
requests the matching referrals. The remaining steps in this process flow may
be similar to those
described with respect to Figure 8.
[00147] For the system features and capabilities described above, one or more
embodiments may
perform functions that analyze system performance and optimize the system for
improved
performance over time. For example, optimizations may be performed to improve
utilization,
utility, or value of the system for users, recipients, merchants, or
administrators. Illustrative
optimizations may include for example the following processes. The system may
use artificial
intelligence or other techniques to observe user input content and to identify
new items that should
be added to the database. The system may aggregate and analyze data regarding
user, recipient
and merchant use of the system in order to: improve performance of links;
increase fees earned;
optimize which site or coupon is selected; and maximize conversion rates (such
as the fraction of
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
recipient links that are activated or that result in transactions). The system
may aggregate and
analyze data regarding the frequency of match between content and database
items (for example
by evaluating ratios such as the number of item matches per word of content or
the number of item
matches per communication sent); matching algorithms may be adjusted to
increase (or decrease)
these frequencies. The system may test links (periodically or continuously) to
ensure that the URL
formatting rules are functioning as intended, and in the event of a
malfunction may alert an
administrator or fix the malfunction automatically. The system may also
incorporate trust and
safety procedures and subsystems to monitor, flag, and prohibit fraudulent use
of the system, in
order to protect the interests of merchants, users, recipients, and
administrators.
[00148] In one or more embodiments, any combination of the functions performed
by the system
may utilize technology, software, resources, and services of third-party
service providers.
[00149] In one or more embodiments, a referral link may be inserted by a
communication
intermediary that conveys, transmits, routes, directs, receives, stores,
forwards, resends,
transforms, analyzes, combines, filters, translates, formats, edits, posts,
displays, or otherwise
handles a message or other communication from a sender to a receiver. The
communication
intermediary may be any link, service, provider, application, server, or
gateway that handles the
message or any part of the message at any point in the path from the sender to
the receiver. The
intermediary may be for example a message gateway associated with the sender,
or a message
gateway associated with the receiver, or a message gateway associated with
both. In some
applications, the sending user may not need to take any action for the
referral link to be added to
a message. The communication intermediary may be responsible for analyzing the
message and
adding a referral link if appropriate, and the intermediary may in some
situations receive credit for
a completed referral, either instead of or in addition to the sending user. In
some scenarios, no
software, app, or utility need be installed at all on the sending user's
device or the receiving user's
device, and analysis of the message and adding of a referral link may all
occur after the
communication has left the sender's device and before the communication is
delivered to the
recipient's device. This approach may simplify management of the referral
process, since referral
matching and referral tracking may be done centrally at one or a few
communications
intermediaries, rather than on thousands or millions of user devices. In one
or more embodiments,
software operating on the sending user's or recipient's device may communicate
with the
46
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
intermediary to select and add a referral link; the sender and recipient may
or may not be involved
in this process.
[00150] Figure 15 shows an illustrative embodiment that integrates referral
matching into the
message flow through one or more communications intermediaries. In this
example, user 101
constructs a communication 1500, which in this case is a text message, using
mobile device 102.
In this example, mobile device 102 has no software or application installed
that intercepts
characters or text of message 1500; instead the user constructs the entire
message 1500 and sends
it over normal communications channels.
Communications carrier 1501 receives the
communication 1500 from the device 102. Carrier 1501 may be any type of
channel, organization,
or infrastructure that conveys, transmits, receives, routes, forwards, stores,
directs, edits, filters,
formats, or manages any type or types of communications. For example, without
limitation, carrier
1501 may be a network provider, a wireless provider, a cellular provider, an
internet service
provider, a social media platform, a messaging service, a telephone service
provider, a broadband
service provider, a Wi-Fi provider, an email service, a text message service,
a mobile application,
a software application, a chat service, an application that conveys,
transmits, routes, or formats
communications, or a gateway between any types of devices, networks, routers,
or nodes. Message
1502 may be any type or types of communication, including for example, without
limitation, a text
message, an email message, a voice message, a video message, a website link, a
link to a mobile
application, a picture message, a transcribed message, a communication via
social media, a
communication via a shopping site, a communication via a message board, a
posting to a product
review service, an encrypted message, a digital communication, a comment
posted to a digital
media service, and a communication via any messaging application. Carrier 1501
transmits the
message 1502 to a gateway 1510, which may for example process the message
before forwarding
it to the message receiver. The message 1502 may contain an identifier 1503 of
the sender, an
identifier 1504 of the receiver, and the message body 1505. The sender
identifier and receiver
identifier may be for example, without limitation, phone numbers, email
addresses, social media
identities, device IDs or any other identifying information. Messages may
contain any other
metadata, such as timestamps, priorities, or formats. The communication body
1505 may contain
any type or types of content, including for example, without limitation, text,
image, voice, audio,
video, code, software, links, URLs, website addresses, and attachments.
47
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
[00151] In the illustrative embodiment of Figure 15, gateway 1510 transmits
the body 1505 of the
message to referral matcher 1511. The referral matcher 1511 may execute on a
computer that is
coupled to or that hosts the gateway 1510. The gateway and the referral
matcher may execute on
the same computer device, or on different computer devices connected by a
network or any other
type of link. In one or more embodiments the referral matcher may execute on a
computer that is
coupled to both the gateway and the sender's device, or to both the gateway
and the receiver's
device; the gateway, referral matcher, and sender and receiver devices may
interact in any manner
to identify referral links and transform messages.
The communications intermediary that
processes messages to identify and insert referrals may be any combination of
services executing
on any combination of systems, including for example the sending and receiving
devices and any
intermediate nodes in a communication path between the sender and receiver. A
computer that
executes the referral matcher, the gateway, or both, may be any processing
device or devices,
including for example, without limitation, a desktop computer, a laptop
computer, a notebook
computer, a server, an embedded processor, a GPU, a tablet, a phone, a
wearable processing
device, a network switch or router, or a network of any of these devices. In
this embodiment, only
the message body 1505 is transmitted to the referral matcher 1511. The sender
identifier 1503 and
the receiver identifier 1504 are not transmitted to the referral matcher 1511.
This limited
information flow to the referral matcher protects the privacy and security of
the sender and
receiver. Personally identifying information or sensitive personal information
of the sender and
receiver may be protected in that this information is not transmitted to or
accessible by the referral
matcher. In one or more embodiments the gateway 1510 or the carrier 1501 may
filter out other
information as desired before transmitting the message body 1505 to the
referral matcher. For
example, the gateway 1510 may filter out person names (such as "Jan" and
"Cindy"), information
such as bank account numbers or social security numbers, or any other data
that may be viewed as
personal or sensitive.
[00152] Referral matcher 1511 then analyzes the message body 1505 to determine
whether any
words, phrases, text strings, or other content of the body match any of the
listings in database 111.
This process may for example be similar to the matching processes described
above. The referral
matcher may for example perform language processing of the message body to
compare the
content of the message body to the database listings. This language processing
may for example
use any techniques of natural language processing, machine learning,
artificial intelligence, or
48
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
pattern recognition. Words may be stemmed to simplify comparison to the
entries in database 111.
If the referral matcher finds a match in search 1512, it may then insert a
link 1513 to a site or
resource associated with the database entry. This process may be similar to
the link insertion
described above. However, in the embodiment shown in Figure 15, the referrer
in the link may be
for example the carrier 1501 or any other message intermediary or gateway,
instead of the sender
1503. The link may be for example a hyperlink 1513 that surrounds the word or
phrase in the
message body that matches a listing in the database, or any other format such
as for example an
icon or image adjacent to the matching content. The hyperlink 1513 may link to
a site or other
resource associated with the merchant, product, service, or other item in the
database that matches
the message body. For example, without limitation, the link 1513 may be to one
or more of a
website, a software application, an e-commerce service, a merchant shopping
cart, a mobile
application, a computer application, a store, a redirector, a link-tracking
service, an affiliate
network, a video player, a coupon or coupon code, a promotion or promotion
code, a discount
code, a transaction code, a mapping service, and a URL. In one or more
embodiments the link
may be to an intermediate server that redirects to the final destination, as
described above. The
hyperlink 1513 may have an embedded referral code 1514 that identifies one or
more referring
entities, such as the carrier 1501 or the gateway 1510.
[00153] The referral matcher 1511 inserts link 1513 into the message body, and
returns the
transformed message body 1506 with the link to the gateway 1510. The gateway
1510 may then
add the sender and receiver identifiers, and any other metadata, to the
transformed message body
1506, resulting and forward the transformed message 1515 to the receiver or
receivers. The
message may pass through other intermediaries such as carrier 1521, which may
be the same as or
different from the intermediary 1501 that originally carried the message from
the sender's device.
The receiver 121 then views the message 123 with link 124 on device 122, as
described above.
[00154] The matching process 1512 of the referral matcher 1511 may not
identify a match
between a message body and the database 111. In this situation the referral
matcher may return a
no-match result 1513 to the gateway, which indicates that the gateway should
forward the original
message to the receiver.
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
[00155] In one or more embodiments, a referral link may include both the
identity of a
communication intermediary and an identity of the sender. This situation is
illustrated in Figure
15A. As in Figure 15, message 1502 is transmitted to gateway 1510, which
forwards message
body 1505 to referral matcher 1512. In this embodiment, the sender identifier
1503 is encoded in
process 1530, and an encoded sender identity 1531 is also passed to the
referral matcher. The
referral matcher 1511 then inserts an embedded referral tracking code 1514 for
the carrier (or other
intermediary) and another referral tracking code 1514a with the encoded sender
identity. Because
the sender identity is encoded, the privacy and personal information of the
sender is preserved;
however, the sender may be credited for the referral using the encoded
identifier. One or more
embodiments may put any desired information into one or more embedded referral
tracking codes
that are integrated into a referral link; this information may identify either
directly or anonymously
via encoded data any party involved in the creation or transmission of a
communication.
[00156] In one or more embodiments, a communications intermediary that
processes a message
may be associated with the receiver of a message rather than, or in addition
to, the sender. This
scenario is illustrated in Figure 15B, which is a variation on the embodiment
shown in Figure 15A.
Message 1500 is transmitted through two communications intermediaries: first
through carrier
1501 that is associated with the sender, and then through carrier 1521 that is
associated with the
receiver. Other communications intermediaries may exist between carriers 1501
and 1521.
Messaging gateway 1510 is linked to carrier 1501; however, unlike the scenario
in Figure 15, this
gateway 1510 does not transform the message to insert a referral link. Instead
the message is
forwarded to carrier 1521 and a second message gateway 1510b that is
associated with the
receiver's carrier 1521. The receiver gateway 1510b forwards the body 1505 of
the message to
the referral matcher, which inserts the referral link and returns the
transformed message body
1506b to the gateway 1510b. The transformed message 1515b is then sent to the
receiver's device
122. In this scenario, the referral link 124b may be associated with the
receiving gateway 1510b
or the receiving communications carrier 1521, for example.
[00157] In one or more embodiments, the referral link may contain the identity
of the receiver,
instead of or in addition to the identity of the communications intermediary
associated with the
receiver, or in addition to identities of any other intermediaries or of the
sender. This receiver
identity may be encoded, similarly to the encoding of the sender identity
illustrated in Figure 15A.
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
In the example shown in Figure 15B, the transformed link 124b in message body
1506b may for
example contain the identity 1514b of the communications intermediary 1521,
and the encoded
identity 1516b of the receiver 121 or of the receiving device 1222. Referral
links may in general
contain identities (unencoded or encoded) of any of the parties or systems
involved in a
communication, including the sender, receiver, carriers, gateways, and other
systems involved in
message transmission, storage, transformation, or delivery.
[00158] Instead of or in addition to generating a link based on references to
database entries found
in messages, one or more embodiments may transform messages in the opposite
sense, and may
recognize database entries based on links a user has placed messages. Figure
15C shows an
illustrative example of this process. User 101 initially views screen 1541 on
mobile device 102,
which may be for example a web browser screen. The user views a web page or
similar resource
with URL or other identifier 1543, and decides to send this link to one or
more recipients in a
message. User 101 therefore performs a copy and paste 1544 and inserts the
link into message
1500c in screen 1542, which may be for example a messaging app. The message is
sent via carrier
1501 and gateway 1510, as described with respect to Figure 15, and the message
content 1505c is
transmitted to the referral matcher 1511. In this embodiment, database 111
includes or references
a table or other data structure 1545 that associates URLs or similar links
with database entries.
The referral matcher therefore identifies that the URL 1543 in message body
1505c corresponds
to entry 1546. As a result of this match, it makes the transformation 1513c to
convert the reference
to a hyperlink that identifies the entry 1546 and credits the communications
intermediary with an
embedded referral code 1514c. One or more embodiments may in addition or
instead insert an
embedded referral code that references the sender, receiver, or any other
entity.
[00159] In one or more embodiments, the transformed communication may include
or may consist
of instructions for modifications to the message that may be executed at a
later stage in the path of
the message to the receiver. Figure 15D shows an illustrative embodiment with
a variation on the
process flow of Figure 15, where the initial message transformation generates
transformation
instructions to add a link to the message, and the message body is modified
afterwards based on
those transformation instructions.
As in Figure 15, message 1500 is transmitted to
communications intermediary 1501, which forwards it to gateway 1510. The body
1505 of the
message is processed by referral matcher 1511, which finds a match and
determines that a
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
replacement 1513 of a term by a link is indicated. However, the referral
matcher in this
embodiment does not make the replacement directly; instead it returns
transformation instructions
1513a to the gateway 1510. The gateway sends these instructions 1513a to the
communications
intermediary 1501, which executes the transformation instructions to generate
the transformed
message 1506. In one or more embodiments, the replacement or augmentation of a
portion of a
message with a link may be performed at any stage in the transmission of the
message from the
sender to the receiver; the referral matcher may execute this replacement or
augmentation, or it
may provide instructions that any later stage or stages may perform to effect
the replacement or
augmentation of the message.
[00160] Figure 16 continues the example of Figure 15 to show the referral link
being used by a
receiver of a communication. If receiver 121 clicks on the link 124, the link
directs to site 201a,
with an embedded referral tracking code in the URL. If the receiver then
performs an action such
as a purchase by pressing the button 203, the merchant 212 may transmit a
notification 1601 of the
transaction to referral tracker 1602. The referral tracker 1602 may be
integrated with the referral
matcher, or it may be a separate system. The notification 1601 may include the
referral tracking
code, so that the referral tracker can calculate a credit 211a and record or
transmit this credit to the
appropriate entity 1501, which in this example is the carrier. For the
scenario illustrated in Figure
15A, credits may be provided to both a communication intermediary and to the
sender of the
message. For the scenario illustrated in Figure 15B, credits may be provided
to both the
communications intermediary associated with the receiver, and to the receiver
of the message.
[00161] In one or more embodiments, the referral matcher 1511 may perform
additional analysis
of the body of a communication to determine whether the context of the match
indicates that adding
a referral link is warranted. Figure 17 shows an example where message 1500d
mentions a
merchant, but in a negative sense. The referral matcher 1511 may first perform
matching search
1512 on message body 1505d to determine that the merchant is mentioned or
otherwise matches
the communication body, and then perform sentiment analysis 1701 to determine
whether the
mention is positive, neutral, or negative for example. Sentiment analysis 1701
may use any of the
techniques known in the art to determine the sentiment associated with a
message. For example,
sentiment analysis 1701 may track the usage of positive or negative words,
particularly if they are
in proximity to the located matching work or phrase. In this example,
sentiment analysis
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
determines that the sentiment 1702 is negative; therefore, the referral
matcher returns an indication
1703 to the gateway that it has not added a referral link.
[00162] In one or more embodiments, the referral matcher may analyze the body
of a
communication to determine whether a database entry is referenced in or with a
context that
indicates that a referral link is appropriate. The required context may for
example include certain
trigger words or trigger phrases that must appear in proximity to the mention
of the item in order
to generate a referral link. This situation is illustrated in Figure 17A.
Referral database 111
contains or references a set of trigger words or phrases 1711 associated with
entries in the database
or with categories of entries. Message 1500e is sent from device 102, and
corresponding message
body is transmitted to referral matcher 1511. The matching step 1512 indicates
that an item from
database 111 occurs in the message body. The subsequent step 1710 searches the
message body
1505e for additional context that may be required to generate a referral. For
the matched item, the
trigger word 1712 from table 1711 appears in the message body 1505e in a
position that is near
the matched item; therefore, the referral link is inserted into transformed
message body 1506. If
no trigger word or phrase were located, then the existence of the positive
match from the initial
matching step 1512 may not be sufficient to generate a referral link in this
illustrative example.
[00163] In one or more embodiments, the closeness of a match needed between
the text of a
communication body and a listing in the database may be a configurable
parameter that may be
set for example by the gateway or by a communication intermediary. Figure 18
shows an
illustrative embodiment with three levels of "closeness of match" defined.
These levels are
illustrated in table 1805 for entry 1810 of database 111. The most specific
type of match is "exact,"
which requires that specific words or phrases describing the particular
merchant, brand, or similar
item be present in the body of a communication. The next, less specific type
of match is
"category," which is a grouping of a generic class of products or services
into which the associated
listing belongs. The least specific type of match is "activity," which
describes activities for which
the associated listing is related. These groupings are illustrative; one or
more embodiments may
use any type of hierarchy or other organization of matching levels. The
gateway 1510 (or other
entity) may set a closeness-of-match parameter 1801 from among these three
levels to control how
the referral matcher 1511 operates. In the example of Figure 18, if parameter
1801 is value 1803a
(exact), then the matcher indicates no match 1804a, since the words associated
with exact match
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
do not appear in the message; however if parameter 1801 is either 1803b
(category) or 1803c
(activity), then the referral matcher does find a positive match. For message
1500f with message
body 1505f, the referral matcher may for example insert a referral link to
listing 1810 around the
category word "flight" in transformed message body 1506f.
[00164] Particularly for non-exact matches, a referral matcher may in some
scenarios identify
multiple listings in database 111 that match a communication body, even for
the same word or
phrase. In these situations, the referral matcher may select from among the
multiple matches,
using for example prioritization processes as described above based on factors
such as conversion
rates, payout rates, or seller reliability. In some situations, a listing in
database 111 may be
associated with multiple sites, and generation of a referral link may include
selection of a specific
site from these multiple sites. Figure 18A shows an illustrative embodiment
with listing 1546 in
database 111 associated with multiple sites 1820. In this example, listing
1546 is a brand, and the
sites 1820 associated with the list correspond to retailers that offer this
brand for purchase. One
or more embodiments may associate multiple sites with a database listing in
any desired manner.
Referral matcher 1511 may select a specific site from the sites 1820, and may
insert a link to that
selected site into the transformed communication. This selection may be based
on any criterion or
criteria, as described above. In the example shown in Figure 18A, data 1821
associated with each
site is available to the referral matcher (either in database 111 or as
another data source accessible
to the referral matcher). This data shows the amount of referral fee each
retailer pays for a
completed transaction resulting from a recipient clicking on a referral link
and completing a
purchase. In this example, the site 1822 with the highest payment per sale is
selected and is
inserted as link 1823 into transformed message 1824. Any performance metric in
addition to or
instead of payment data may be used to select a specific site from multiple
sites associated with a
listing in one or more embodiments. Illustrative performance metrics
associated with a site that
may be used in one or more embodiments include for example, without
limitation, the amount of
referral credit provided by the site, the price of items on the site, the
closeness of match of the site
to the communication, the transaction conversion rate of the site, a defined
set of business logic
associated with the site, closeness of match of the site to characteristics of
the sender or receiver,
proximity of the location of the site to the sender location or receiver
location, speed of fulfillment
by the site, and a review score, popularity score, or rating score associated
with the site.
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[00165] In one or more embodiments, the selection of a specific site from
multiple matching sites
may be performed after a recipient clicks on a referral link, as described for
example above with
respect to Figure 8A. The referral link may send a recipient to an
intermediate server, which then
accesses data such as a list of possible destination sites 1820 and metrics
1821 associated with
each site in order to select a final destination site.
[00166] In one or more embodiments, language processing or other analysis of
the body of a
communication may allow the referral matcher to generate a more specific link
that incorporates
additional information from the communication. Figure 19 shows an illustrative
embodiment in
which listings in the database 111 may be associated with subcategory
information that may be
used to identify a more specific page on a site or specific parameters in a
referral link URL. The
type of subcategory information that is relevant may in general vary among
listings in the database
111. For example, for clothing brands, relevant subcategory information may
include data such
as size, style, or color; for air travel, on the other hand, relevant
subcategory information may
include data such as departure, destination, date, and time. In the example
shown in Figure 19,
referral matcher 1511 first performs a search 1901 for a primary target match
between the body of
message 1500g and listings in database 111. The result is a category match
1902 that is associated
with listing 1903. Database 111 contains a table 1910 of subcategory
information linked to this
listing, which indicates that location and date/time information may be
relevant to a referral link
for this entry. This data is used in a subsequent search 1904 for modifiers in
the message body
that may indicate the subcategories of flights that are relevant. This search
may look for certain
keywords or categories of words or phrases, such as those identified in table
1910, or it may use
any other type of natural language processing or artificial intelligence to
infer modifiers and
context. The search results 1905 may be used in link generation process 1906,
which generates
referral link 1907. This link 1907 passes the location data and date/time data
(which the system
may convert from the generic "next weekend" to a specific date) to the target
site as URL
parameters. One or more embodiments may use subcategory data to refine a
referral link in any
desired manner, including for example linking to a specific page on a site,
linking to one of several
related sites, or passing data to a web page in URL parameters.
[00167] One or more embodiments may analyze message histories in addition to
individual
messages to generate referral links. For example, the content of message 1500g
of Figure 19 may
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
be spread over two or more messages, and the system may analyze the combined
content of these
messages to determine whether a referral link should be added and possibly to
determine the
specific target of the link. For instance, a first message may contain the
first sentence of message
1500g, which indicates the destination. A subsequent message may contain the
remainder of
message 1500g, which indicates the date. The system may track the message
history to generate
the specific referral link 1907, which combines the location data from a
previous message with the
date information from a subsequent message.
[00168] In one or more embodiments, senders or receivers of messages may be
able to opt-out of
the link insertion process performed by a communication intermediary or
gateway. This feature
is illustrated in Figure 20, which illustrates a variation on the example of
Figure 15. In this
example, the gateway 1510 passes the message body 1505 to referral matcher
1511 and receives a
transformed body 1506 with an inserted referral link. The gateway (or the
carrier 1501) recognizes
that this message is the first message from the sender 101 for which a
referral link has been
generated. Therefore, it generates a message 2001 to the sender that informs
the sender that the
sender's message has been automatically converted to a "smart message" with an
embedded link.
The sender has the option of learning more about the process, and of opting
out of having links
added to messages from this sender. If the sender chooses to opt out, the
gateway 1510 or the
carrier 1501 may track this information and may refrain from sending future
messages from this
sender to the referral matcher 1511. One or more embodiments may provide a
similar opt-out
capability for the receiver. One or more embodiments may instead require the
sender or receiver
to opt in to the referral link process before generating these links. In
addition to or instead of
opting in or opting out, in one or more embodiments the sender or receiver may
be able to send
any other types of communication preferences messages to the referral matcher
or to any of the
communications intermediaries. Communications preferences messages may for
example modify
the frequency with which referral links are inserted, or the manner in which
the referral links are
inserted, displayed, or used. For example, a recipient may request that
referral links be inserted
only from selected senders, only for selected topics, or only at specific
times. A recipient may
request that referral links be highlighted in messages as referral links, to
distinguish them from
other links that may already be in messages, or that referral links be
displayed only at certain times
or under certain conditions. A sender may similarly request for example that
referral links be
inserted only for selected recipients, only at a certain frequency, or only
for certain topics.
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[00169] One or more embodiments may process images, and may generate referral
links based on
analysis of these images. Images may be obtained for example from any digital
communication,
such as an email, text message, or social media post. As described above,
processing of images
and generation of referral links may occur at any node or nodes in a
communication link between
a sender and a receiver, including for example the sender's device, the
receiver's device, a
messaging gateway, a communications server, or any combination thereof.
Processing may occur
on any device used to encrypt or decrypt all or a portion of a communication,
including for example
a device used by the sender to encrypt a communication or a device used by the
receiver to decrypt
a communication.
[00170] Figure 21 shows a flowchart of illustrative steps that may be used in
one or more
embodiments to generate referral links from images. One or more embodiments
may perform only
a subset of these steps, for example omitting any of the steps in Figure 21,
and may reorder and
restructure steps in any desired manner. Any of these steps shown in Figure 21
may be performed
by one or more third-party services or systems. In step 2101, an image input
is obtained, for
example from a digital communication or from a device or image library.
Illustrative sources of
images may include for example, without limitation, a camera, an email, a text
message, a picture
message, a video message, a SnapchatTM message, a FacebookTM message, a
Twitter message, a
post on any website or blog, or a gallery from a photo sharing or photo
archiving site. Images may
also be obtained from videos associated with any of these sources. Images may
be for example,
without limitation, photos, videos, video frames, drawings, paintings,
graphics, 2D models, 3D
models, screenshots, barcodes, QR codes, icons, emoticons, avatars, or virtual
reality scenes or
characters. In step 2102, the components of an image are detected and
classified. Components
2120 may include for example, without limitation, any or all of text, object,
scene, code (such as
barcodes or QR codes or similar identifying marks), product, product
packaging, label, logo,
building, place, location, person, character, celebrity, performer, activity,
event, shapes, symbol,
action, colors, icon, emoji, and sticker. A single image may have one or more
types of components.
Step 2103 then routes individual components to analyzers that may for example
be specialized to
analyze a specific type or types of component. For each component type there
may be a distinct
extraction method. The routing methodology may split the image into its
components and may
route each component to a corresponding analysis method. In one or more
embodiments, different
component analyzers may execute on different systems, and routing may be
performed over
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
network connections. Step 2104 then analyzes the components of the input
image, using for
example individual analyzers such as a text analyzer, a logo analyzer, an icon
analyzer, etc.
Depending on the component type, extraction of the component from the image
and analysis of
the extracted component may include various types of processing. For example,
for text
components, analysis may recognize the letters, words, or phrases in a
component. Text analysis
may process or transform the orientation, font size, font type, boundary,
decoration, and color; it
may de-noise and de-warp the extracted component. For image components,
analysis may identify
the object or objects contained in an image component. Image processing may
include for example
de-noising, de-warping, boundary detection, logo analysis, analysis of
orientation, shape, and
color, and reverse image lookup. For codes (such as barcodes or QR codes), the
codes may be
extracted and decoded, or they may bypass extraction and skip to the synthesis
or matching steps
described below.
[00171] Results of the component analyzers from analysis step or steps 2104
may then be
transmitted to step 2105 that synthesizes the various analyses. The synthesis
stage 2105 may for
example determine relationships among the extracted component data, and
reconstruct the
extracted and analyzed components of the images. The extracted component data
may be
synthesized into a text descriptor of the image, which may include for example
a list of keywords
or key phrases, a hierarchically structured descriptor of the image
components, or a summary
sentence or phrase that describes the image and its components. The result of
synthesis 2105 is
then transmitted to referral matching step 2106, which searches referral
database 111 for one or
more matches, as described above. After matching against an item in the
referral database, an
optional verification step 2107 may verify the match or matches, for example
by comparing the
original image input to an image of the item that it has matched against in
the referral database
111. This verification step 2107 may be optional in one or more embodiments.
It may not be
performed at all in one or more embodiments, and in one or more embodiments it
may be
performed only in certain situations. Verify match step 2107 may for example
generate a
confidence score based on how closely the original input image matches an
image of the matched
item or items. This confidence score may provide a measure of how close the
match is. In
embodiments that perform optional verification step 2107, the system may set a
threshold for the
confidence score, and may proceed with generating a referral link for the
input image only if the
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
confidence score is above the threshold. The confidence score and threshold
may not be used in
embodiments that do not perform optional verification step 2107.
[00172] If matching step 2106 generates multiple matches against referral
database 111, then a
prioritization step 2108 may be performed to select one or more of these
matches for referral links.
This prioritization may use any information from the component analyses 2104
and any
information from the referral database 111 to prioritize matches. For example,
as described above,
merchants may be prioritized based on factors such as the size or amount of
the referral credit
associated with each merchant, the location of the merchant, the availability
of inventory, speed
of fulfillment of orders, ratings or reviews related to the merchant, or the
price of the product or
service offered by the merchant. If verification step 2107 is performed, then
the confidence score
generated for each match may also be used for prioritization; for example, the
match with the top
confidence score may be selected, or all matches with a confidence score above
a threshold may
be selected. One or more embodiments may use any desired method to prioritize
matches and to
select which match or matches to use for referral links.
[00173] Step 2109 then generates one or more referral links, as described
above. Each referral
link is trackable, and may include for example the identity of one or more of
the matched item, the
sender, the receiver, a messaging intermediary, or a gateway. In step 2110,
the referral link or
links are presented by modifying or augmenting a message or communication that
is displayed to
a recipient. For example, presentation step 2110 may construct and transmit
markup instructions
to whatever system or systems are responsible for formatting or displaying a
message. Formatting
transformations may occur for example at the sending device, at the receiving
device, at the
messaging gateway, at a messaging intermediary, at a communications server, in
any application
or software, or using any combinations thereof. The message body may be
formatted in one or
more ways to incorporate the trackable referral link. For example, the image
in the message may
be made clickable or interactive, or one or more elements may be placed
adjacent to or over the
image. Added elements may include for example a URL, a link, a token, a
sticker, a button, an
image, a product name, or a product description. One or more embodiments may
present a referral
link by transmitting an additional message with any of the above elements
included.
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
[00174] Figure 22 shows selected processing steps applied to an illustrative
image 2200. This
image 2200 may for example be sent from a sender to a receiver in a message,
or shared between
a sender and a receiver. In step 2102, individual components of the image are
detected and
classified. For example, this step may identify a text component 2201, an
object 2202, and a QR
code 2203 attached to an item in the image. Analysis step 2104, which may
occur on various
systems using analyzers appropriate for each component type. Each analysis may
for example
generate a list of keywords or phrases associated with the components. Text
2211 may be for
example a direct translation of the textual content of item 2201 in the image.
Keyword 2212 may
be the result of applying an object recognizer (such as a neural network) to
object 2202. Descriptor
2213 may result from decoding QR code 2203. In step 2105, the individual
component analyses
are synthesized into a descriptor 2220 of the entire image. This descriptor
may include for example
a list 2220a of keywords and phrases; in one or more embodiments it may be
structured
hierarchically to match for example a hierarchical decomposition of image
components. The
descriptor 2220 may include for example a summary sentence or phrase 2220b
that describes the
image and its major components. Step 2106 then matches descriptor 2220 against
the referral
database, generating a match against item 2221, such as a merchant.
Verification step 2107 may
for example retrieve an image 2222 associated with the matched item 2221, and
compare this
image 2222 to the original input image 2200. A match score 2223 may indicate
how closely the
two images match. In this illustrative scenario, the two images are similar
because they contain
some similar elements, but they are not close matches. Depending on the
threshold set for the
match score 2233, a referral link 2224 may be generated and added to image
2200 for display to
the image recipient.
[00175] Figure 23 shows a variation of the example of Figure 22 where the
match referral database
step 2106 generates multiple matches for the components of the image or the
image descriptor
2220. In this example, component 2201 generates matches 2311 in category 2301
of booking
agents that may for example be able to reserve stays at the identified bed and
breakfast 2211;
component 2202 generates matches 2312 in category 2302 of sellers of the
identified item 2212 (a
bicycle); and component 2203 generates matches 2313 in category 2303 of rental
services similar
to or identical to the identified service 2213. The multiple matches 2311,
2312, and 2313 are then
input into prioritization step 2108, which selects one or more matches from
which to generate
referral links. Prioritization and selection may be based for example on
closeness of match, or on
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
any characteristics of the matched merchant or service, as described above. In
this example, two
matches 2311c and 2313b are selected in step 2108, and these matches are input
into step 2109 for
generation of referral links, which are transmitted to step 2110 that presents
the referral links to
the receiver.
[00176] In one or more embodiments, the system may monitor the user interface
of an application
used by a user, and may present the user with sharing or earning options when
content of that user
interface matches an item in the referral database. Figure 24A shows an
illustrative example of
user on a mobile device using a mobile browser on mobile device 102, such as
for example a
mobile phone or tablet. This browser application is illustrative; one or more
embodiments may
monitor user interface content of any application used by a user, including
for example, without
limitation, a messaging application, a web viewing application, a social media
platform
application, a merchant or e-commerce application, a search application, a
shopping application,
or an app provided by a website or service. In the example of Figure 24A, the
user is browsing a
website at URL 2401 The referral matcher 110 may analyze the content of the
user interface to
obtain for example the URL 2401, as described in detail below. Content may be
obtained or
accepted by the referral matcher in any manner, including via analysis of user
interface events, as
described below. The referral matcher may also analyze other elements of the
content of the
browsing session, such as text 2402 or images 2403 on the web page. Content
may be analyzed
using any of the techniques described above, including for example, without
limitation, machine
learning, text parsing, image analysis, audio analysis, artificial
intelligence, keyword matching,
and natural language processing. The referral matcher may then compare the
content to the referral
database to identify one or more matches. If a match is located (for example,
if the merchant
associated with the URL 2401 is in the referral database), the system may then
present options
2410 to the user for how to use the referral link to the matched item. In one
or more embodiments
the system may present these options 2410 in any desired manner; for example,
it may modify the
user interface of the browser to include the options 2410, or it may use
operating system services
to display a notification. In the embodiment shown in Figure 24A, the
referring options 2410
include two options: a "share and earn" option 2412, and a "cashback" option
2411. These options
and their names are illustrative; one or more embodiments may present any
number of ways to use
a referral link, and may describe and present them in any desired manner. In
this example, the
share and earn option 2412 may be used for the user to send a referral link to
one or more other
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
users, and the cashback option 2411 may be used by the user to obtain his or
her own discount or
other credit from the referral link. In one or more embodiments, use of both
options at once may
be supported.
[00177] Figure 24A illustrates obtaining a URL 2401 from the user interface of
a browser
application. One or more embodiments may analyze the user interface of any
application to extract
any type of content. Figure 24B shows additional content that may for example
be obtained from
the user interface of the web browser screen shown in Figure 24A. Any view
elements 2420 in
the user interface, including possibly hidden elements that may be machine
readable but not visible
to the user, may be extracted and compared by the referral matcher 110 to the
referral database.
In addition to URL 2421, these elements may include text elements 2422, such
as text 2402, image
elements 2423, such as image 2403, and hidden elements 2424 such as an SKU
embedded in the
raw HTML 2430 of the web page source for the browser. Other elements that may
be analyzed in
one or more embodiments may include for example, without limitation, icons,
logos, codes,
product identifiers, application identifiers, and merchant identifiers.
[00178] Figure 25 continues the example of Figure 24A to illustrate the result
of the user selecting
the share and earn option 2412. The referral matcher 110 generates a referral
link 2501, as
described above, which may include for example the URL of the site that is
being referred and
identifying information of the sender (or of another entity) so that the
referral credit can be applied
to the referrer. When the user selects share and earn, the referral matcher
may invoke a native
sharing service 2502, which may be supplied by a mobile operating system, for
example. The
referral link 2501 may be passed to the sharing service 2502 as the context to
be shared. The
native sharing service 2502 may then present a sharing menu 2510 to the user
with options for
how the link 2501 is to be shared. These options may include any types of
communication or
transfer services, such as for example, without limitation, email 2511, text
messaging 2512, or
social media services or sites such as 2513 and 2514. When the user selects a
specific sharing
option from this menu 2510, the associated application or service may be
invoked to create a
message or communication, to insert the referral ink 2501, and to select the
recipient or recipients
of the communication.
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[00179] If the user selects the cashback option 2411, the system may transmit
the referral link
2501 directly to the user's browser and refresh the page, so that the user is
viewing effectively the
same content but will receive a credit if the user performs the action (such
as a purchase) associated
with the referral. In this scenario the user is effectively making a referral
to himself or herself, and
may receive credit for his or her own actions as a result of this referral.
[00180] Figure 26A shows an illustrative sequence diagram for actions that may
be performed to
implement referral matching and referral tracking for a scenario such as the
one shown in Figures
24A and 25. This sequence diagram illustrates a referral matcher that monitors
a web browsing
session and that generates a referral link based on the URL of the address bar
of the browser. As
described above, one or more embodiments may monitor the user interface of any
application for
any content, and may generate referral links based on this content. In this
illustrative embodiment,
the referral matching system may monitor the contents of the user's browsing
session by
subscribing to operating system events that indicate the state of the browser
user interface. For
example, without limitation, one or more embodiments may use "accessibility
services" of an
operating system that provide programmatic access to user interface elements
and that may
generate events when user interface elements change. In some operating
systems, permission must
be granted by the user for an application to access accessibility services.
The referral matcher
subsystem 110 therefore requests accessibility permission from the user, who
is identified as the
"Sender" 2601 in Figure 26A. The Sender 2601 then grants permission to the
operating system
2602, which in this example may be a Mobile operating system such as Android
for a smart
phone. The Mobile OS 2602 then begins broadcasting screen content events to
the referral matcher
110. These events may be for example Accessibility Events on Android , or
similar events in
other environments that notify the referral matcher of user interface changes.
[00181] During a web browsing session using Mobile Browser 2603, the Sender
(user) 2601
enters a first URL, for example into the address bar of the browser, to browse
the associated web
page. This triggers a screen change as the Mobile Browser 2603 invokes display
services of the
Mobile OS 2602. The Mobile OS 2602 then transmits events with the screen
content changes to
the referral matcher 110, since the referral matcher has previously subscribed
to receive these
notifications. As the referral matcher 110 receives these events, it analyzes
the events (as described
below with respect to Figure 27) to obtain the URL of the web page being
browsed. In this
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
example, the initial URL is not a match for any listing in the referral
database, so the referral
matcher takes no further action.
[00182] The Sender 2601 then enters a second URL to browse a different web
page. Again this
triggers a screen change, which generates new events with the updated screen
content. Again the
referral matcher analyzes the events to obtain the new URL, and it determines
that this second
URL is a match to one or more listings in the referral database. The referral
matcher 110 then
presents a referral options dialog (such as the dialog 2410 of Figure 24A,
with share and earn and
cashback options) to Sender 2601. If the Sender 2601 selects a share and earn
option, the referral
matcher 110 constructs a referral link and presents a sharing options dialog
(such as menu 2510 of
Figure 26A) to the Sender. The Sender then selects a sharing option and one or
more recipients,
which results a transmission of the referral link to a Recipient 2605. If the
Recipient 2605 then
performs an action (such as a purchase) via the referral link, the Merchant
2604 (or other entity)
that receives this action may transmit a notice to the Referral Tracker 210,
indicating that the
referral has been used and remitting a commission if needed. The Referral
Tracker 210 may then
credit the Sender 2601 for the completed referral.
[00183] The sequence of actions shown in Figure 26A is illustrative; one or
more embodiments
may organize these actions differently to obtain content from a browsing
session and to generate
referrals from this content. For example, any method of obtaining a URL or
other page content
from a browser or an operating system may be used by the referral matcher. For
example, in one
or more embodiments, the referral matcher may use a browser extension to
access this content,
instead of or in addition to using operating system events that reflect user
interface changes. Figure
26B illustrates a general sequence of actions that may be used for any type of
application to obtain
and analyze content from the application and to generate referrals based on
this content. The
referral matcher 110 begins monitoring mobile content 2610 from an
application, using any
method including, but not limited to, monitoring of events as described in
Figure 26A. When the
sender 2601 invokes mobile content on the application, the referral matcher
analyzes any of this
content to detect a match to the referral database. As described with respect
to Figure 26A, the
referral matcher than presents a dialog to the sender with for example share
and earn and cash back
options. When the user selects to share and earn, the referral matcher
generates and transmits a
referral link, which the sender forwards to the recipient 2605. When the
recipient completes an
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
action associated with the referral link, the referral tracker provides the
associated credit to the
sender for the referral.
[00184] Figure 27 shows an illustrative method for extracting the web page URL
from screen
content events that may be used in one or more embodiments. As described
above, in one or more
embodiments the referral matcher may subscribe to screen contents events using
for example
accessibility services on a mobile device. The mobile OS 2602 then broadcasts
Accessibility
Events 2701 when the user interface changes. In some operating systems (such
as Android , for
example), an Accessibility Event may be associated with a view element of a
user interface, such
as a panel, field, image, or control. These view elements may be organized in
a tree of nodes, and
each event may therefore be associated with a specific node (or nodes) of this
tree. In the example
shown in Figure 27, the tree 2700 of nodes corresponds to the browser user
interface shown in
Figure 24A. Data associated with each node may include for example an
identifier, a type, a value,
and a set of actions that may be performed on the corresponding user interface
element. When the
user interface is changed (for example when the user browses a new URL), this
tree is modified
and a series of Accessibility Events is transmitted to the referral matcher
corresponding to the new
or updated nodes. The referral matcher may process these nodes (corresponding
to user interface
elements) to determine for example the URL of a web page being browsed. Figure
27 shows a
sequence of illustrative filters 2711, 2712, 2713, and 2714 that may be used
to extract this URL.
The first filter 2711 checks whether the type of content in a node is text.
Nodes containing other
types of information, such as images, are not evaluated further. The second
filter 2712 checks
whether the text content of a node matches a pattern for a possible URL. This
pattern may be for
example a regular expression. The third filter 2713 identifies the address bar
node specifically by
comparing the node's id (if present) to an expected id for an address bar.
This filter ensures that
URLs on a page that are not in the address bar are not mistaken for the web
page address. The id
of an address bar varies by browser; for Chrome for example the expected
address bar value is
com.android.chrome:id/url_bar. Some browsers do not use an id to identify the
address bar, in
which case the other filters are used to find the web page URL. The fourth
filter 2714 is used
because some address bar actions display a URL that is not the current URL of
the browser. An
example of this is a type-ahead dropdown that shows examples of URLs that the
user may want to
navigate to. These URLs would match the first three filters 2711, 2712, and
2713. However the
type-ahead proposed URLs can be distinguished from the current page URL by the
set of actions
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
available on the field: for the node of the current URL, the available actions
include a focus action
(which moves the screen focus to the address bar input field), while the type-
ahead URL nodes do
not include a focus action. In this example, the result of applying these 4
filters is the URL 2401
of the current web page being browsed. The referral matcher can then match
this URL 2401
against entries in the referral database.
[00185] The filters 2711 through 2714 shown in Figure 27 are illustrative. One
or more
embodiments may analyze user interface elements in any desired manner to
extract a web page
URL or other desired content from a browsing session. For example, one or more
embodiments
may apply only filter 2711 to obtain all text content from a web page or other
user interface, and
may match all of this text content against the referral database. Similar
filters may be used to
obtain images or other types of content, and to match this content against the
referral database.
The organization of user interface elements and the data available from
operating system generated
events may differ across browsers and across operating systems.
[00186] As described above with respect to Figure 24A, in one or more
embodiments the system
may analyze the user interface of an application to provide a user with
options to activate
monetization offers directly, even without sending a referral to another user.
The "Activate
Cashback" option 2411 in Figure 24A for example may apply to purchases by the
user. In one or
more embodiments, offers that are detected by the system may be identified or
applied when a user
is at or near a checkout screen that requests payment; in one or more
embodiments the system may
also automatically select a payment method and use this to enable a user
purchase. Figures 28
through 30 show an example of an embodiment of the invention that activates an
offer and that
applies a payment method, and that credits the user or an intermediary with
this offer when the
user completes a purchase. In Figure 28, a user views information 2801 on an
application user
interface of a device 102, which may be for example a mobile device, a
computer, or any other
type of device with which a user may interact. The user may for example be
viewing a shopping
cart screen associated with an online store, or any related screen associated
with a purchasing
process or product search process. The user interface of device 102 contains
user interface
elements 2802 that are related to purchasing or purchase or payment methods.
The referral matcher
110, which may be for example installed on device 102 or may receive data from
device 102, may
monitor and analyze the application to identify and select a monetization
offer 2810 from a
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
database of offers 2803. Each offer in database 2803 may be associated with
one or more listings
in database 111. This selection of an offer may for example use any of the
methods and techniques
described above to match against words, phrases, images, URLs, or any other
contextual elements
of the application. Database 111 may contain any listings of products,
merchants, or other items
that are associated with any types of rewards available to the user, such as
discounts, promotions,
bonuses, points, cashback, or any other offers. In one or more embodiments the
referral matcher
may compare offers associated with different listings and may select an
optimal reward for the
transaction. In some cases, the system may obtain feedback from the merchant
regarding the value
of the offer associated with a listing in database 2803. This may be
accomplished for example
either (a) by testing promotion/coupon codes at the checkout and seeing which
code earns or saves
the user the most or (b) in some cases the merchant provides feedback (such as
via APIs or post-
backs) some time after the transaction has been competed to confirm that value
of the
reward/cashback/savings.
[00187] In one or more embodiments the listings in database 111 may be
associated with shopping
cart descriptors. These descriptors may be used by the system to detect when a
user is at or near a
purchase step. For example, shopping cart descriptor 2804 is associated with
listing 2805 in
database 111. A shopping cart descriptor may contain any information that
allows the system to
recognize when a purchase or similar transaction is in process or is at a
particular stage in a
purchasing process; for example, a shopping cart descriptor may contain any or
all of a URL, a
web page element, a page title, a header, a calculation, an input field, a
control, a text element, an
image element.
[00188] In one or more embodiments the system may include a payment assistant
2850 that
analyzes user interface elements to make a detection 2811 of payment related
elements. This
detection may for example detect specific configurations, characteristics,
attributes, fields or
components (whether or not these are visible to the user), may search for
specific descriptors,
specific terms or images (such as credit card names, input fields, or icons),
or it may use the URL
of a web page to recognize when a user is at or nearing checkout. Illustrative
user interface
elements 2802 provide multiple payment options from which the user can select;
in one or more
embodiments the application on device 102 may preselect an option or
prepopulate payment
options. Instead of accepting the options or prepopulated data from this
application, in one or
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
more embodiments the payment assistant 2850 may analyze a database 2821 of the
user's payment
methods and may make a selection 2812 of a payment method 2831 to use for this
transaction.
[00189] Payment methods database 2821 may for example contain information on
one or more
payment methods that may be used by the user. This information may be obtained
from the user
directly or from other applications or services. Payment methods may include
for example,
without limitation, any or all of credit cards, debit cards, gift cards,
digital wallets, funds transfer
services, debt financing products, installment payment services, and bank
accounts. Database data
associated with a payment method may include for example, without limitation,
any or all of an
account number, a card number, an issuing or responsible institution, a
username, a user email, a
user address, a billing address, a shipping address, an expiration date, and a
verification number.
Database 2821 may contain any payment method information that may be needed to
fill in or
validate payment data in any application, which may include for example,
without limitation,
billing addresses, shipping addresses.
[00190] Payment methods database 2821 may also contain information on one or
more additional
benefits that may be available to the user when the user uses the associated
payment method. These
benefits may be distinct from the offers in the listing of database 2803.
Illustrative benefits
associated with payment methods may include for example, without limitation,
coupons, cashback
offers, discounts, promotions, savings, points offers (such as for loyalty
programs), or miles offers
(such as for frequent flyer programs and affiliated programs). Some benefits
may be associated
with specific merchants, specific products, or specific conditions such as
times or quantities of
purchases.
[00191] When the payment assistant 2850 detects payment related elements 2802
in an
application user interface, it may analyze the payment methods database 2821
to make a selection
2831 of a specific payment method to propose to the user or to apply
automatically to the
associated transaction in the application. If payment methods have associated
additional benefits
(such as cashback deals), this analysis may compare the available benefits to
select an optimal
benefit for the user within the context of the transaction. Applicable
benefits may be compared
on any monetary or nonmonetary scale to select an optimal benefit. In one or
more embodiments
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
a user may indicate preferences that may be stored database 2821 to control or
influence the
selection of an optimal benefit.
[00192] In the example shown in Figure 28, step 2812 selects payment method
2831 and
associated cashback benefit 2832. In this situation the additional benefit
2832 associated with
payment method 2831 exceeds the benefit 2833 associated with another payment
method, so
payment method 2831 is selected for the transaction
[00193] In one or more embodiments some or all of the payment methods 2821 may
be associated
with a service that generates a single use identifier, such as a virtual
credit card PAN (primary
account number), that can be used only for a single transaction. For example,
selected payment
method 2831 in Figure 28 uses such a system. These types of payment methods
provide additional
security because numbers cannot be reused if they are stolen or leaked.
[00194] Figure 29 continues the scenario illustrated in Figure 28 from the
point where payment
method 2831 is selected. In some situations, the payment assistant 2850 may
present this payment
method to the user for confirmation before proceeding to use the payment
method. (Confirmation
may not always be needed or indicated; in one or more embodiments the referral
matcher may
proceed directly to generate a referral link and to populate payment
information using the selected
payment method.) When to the system is configured to perform step 2901 to
obtain user
confirmation, it may for example generate a dialog box 2911 or similar user
interface element and
display this element on the screen of device 102. Element 2911 may for example
present the
suggested payment method and may indicate the identified offer 2810, as well
as any additional
benefits (such as cashback) associated with the payment method. When the user
confirms with
input 2912 (or if confirmation steps 2901 is not performed), the payment
assistant 2850 may then
perform step 2903 to populate the application user interface with the payment
information for the
selected payment method. For some payment methods, this step 2903 may include
communication
with the issuing institution 2920 or with another payment service, for example
to generate a one-
time card identifier 2921 that may be used for payment for this transaction
exclusively. For some
payment methods all of the payment information may be obtained directly from
database 2821,
without the need to obtain additional data from a financial institution.
Payment information may
include for example, without limitation, a card number 2931, a name 2932, an
expiration date
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Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
2933, and any other required data such as addresses or verification codes. The
payment
information may be obtained directly from payment methods database 2821 or
from an institution
or service 2920 associated with the selected payment method. The referral
matcher may perform
step 2902 to generate a referral link or referral code that contains a
reference to the associated offer
and information that identifies the user or intermediary who will be credited
when the offer is
activated. This referral link or referral code may for example be a URL
encoded with information
that identifies the user and the reward, as described above. The referral link
may be embedded
into the application user interface, for example as one or more parameters
associated with the
payment information or as a URL that encodes the referral information.
[00195] Figure 30 continues the scenario of Figure 29 from the point where the
user uses the
populated payment information to pay for the transaction. When the user
presses the button 3001
for example, a message is transmitted to the merchant, payment institution or
clearinghouse 2920.
The receiving service 2920 may then apply payment, and may credit any benefits
associated with
the payment method. The referral link included in the transaction information
(for example in a
URL parameter) may be transmitted to the associated merchant, or to one or
more intermediaries.
A referral tracker 3010 may also receive a message that the offer has been
awarded and may
perform step 3011 to record the transaction associated with the offer.
In one or more
embodiments a subsequent step 3012 may be performed to notify the user or an
intermediary that
the offer has been received or credited to the account of the user or
intermediary. For example,
referral tracker 3010 may transmit a message 3013 to the user's device 102
that describes the offer
and the associated purchase transaction.
[00196] While the invention herein disclosed has been described by means of
specific
embodiments and applications thereof, numerous modifications and variations
could be made
thereto by those skilled in the art without departing from the scope of the
invention.
Date recue/Date received 2023-03-31
