U.S. patent application number 17/012271 was filed with the patent office on 2021-07-22 for measuring conversion of an online advertising campaign including referral offers from an offline merchant.
This patent application is currently assigned to CARDSPRING, LLC. The applicant listed for this patent is Geraud Boyer, Amit Kumar, Eckart Walther, Jeffrey WINNER. Invention is credited to Geraud Boyer, Amit Kumar, Eckart Walther, Jeffrey WINNER.
Application Number | 20210224844 17/012271 |
Document ID | / |
Family ID | 1000005507451 |
Filed Date | 2021-07-22 |
United States Patent
Application |
20210224844 |
Kind Code |
A1 |
WINNER; Jeffrey ; et
al. |
July 22, 2021 |
MEASURING CONVERSION OF AN ONLINE ADVERTISING CAMPAIGN INCLUDING
REFERRAL OFFERS FROM AN OFFLINE MERCHANT
Abstract
A technique for determining the effectiveness of an offer
includes analyzing views, clicks, acceptances and satisfactions of
the offer. Transaction data is retrieved to determine whether
criteria of the offer has been satisfied. As a result, a total cost
per transaction may be determined for an advertisement campaign
that incorporates the offer. Further, detailed queries may be
issued to identify areas in which the offer needs improvement.
Inventors: |
WINNER; Jeffrey; (San
Francisco, CA) ; Boyer; Geraud; (San Francisco,
CA) ; Kumar; Amit; (San Francisco, CA) ;
Walther; Eckart; (San Francisco, CA) |
|
Applicant: |
Name |
City |
State |
Country |
Type |
WINNER; Jeffrey
Boyer; Geraud
Kumar; Amit
Walther; Eckart |
San Francisco
San Francisco
San Francisco
San Francisco |
CA
CA
CA
CA |
US
US
US
US |
|
|
Assignee: |
CARDSPRING, LLC
San Francisco
CA
|
Family ID: |
1000005507451 |
Appl. No.: |
17/012271 |
Filed: |
September 4, 2020 |
Related U.S. Patent Documents
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Application
Number |
Filing Date |
Patent Number |
|
|
13211270 |
Aug 16, 2011 |
10769657 |
|
|
17012271 |
|
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|
|
61442943 |
Feb 15, 2011 |
|
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61442691 |
Feb 14, 2011 |
|
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Current U.S.
Class: |
1/1 |
Current CPC
Class: |
G06Q 30/0246 20130101;
G06Q 30/02 20130101; G06Q 30/0273 20130101 |
International
Class: |
G06Q 30/02 20060101
G06Q030/02 |
Claims
1. (canceled)
2. A method for measuring conversion of an online advertising
campaign for an offline merchant by determining completion of
transactions between respective customers and the offline merchant
in response to the respective customers receiving and accepting an
online offer from the offline merchant via a webpage advertisement
rendered by web browsers coupled to the Internet and used by the
respective customers to view the online offer, wherein the online
offer specifies at least one criterion for the respective customers
to satisfy the online offer and thereby complete the transactions
with the offline merchant, the method comprising: storing, by an
offer engine coupled to the Internet, offer information for the
online offer, wherein the offer information includes an electronic
merchant identifier of the offline merchant and the at least one
criterion for the customers to satisfy the online offer, wherein
the electronic merchant identifier uniquely identifies, to a
payment processor, the transactions between the offline merchant
and the customers of the offline merchant; determining, by the
offer engine, that a first customer of the respective customers
viewing the webpage advertisement including the online offer via a
first web browser clicked on the webpage advertisement including
the online offer, via at least one of a browser cookie and Internet
Protocol (IP) address tracking; providing, by the offer engine via
the Internet, an interface for display on the first web browser of
the first customer to register a first customer account with the
offer engine to accept the online offer; receiving, by the offer
engine via the Internet, in response to providing the interface to
register the first customer account, a first payment account number
of a first payment account for the first customer at a first
customer financial institution, wherein the first payment account
includes at least one of a customer credit card, a customer debit
card, and a customer prepaid card issued by the first customer
financial institution; transmitting, by the offer engine via the
Internet to the payment processor, only the electronic merchant
identifier included in the offer information and information
corresponding to respective payment accounts associated with the
respective customers for the transactions between the respective
customers and the offline merchant, the respective payment accounts
including at least the first payment account, wherein the payment
processor is communicatively coupled to the first customer
financial institution and a merchant financial institution of the
offline merchant to facilitate, at least a first offline
transaction between the first customer and the offline merchant
corresponding to the online offer; receiving, by the offer engine
via the Internet from the payment processor, based on the
electronic merchant identifier, one or more offline transactions
for an in-store purchase at a brick-and-mortar location of the
offline merchant, wherein the one or more offline transactions
received by the offer engine from the payment processor do not
include the identification of the online offer; and determining, by
the offer engine based on the one or more offline transactions
received from the payment processor and the at least one criterion
specified by the online offer in the stored offer information,
whether the first customer has completed the first offline
transaction corresponding to the online offer by: determining if
the at least one criterion specified by the online offer is
satisfied in the one or more offline transactions received from the
payment processor; and for each offline transaction of the one or
more offline transactions in which the at least one criterion
specified by the online offer is satisfied: determining if one
offline transaction of the one or more offline transactions is the
first offline transaction completed by the first customer, based at
least in part on the first payment account number of the first
payment account for the first customer received by the offer engine
via the Internet in response to providing the interface to register
the first customer account.
3. The method of claim 2, further comprising: calculating, by the
offer engine, a cost per transaction of the online advertising
campaign by the offline merchant, based at least in part by
dividing a total cost of the online advertising campaign by a
number of the one or more offline transactions received from the
payment processor that satisfy the at least one criterion specified
by the online offer; and transmitting, from the offer engine via
the Internet to a second web browser, a second interface for
display on the second web browser, wherein the second interface
comprises: a menu to allow a first selection of the online
advertising campaign from a plurality of different online
advertising campaigns and a second selection to generate a report
for at least one of: online offers viewed vs. online offers clicked
by the respective customers; online offers clicked vs. online
offers accepted by the respective customers; online offers accepted
vs. online offers satisfied by the respective customers; and the
cost per transaction of the online advertising campaign; and an
output to display the at least one of the online offers viewed vs.
online offers clicked by the respective customers, the online
offers clicked vs. online offers accepted by the respective
customers, the online offers accepted vs. online offers satisfied
by the respective customers, and the cost per transaction of the
online advertising campaign.
4. The method of claim 2, further comprising: responsive to
determining that the first customer has completed the first offline
transaction corresponding to the online offer, performing, by the
offer engine, at least one operation comprising at least one of:
providing at least one of an electronic discount or an electronic
reward to the first customer; determining a location at which the
online offer was satisfied by the first customer; or providing a
metric for display that is based on the first customer receiving
the online offer and satisfying the online offer.
5. The method of claim 2, wherein the one or more offline
transactions are compiled for the payment processor by one or more
of a merchant system of the offline merchant, a payment card issuer
that issues the at least one of the customer credit card, the
customer debit card, and the customer prepaid card to the first
customer, a payment processor system that processes the in-store
sale using the at least one of the customer credit card, the
customer debit card, and the customer prepaid card for the offline
merchant, a point of sale system that processes the in-store sale
for the offline merchant using the at least one of the customer
credit card, the customer debit card, and the customer prepaid
card, or a financial institution that maintains financial funds for
at least one of the first customer or the offline merchant.
6. The method of claim 2, wherein determining if the one offline
transaction of the one or more offline transactions is the first
offline transaction completed by the first customer further
comprises: extracting, by the offer engine, a hashed transaction
payment account number included in the one offline transaction;
comparing the extracted hashed transaction payment account number
against a first hashed account number corresponding to the first
payment account number of the first payment account for the first
customer received by the offer engine via the Internet in response
to providing the interface to register the first customer account;
and determining that the first customer has completed the first
offline transaction corresponding to the online offer if the
extracted hashed transaction payment account number matches the
first hashed account number corresponding to the first payment
account number of the first payment account for the first
customer.
7. The method of claim 2, wherein determining whether the first
customer has completed the first offline transaction corresponding
to the online offer comprises: determining whether the first
customer performed an action comprising at least one of: purchasing
a certain quantity of a good or service, spending a certain amount
in a particular purchase, making a purchase at a particular time,
or making a number of purchases within a particular amount of
time.
8. A non-transitory computer-readable medium storing instructions
that, when executed by one or more processors, cause the one or
more processors to measure conversion of an online advertising
campaign for an offline merchant by determining completion of
transactions between respective customers and the offline merchant
in response to the respective customers receiving and accepting an
online offer from the offline merchant via a webpage advertisement
rendered by web browsers coupled to the Internet and used by the
respective customers to view the online offer, wherein the online
offer specifies at least one criterion for the respective customers
to satisfy the online offer and thereby complete the transactions
with the offline merchant, wherein upon execution of the
instructions, the one or more processors: store offer information
for the online offer, wherein the offer information includes an
electronic merchant identifier of the offline merchant and the at
least one criterion for the customers to satisfy the online offer,
wherein the electronic merchant identifier uniquely identifies, to
a payment processor, the transactions between the offline merchant
and the customers of the offline merchant; determine that a first
customer of the respective customers viewing the webpage
advertisement including the online offer via a first web browser
clicked on the webpage advertisement including the online offer,
via at least one of a browser cookie and Internet Protocol OP)
address tracking; provide, via the Internet, an interface for
display on the first web browser of the first customer to register
a first customer account with the offer engine to accept the online
offer; receive via the Internet, in response to providing the
interface to register the first customer account, a first payment
account number of a first payment account for the first customer at
a first customer financial institution, wherein the first payment
account includes at least one of a customer credit card, a customer
debit card, and a customer prepaid card issued by the first
customer financial institution; transmit, via the Internet to the
payment processor, only the electronic merchant identifier included
in the offer information and information corresponding to
respective payment accounts associated with the respective
customers for the transactions between the respective customers and
the offline merchant, the respective payment accounts including at
least the first payment account, wherein the payment processor is
communicatively coupled to the first customer financial institution
and a merchant financial institution of the offline merchant to
facilitate, at least a first offline transaction between the first
customer and the offline merchant corresponding to the online
offer; receive, via the Internet from the payment processor, based
on the electronic merchant identifier, one or more offline
transactions for an in-store purchase at a brick-and-mortar
location of the offline merchant, wherein the one or more offline
transactions received by the offer engine from the payment
processor do not include the identification of the online offer;
and determine, based on the one or more offline transactions
received from the payment processor and the at least one criterion
specified by the online offer in the stored offer information,
whether the first customer has completed the first offline
transaction corresponding to the online offer by: determining if
the at least one criterion specified by the online offer is
satisfied in the one or more offline transactions received from the
payment processor; and for each offline transaction of the one or
more offline transactions in which the at least one criterion
specified by the online offer is satisfied: determining if one
offline transaction of the one or more offline transactions is the
first offline transaction completed by the first customer, based at
least in part on the first payment account number of the first
payment account for the first customer received by the offer engine
via the Internet in response to providing the interface to register
the first customer account.
9. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 8, wherein
the instructions further cause the one or more processors to:
calculate a cost per transaction of the online advertising campaign
by the offline merchant, based at least in part by dividing a total
cost of the online advertising campaign by a number of the one or
more offline transactions received from the payment processor that
satisfy the at least one criterion specified by the online offer;
and transmit, via the Internet to a second web browser, a second
interface for display on the second web browser, wherein the second
interface comprises: a menu to allow a first selection of the
online advertising campaign from a plurality of different online
advertising campaigns and a second selection to generate a report
for at least one of: online offers viewed vs. online offers clicked
by the respective customers; online offers clicked vs. online
offers accepted by the respective customers; online offers accepted
vs. online offers satisfied by the respective customers; and the
cost per transaction of the online advertising campaign; and an
output to display the at least one of the online offers viewed vs.
online offers clicked by the respective customers, the online
offers clicked vs. online offers accepted by the respective
customers, the online offers accepted vs. online offers satisfied
by the respective customers and the cost per transaction of the
online advertising campaign.
10. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 8,
wherein the instructions further cause the one or more processors
to: responsive to determining that the first customer has completed
the first offline transaction corresponding to the online offer,
perform at least one operation comprising at least one of:
providing at least one of an electronic discount or an electronic
reward to the first customer; determining a location at which the
online offer was satisfied by the first customer; or providing a
metric for display that is based on the first customer receiving
the online offer and satisfying the online offer.
11. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 8,
wherein the one or more offline transactions are compiled for the
payment processor by one or more of a merchant system of the
offline merchant, a payment card issuer that issues the at least
one of the customer credit card, the customer debit card, and the
customer prepaid card to the first customer, a payment processor
system that processes the in-store sale using the at least one of
the customer credit card, the customer debit card, and the customer
prepaid card for the offline merchant, a point of sale system that
processes the in-store sale for the offline merchant using the at
least one of the customer credit card, the customer debit card, and
the customer prepaid card, or a financial institution that
maintains financial funds for at least one of the first customer or
the offline merchant.
12. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 8,
wherein the instructions that cause the one or more processors to
determine if the one offline transaction of the one or more offline
transactions is the first offline transaction completed by the
first customer further comprise instructions that, when executed,
cause the one or more processors to: extract a hashed transaction
payment account number included in the one offline transaction;
compare the extracted hashed transaction payment account number
against a first hashed account number corresponding to the first
payment account number of the first payment account for the first
customer received by the offer engine via the Internet in response
to providing the interface to register the first customer account;
and determine that the first customer has completed the first of
transaction corresponding to the online offer if the extracted
hashed transaction payment account number matches the first hashed
account number corresponding to the first payment account number of
the first payment account for the first customer.
13. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 8,
wherein the instructions that cause the one or more processors to
determine whether the first customer has completed the first
offline transaction corresponding to the online offer comprise
instructions that, when executed, cause the one or more processors
to: determine whether the first customer has performed an action
comprising at least one of: purchasing a certain quantity of a good
or service, spending a certain amount in a particular purchase,
making a purchase at a particular time, or making a number of
purchases within a particular amount of time.
14. A system to measure conversion of an online advertising
campaign for an offline merchant by determining completion of
transactions between respective customers and the offline merchant
in response to the respective customers receiving and accepting an
online offer from the offline merchant via a webpage advertisement
rendered by web browsers coupled to the Internet and used by the
respective customers to view the online offer, wherein the online
offer specifies at least one criterion for the respective customers
to satisfy the online offer and thereby complete the transactions
with the offline merchant, the system comprising: a computer
processor; and a memory to store instructions that are executable
by the computer processor to: store offer information for the
online offer, wherein the offer information includes an electronic
merchant identifier of the offline merchant and the at least one
criterion for the customers to satisfy the online offer, wherein
the electronic merchant identifier uniquely identifies, to a
payment processor, the transactions between the offline merchant
and the customers of the offline merchant; determine that a first
customer of the respective customers viewing the webpage
advertisement including the online offer via a first web browser
clicked on the webpage advertisement including the online offer,
via at least one of a browser cookie and Internet Protocol (IP)
address tracking; provide, via the Internet, an interface for
display on the first web browser of the first customer to register
a first customer account with the offer engine to accept the online
offer; receive via the Internet, in response to providing the
interface to register the first customer account, a first payment
account number of a first payment account for the first customer at
a first customer financial institution, wherein the first payment
account includes at least one of a customer credit card, a customer
debit card, and a customer prepaid card issued by the first
customer financial institution; transmit, via the Internet to the
payment processor, only the electronic merchant identifier included
in the offer information and information corresponding to
respective payment accounts associated with the respective
customers for the transactions between the respective customers and
the offline merchant, the respective payment accounts including at
least the first payment account, wherein the payment processor is
communicatively coupled to the first customer financial institution
and a merchant financial institution of the offline merchant to
facilitate, at least a first offline transaction between the first
customer and the offline merchant corresponding to the online
offer; receive, via the Internet from the payment processor, based
on the electronic merchant identifier, one or more offline
transactions for an in-store purchase at a brick-and-mortar
location of the offline merchant, wherein the one or more offline
transactions received by the offer engine from the payment
processor do not include an identification of the online offer; and
determine, based on the one or more offline transactions received
from the payment processor and the at least one criterion specified
by the online offer in the stored offer information, whether the
first customer has completed a first offline transaction
corresponding to the online offer by: determining if the at least
one criterion specified by the online offer is satisfied in the one
or more offline transactions received from the payment processor;
and for each offline transaction of the one or more offline
transactions in which the at least one criterion specified by the
online offer is satisfied: determining if one offline transaction
of the one or more offline transactions is the first offline
transaction completed by the first customer, based at least in part
on the first payment account number of the first payment account
for the first customer received by the offer engine via the
Internet in response to providing the interface to register the
first customer account.
15. The system of claim 14, wherein the instructions are further
executable by the computer processor to: calculate a cost per
transaction of the online advertising campaign by the offline
merchant, based at least in part by dividing a total cost of the
online advertising campaign by a number of the one or more offline
transactions received from the payment processor that satisfy the
at least one criterion specified by the online offer; and transmit,
via the Internet to a second web browser, a second interface for
display on the second web browser, wherein the second interface
comprises: a menu to allow a first selection of the online
advertising campaign from a plurality of different online
advertising campaigns and a second selection to generate a report
for at least one of: online offers viewed vs. online offers clicked
by the respective customers; online offers clicked vs. online
offers accepted by the respective customers; online offers accepted
vs. online offers satisfied by the respective customers; and the
cost per transaction of the online advertising campaign; and an
output to display the at least one of the online offers viewed vs.
online offers clicked by the respective customers, the online
offers clicked vs. online offers accepted by the respective
customers, the online offers accepted vs. online offers satisfied
by the respective customers, and the cost per transaction of the
online advertising campaign.
16. The system of claim 14, wherein the instructions are further
executable by the computer processor to: responsive to determining
that the first customer has completed the first offline transaction
corresponding to the online offer, perform at least one operation
comprising at least one of: providing at least one of an electronic
discount or an electronic reward to the first customer; determining
a location at which the online offer was satisfied by the first
customer; or providing a metric for display that is based on the
first customer receiving the online offer and satisfying the online
offer.
17. The system of claim 14, wherein the one or more offline
transactions are compiled for the payment processor by one or more
of a merchant system of the offline merchant, a payment card issuer
that issues the at least one of the customer credit card, the
customer debit card, and the customer prepaid card to the first
customer, a payment processor system that processes the in-store
sale using the at least one of the customer credit card, the
customer debit card, and the customer prepaid card for the offline
merchant, a point of sale system that processes the in-store sale
for the offline merchant using the at least one of the customer
credit card, the customer debit card, and the customer prepaid
card, or a financial institution that maintains financial funds for
at least one of the first customer or the offline merchant.
18. The system of claim 14, wherein the instructions that cause the
one or more processors to determine if the one offline transaction
of the one or more offline transactions is the first offline
transaction completed by the first customer further comprise
instructions executable by the processor to: extract a hashed
transaction payment account number included in the one offline
transaction; compare the extracted hashed transaction payment
account number against a first hashed account number corresponding
to the first payment account number of the first payment account
for the first customer received by the offer engine via the
Internet in response to providing the interface to register the
first customer account; and determine that the first customer has
completed the first offline transaction corresponding to the online
offer if the extracted hashed transaction payment account number
matches the first hashed account number corresponding to the first
payment account number of the first payment account for the first
customer.
19. The system of claim 14, wherein the instructions that are
executable by the computer processor to determine whether the first
customer has completed the first offline transaction corresponding
to the online offer comprise instructions executable by the
computer processor to: determine whether the first customer has
performed an action comprising at least one of: purchasing a
certain quantity of a good or service, spending a certain amount in
a particular purchase, making a purchase at a particular time, or
making a number of purchases within a particular amount of time.
Description
CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
[0001] This application is a U.S. Continuation Application of U.S.
application Ser. No. 13/211,270, filed Aug. 16, 2011, and entitled
"MEASURING CONVERSION OF AN ONLINE ADVERTISING CAMPAIGN INCLUDING
REFERRAL OFFERS FROM AN OFFLINE MERCHANT," which claims priority
benefit to United States provisional patent application titled,
"SYSTEM AND METHOD IMPLEMENTING REFERRAL PROGRAMS," filed on Feb.
15, 2011, having application Ser. No. 61/442,943 and also claims
priority benefit to United States provisional patent application
titled, "SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR IMPLEMENTING PAYMENT NETWORK
COOKIES," filed on Feb. 14, 2011, having application Ser. No.
61/442,691, both of which are incorporated by reference herein.
BACKGROUND
Field of the Invention
[0002] The present invention relates to the field of computer
software and, in particular, to a system and method for quantizing
the effectiveness of an advertising campaign.
Description of the Related Art
[0003] Online advertising is a form of promotion that uses the
internet to deliver marketing messages to potential customers.
Examples of online advertising include contextual advertisements on
search engine results pages, banner advertisements, rich media
(e.g., video) advertisements, social network advertisements,
interstitial advertisements, online classified advertisements,
e-mail marketing, and many others.
[0004] One important aspect of an online advertisement is the
online "conversion" of the online advertisement, which refers
generally to a customer completing an online transaction with an
online merchant in response to viewing the online
advertisement.
Typically, when a customer views an online advertisement, the
customer's activity across one or more web pages is tracked to
determine whether a particular online transaction is actually
completed by the customer. One example of a tracking technique is
referred to as pixel-based tracking, where a 1.times.1 pixel
image--often referred to as a "web beacon"--is linked to an online
advertisement and included in each web page of, for example, an
online shopping cart. The 1.times.1 pixel image reports information
back to a manager of the online advertisement such that the manager
is able to determine whether the customer has reached an order
confirmation page, indicating that the online advertisement was
successful by resulting in a conversion.
[0005] Although most merchants provide their customers the ability
to shop online, there exists a large number of merchants that have
one or more brick-and-mortar locations, referred to herein as
"offline" merchants. Though offline merchants typically do not
provide an online shopping cart to their customers, the offline
merchants may nonetheless be interested in online advertising that
causes customers to visit their brick-and-mortar locations in an
attempt to increase sales. Unfortunately, as with offline
advertising (e.g., advertising in magazines, TV, radio, etc.), it
is difficult for offline merchants to measure the performance of
their online advertising campaigns.
[0006] One attempt to measure performance of an advertising
campaign involves polling customers and asking them to share the
motivation for the purchase they are making. For example, if a
customer shops at a merchant location during a sale, then the
merchant may ask the customer, "Where did you hear about our sale?"
Unfortunately, some customers are lazy and do not wish to share
such information with the merchant or may provide inaccurate
information. Determining the effectiveness of an online portion of
ad campaign is further complicated when the same advertisements are
presented to potential customers through other channels that are
not online.
[0007] As the foregoing illustrates, there is a need in the art for
an improved technique for quantizing the effectiveness of an
advertising campaign.
SUMMARY
[0008] One embodiment of the invention provides a method for
determining the effectiveness of an offer. The method includes
identifying an offer viewed by a customer, determining that the
customer performs a first action in response to viewing the offer,
determining that the customer has not performed a second action
after performing the first action, and generating a report that
displays details associated with the first action and the second
action.
[0009] Another embodiment of the invention provides a method for
providing query access to transaction data. The method includes
receiving a query that includes one or more parameters, receiving
one or more transactions that correspond to the query, filtering
the one or more transactions to exclude transactions that do not
correspond to an offer, determining for each of the filtered one or
more transactions whether the transaction satisfies the
corresponding offer, analyzing the filtered one or more
transactions based on the query, and generating an output that
displays results associated with the filtered one or more
transactions.
[0010] Further embodiments of the present invention provide a
computer-readable storage medium that includes instructions for
causing a computer system to carry out one or more of the methods
set forth above.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0011] So that the manner in which the above recited features of
the invention can be understood in detail, a more particular
description of the invention, briefly summarized above, may be had
by reference to embodiments, some of which are illustrated in the
appended drawings. It is to be noted, however, that the appended
drawings illustrate only typical embodiments of this invention and
are therefore not to be considered limiting of its scope, for the
invention may admit to other equally effective embodiments.
[0012] FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating components of a
system in which embodiments of the present invention may be
implemented.
[0013] FIG. 2 is a flow diagram of method steps for determining
whether a set of offers have been satisfied, according to one
embodiment of the invention.
[0014] FIG. 3 is a screenshot of an interface that enables a
campaign manager to quantize the effectiveness of an ad campaign,
according to one embodiment of the invention
[0015] FIG. 4 is a flow diagram of method steps for analyzing the
effectiveness of an offer campaign, according to one embodiment of
the invention
[0016] FIG. 5 is a screenshot of an interface that enables a
campaign manager to query transaction data, according to one
embodiment of the invention.
[0017] FIG. 6 is a flow diagram of method steps for providing
transaction data based on a query, according to one embodiment of
the invention.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
[0018] In the following description, several specific details are
presented to provide a thorough understanding of embodiments of the
invention. One skilled in the relevant art will recognize, however,
that the concepts and techniques disclosed herein can be practiced
without one or more of the specific details, or in combination with
other components, etc. In other instances, well-known
implementations or operations are not shown or described in detail
to avoid obscuring aspects of various examples disclosed
herein.
[0019] FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating components of a
system 100 in which embodiments of the invention may be
implemented. As shown, system 100 includes a merchant 102, a point
of sale (POS) system 104 with an associated database 106, an offer
engine (OE) 108 with an associated database 109, a payment
processor 110 with an associated database 112, one or more
financial institutions 114, and a network 118. As shown, merchant
102, OE 108, payment processor 110 and financial institutions 114
communicate with one another via network 108, such as the
internet.
[0020] Though not illustrated in FIG. 1, each of OE 108, payment
processor 110 and POS system 104 include conventional components of
a computing device, e.g., a processor, system memory, a hard disk
drive, input devices such as a mouse and a keyboard, and output
devices such as a monitor.
[0021] In one embodiment, DB 106, DB 109 and/or DB 112 can be any
type of storage system, e.g., a relational database hosted on a
network file system (NFS) device, a storage system hosted by a
cloud service provider, and the like. Alternatively, DB 106, DB 109
and/or DB 112 may be integrated in POS system 104, OE 108 and
payment processor 110, respectively, such as a database hosted on a
local disk and managed by an operating system.
[0022] Merchant 102 may be a brick-and-mortal physical merchant, an
online merchant, a mail-order/telephone-order (MOTO) merchant, and
the like. Merchant 102 is capable of processing accounts of
customers when they pay for goods or services offered by merchant
102. Such accounts include credit cards, debit cards, prepaid
cards, and the like. In some embodiments, merchant 102 is equipped
with POS system 104. As shown, POS system 104 is coupled to
database 106, which enables POS system 104 to store detailed
information associated with transactions between merchant 102 and
customers of merchant 102.
[0023] A transaction may be initiated at merchant 102 according to
a variety of techniques. For example, a cashier at merchant 102 may
swipe a credit card through a card reader included in POS system
104. Alternatively, an account may be delivered virtually on a
customer's mobile device, which enables a customer at merchant 102
to wave his/her mobile device in front of a contactless card reader
included in POS system 104. Further, the customer may show his/her
mobile device to a cashier at merchant 102 who manually enters an
account number of the account being used by the customer.
Alternatively, the mobile device may include a contactless chip or
tag that is wireless-readable by POS system 104 using, e.g.,
near-field-communication (NFC) technology.
[0024] Payment processor 110, in conjunction with financial
institutions 114, facilitates payment transactions between merchant
102 and customers thereof, and stores the transactions in DB 112.
More specifically, when a customer attempts to pay for goods and/or
services offered by merchant 102 using his or her account, a POS
terminal submits the transaction through a merchant account to an
acquiring bank of the merchant (i.e., one of the financial
institutions 114). The acquiring bank then transmits a request for
funds through the payment processor 110. The payment processor 110
routes the request for funds to the card holder's issuing bank
(i.e., the appropriate financial institution 114) for authorization
based on a type of the account. The issuing bank verifies the card
number, the transaction type, and the amount. In some examples, the
issuing bank then reserves that amount of the cardholder's credit
limit for the merchant.
[0025] For example, if payment processor 110 detects that the
account is a debit card associated with a checking account of the
customer, then payment processor 110 routes the transaction request
to the bank that issued the debit card, whereupon the issuing bank
indicates to payment processor 110 whether the checking account
possesses sufficient funds to satisfy the transaction request. In
turn, payment processor 110 indicates to the merchant acquiring
bank whether the request is for funds has been approved. If the
transaction is successfully processed, then funds are transferred
from the card holder's account at the issuing bank to the merchant
account at the inquiring bank.
[0026] An offer engine (POE) 108 is configured to determine the
effectiveness of advertising campaigns requested and managed by
merchant 102. As shown in FIG. 1, OE 108 is in communication with
both merchant 102 and payment processor 110.
OE 108 manages "offers" that are advertised to, possibly accepted
by, and possibly satisfied by customers of merchant 102. The offer
can be coupled to a reward that is given to the customer when he or
she has satisfied the offer, e.g., cash-back rewards, credit card
rewards, store credit, virtual currency, and the like.
[0027] An offer may be any offer that involves a customer
completing a transaction according to specific criteria, such as
buying a certain amount of a product, spending a certain amount in
one purchase, making a purchase at a particular time, making a
number of purchases within a particular amount of time, and the
like. Offers may also involve a group of customers completing a
transaction according to specific criteria. As is described in
greater detail herein, OE 108 is configured to monitor for
transactions to determine whether the criteria for a particular
offer have been satisfied. As is also described herein, OE 108 can
monitor both online and offline transactions to determine whether
the criteria for a particular offer have been satisfied.
[0028] Offer data is stored in database 109 accessed by OE 108. The
offer data is advertised to customers via webpage advertisements,
email marketing campaigns, short-message-service (SMS) messages,
telemarketing campaigns, and the like, as described herein. As
described below in conjunction with FIG. 2, OE 108 provides an
interface that enables customers (e.g., individuals) to register an
account with OE 108, including their account information, and
subsequently accept and complete offers. OE 108 subsequently
monitors transactions initiated at merchant 102 (i.e., online
and/or offline) to determine whether offers are satisfied by the
customers whom accepted them.
[0029] FIG. 2 is a flow diagram of method steps 200 for determining
whether a set of offers has been satisfied, according to one
embodiment of the invention. Persons skilled in the art will
understand that, even though method 200 is described in conjunction
with FIG. 1, any system configured to perform the method steps, in
any order, is within the scope of embodiments of the invention. As
shown, method 200 begins at step 202, where OE 108 receives a set
of offers that have been accepted by one or more customers. For
example, OE 108 may query database 109 to return a set of offers
that have not been marked as expired or satisfied such that only
outstanding and/or valid offers are processed.
[0030] At step 204, OE 108 receives a set of transactions
associated with purchases made at one or more merchants. In one
embodiment, OE 108 receives the set of transactions by querying
payment processor 110 for particular transactions from one or more
merchants. In one example, OE 108 may transmit to payment processor
110 both an ID of a merchant and a set of hashed account numbers
associated with customers who have accepted at least one offer with
the merchant. In response, payment processor 110 returns
transactions that match the hashed account numbers. In another
embodiment, a merchant can give the payment processor 110
permission to deliver all transactions from the merchant to a third
party, such as OE 108. For example, the transactions can be
delivered to the OE 108 periodically (e.g., daily) or in
real-time.
[0031] At step 206, OE 108 sets a first offer in the set of offers
as a current offer. At step 208, OE 108 determines whether criteria
of the current offer are satisfied by one or more transactions in
the set of transactions. In one embodiment, each offer is
associated with executable code that, when executed by OE 108,
enables OE 108 to determine whether the current offer has been
satisfied by one or more transactions in the set of transactions.
For example, if a customer accepts an offer that requires him or
her to make an in-store purchase at merchant 102 between the hours
of 2:00 PM-6:00 PM, and OE 108 determines from a transaction in the
set of transactions that a customer performs a purchase at merchant
102, then OE 108 analyzes timestamp data included the transaction
to determine whether the transaction was performed between the
required hours.
[0032] If, at step 208, OE 108 determines that criteria of the
current offer are not satisfied by one or more transactions in the
set of transactions, then method 200 proceeds to step 212.
Otherwise, at step 209, OE 108 determines whether the one or more
transactions identified at step 208 are associated with an account
number that matches an account number associated with the current
offer. In one embodiment, OE 108 extracts a hashed account number
from each transaction and compares the hashed account number
against the hashed account number associated with the current
offer. If, at step 209, OE 108 determines that the one or more
transactions identified at step 208 are not associated with an
account number that matches an account number associated with the
current offer, then method 200 proceeds to step 212. Otherwise,
method 200 proceeds to step 210.
[0033] At step 210, OE 108 notifies a merchant associated with the
current offer that the current offer has been satisfied. In one
embodiment, OE 108 is configured to lookup via database 109
notification preferences of the merchant that is associated with
the current offer. For example, OE 108 may determine that the
merchant associated with the current offer prefers to receive a
daily batch file emailed at the end of each day, where the batch
file includes line-by-line detail of each customer who satisfied an
offer and the reward that is to be given to them. In addition to
notifying the merchant, OE 108 may also be configured to notify the
customer associated with the current offer that he or she has
satisfied the current offer, as described above in conjunction with
FIG. 2.
[0034] At step 212, OE 108 determines whether additional offers are
in the set of offers. If, at step 212, OE 108 determines that
additional offers are in the set of offers, then at step 214, OE
108 sets a next offer in the set of offers as the current offer. In
this way, each of the offers in the set of offers are compared
against the set of transaction data.
[0035] FIG. 3 is a screenshot of an interface 300 that enables a
campaign manager to quantize the effectiveness of an ad campaign,
according to one embodiment of the invention. As shown, interface
300 is accessible via a web browser application and includes a menu
302 and an output 304. Menu 302 enables a campaign manager to
choose from ad campaigns that are associated with a merchant that
he or she is managing and to generate one or more reports for the
chosen ad campaign.
[0036] In one embodiment, menu 302 displays to the campaign manager
each ad campaign that he or she manages, e.g., ad campaigns that
are associated with merchant 102 for which the campaign manager
works. Each ad campaign is associated with a description, e.g.,
"Google Campaign," and is selectable to generate one or more
pre-configured or customized reports thereon. For example, the
pre-configured report "POs viewed vs. POs clicked" enables the
campaign manager to view for a particular ad campaign a report that
displays the number of offers viewed by customers vs. the number of
offers clicked by customers. Such a report may indicate, for
example, that a web page advertisement for an offer that includes a
colorful animation causes more customers to click on the offer than
a text-only web page advertisement for the offer.
[0037] Another example of a pre-configured report, "POs clicked vs.
POs accepted" enables the campaign manager to determine which of
the offers directly viewed by customers are also accepted by
customers. In one example, a customer may be inclined to click on a
web advertisement for an offer as a result of the attractiveness of
the web advertisement. However, when the offer associated with the
web advertisement is displayed to the customer, the customer may
find that the offer is not something in which he or she is
interested, e.g., when there is a miscorrelation between the offer
and the web advertisement associated therewith. As a result, an
offer may be clicked by a customer, but is not ultimately accepted
by the customer. Alternatively, an offer may be directly correlated
to a web advertisement in which the offer is displayed such that
there is a high ratio of offers clicked to offers accepted.
[0038] Yet another example of a pre-configured report, "POs
accepted vs. POs satisfied," enables the campaign manager to
determine which of the offers accepted by customers are also
satisfied by customers, as described above in conjunction with FIG.
2. In this way, the campaign manager is able to determine, for
example, that certain offers, while attractive to a customer in
some respects, fail to ultimately encourage the customer to satisfy
the offer. In one example, a customer accepts an offer that
requires him or her to spend $100.00 or more at a location of
merchant 102 during a holiday sale, where the customer is entitled
to a $50.00 cash back reward if he or she satisfies the offer.
However, for whatever reason, the customer may not shop at a
location of merchant 102, so the customer fails to satisfy the
offer, despite the attractive $50.00 cash back reward associated
therewith.
[0039] Yet another example of a pre-configured report, "Cost per
transaction (CPT)," enables the campaign manager to determine a CPT
for the ad campaign. Specifically, a CPT is representative of an
amount of money that an ad campaign costs relative to the number of
transactions that result from the ad campaign. For example,
referring to output 304 in FIG. 3, the "Yahoo Campaign" caused
50,000 offers to be viewed by customers who, for example, utilize
Yahoo's search engine and view offers alongside search results. Of
those 50,000 viewed offers, 10,000 are clicked by the
customers.
[0040] Continuing with the example illustrated in output 304, of
the 10,000 offers that are clicked by customers, 5,000 are accepted
by the customers. Further, of the 5,000 offers that are accepted by
the customers, 1,383 have been satisfied, such that 3,617 offers
remain outstanding and may or may not ultimately be satisfied.
Thus, OE 108 determines at the time that the CPT report is
requested, that the CPT for the Yahoo Campaign is:
($10,000/1,383)=$7.23. Advantageously, the campaign manager may
compare the CPT of $7.23 against the profit margins of the items
that were purchased by the customers. In this way, the campaign
manager may determine an exact amount of profit that is yielded for
goods and/or services that are purchased in response to offers
accepted by customer.
[0041] OE 108 may be configured to consider additional data to the
data described above when calculating CPTs. In one example, OE 108
determines that a customer accepts a referral offer, where the
referral offer requires the customer to get one or more additional
customers to both accept and satisfy an offer associated with the
referral offer.
[0042] In one example of a referral offer, a first customer is
exposed to an offer advertisement widget for a referral offer that
requires him or her to get five or more additional customers to
both accept and satisfy an offer, where the offer requires them to
make a purchase of $25.00 or more at merchant 102. Typically, the
offer provides incentive to the five or more friends to both accept
and satisfy the referral offer, such as $5.00 cash back for making
the $25.00 purchase. In turn, the first customer is rewarded $50.00
by merchant 102 when each of the five or more friends both accept
and satisfy the offer. The first customer may notify the five
friends according to a variety of techniques, such as submitting
their email addresses into an interface provided by OE 108, which
then delivers a notification of the offer to each email
address.
[0043] Thus, in the above example, merchant 102 receives business
from the five or more friends while only paying the advertising
costs involved in getting the first customer to view, click and
accept the referral offer. Accordingly, OE 108 updates the CPT by
increasing the total number of transactions before dividing the
total number of transactions into the cost of the ad campaign,
which decreases the CPT value.
[0044] Additional data may also be processed by OE 108 when
determining a CPT. For example, OE 108 may detect that a customer,
subsequent to accepting and satisfying an offer made by merchant
102, continues to shop regularly at merchant 102 without accepting
any offers, i.e., he or she becomes a loyal customer of merchant
102. In this way, the CPT is reduced as a result of the number of
transactions increasing since there is no increase in advertisement
sales that corresponds to the increase in the customer's
shopping.
[0045] FIG. 4 is a flow diagram of method steps 400 for analyzing
the effectiveness of an offer campaign, according to one embodiment
of the invention. Persons skilled in the art will understand that,
even though method 400 is described in conjunction with FIGS. 1 and
3, any system configured to perform the method steps, in any order,
is within the scope of embodiments of the invention. As shown,
method 400 begins at step 402, where OE 108 receives a set of
offers that have been viewed by customers. OE 108 may determine
that offers have been viewed by customers according to a variety of
techniques, including use of browser cookies, Internet Protocol
(IP) address tracking, campaign performance information obtained
from an ad campaign publisher through which the offers are
presented to the customers, and the like.
[0046] At step 404, OE 108 determines, for one or more offers, a
number of customers that have clicked the viewed offer to view
offer details associated therewith. As described herein, a customer
that views an offer, e.g., an offer displayed within a web
advertisement, may or may not click on the offer to view the
details and/or accept the offer. OE 108 determines whether the
offer was clicked according to the same techniques described above
in step 402. For example, a web advertisement that includes an
offer that, when clicked by a customer, is configured to update the
state of a browser cookie to reflect that the offer has been
clicked. The publisher of the web advertisement, e.g., OE 108, then
reads the browser cookie and updates a database, e.g., DB 109, to
reflect that the offer was, in fact, clicked by a customer.
[0047] At step 406, OE 108 determines how many of the customers
that have clicked the viewed offers have accepted the published
offers, according to the techniques described above in conjunction
with FIG. 2-3.
[0048] At step 408, OE 108 determines how many of the customers
that have both clicked and accepted the viewed offers also have
satisfied the offers, according to the techniques described above
in conjunction with FIG. 2-3.
[0049] At step 410, OE 108 calculates a total effectiveness of the
offers based on the foregoing determinations. Such calculations,
for example, may involve generating a CPT or a custom report for
one or more ad campaigns, as described above in conjunction with
FIG. 3.
[0050] FIG. 5 is a screenshot of an interface 500 that enables a
campaign manager to query transaction data, according to one
embodiment of the invention. As shown, interface 500 is accessible
via a web browser application and includes a menu 502 and an output
504. Menu 502 enables a campaign manager to, for example, view
detailed transaction information for particular customers of
merchant 102 along with goods and/or services provided by merchant
102.
[0051] In one embodiment, menu 502 displays a list of known
customers of merchant 102. In the example illustrated in menu 502,
each listed customer corresponds to a unique hashed account number,
as described above in conjunction with FIG. 2. For example, OE 108
may parse transaction data obtained from payment processor 110 and
group equal hash values as customers that are listed in menu
502.
The customers listed in menu 502 may further be highlighted as
customers who have accepted one or more offers, i.e., customers
known to OE 108. Also shown in menu 502 is a listing of universal
product codes (UPC) codes. The listing of UPC codes may be
displayed according to a variety of techniques, including listing
the most popular items sold by merchant 102, where such information
may be obtained, for example, from POS system 104.
[0052] Menu 502 enables a campaign manager to select from a list of
pre-defined reports, such as "All transactions", which, when
generated, displays in output 504 a list of all transactions
associated with the selection made in menu 502, e.g., a product
associated with a UPC code "ID3". The list of transactions may
include, for each transaction in the list, a set of attributes,
e.g., a date of the transaction, an amount of the transaction, and
the like. Method 502 also enables a campaign manager to generate a
customer report where he or she may submit criteria for the
transactions that he or she wants to analyze.
[0053] For example, in FIG. 5 output 504 displays the results of a
custom report for the product associated with the UPC code "ID3".
As shown, the custom report displays the total number of purchases
(3,000) since the product was introduced. The customer report also
displays the number of unique customers who have purchased the
product (890), which OE 108 calculates by identifying transactions
for the product and identifying the number of unique customers who
performed the transactions.
[0054] The number of unique customers may then be used to generate
an average number of purchases of the product per customer, which
is also included in output 504 and has a value of 3.37, which
indicates that the typical customer is a repeat-purchaser of the
product. The requested report may also cause OE 108 to determine
the number of satisfied offers that are associated with the total
number of purchases such that the campaign manager may determine
whether the offers are effective. Additional customizations to the
report may be selected by the campaign manager, including viewing
the total number of purchases of the product that have been made
within the last twenty-four hours (198).
[0055] Though not explicitly illustrated or described in
conjunction with FIG. 5, embodiments of the invention provide
report generation techniques that enable the campaign manager to
query and analyze transaction data using, e.g., any database
queries and/or database operations, and any subsequent processing
and/or analysis thereon. OE 108 may also be configured to provide
detailed information for each customer, e.g., determining whether a
particular user has performed a transaction of $25.00 or more at
merchant 102 within the past month.
[0056] FIG. 6 is a flow diagram of method steps 600 for providing
transaction data based on a query, according to one embodiment of
the invention. Persons skilled in the art will understand that,
even though method 600 is described in conjunction with FIG. 1, any
system configured to perform the method steps, in any order, is
within the scope of embodiments of the invention. As shown, method
600 begins at step 602, where OE 108 receives a request to provide
transaction data. Such a request may generated, for example, via
menu 502 described above in conjunction with FIG. 5.
[0057] At step 604, OE 108 retrieves the transaction data from a
database, e.g., DB 109 and or payment processing platform 110,
based on the request. At step 606, OE 108 determines whether the
transaction data is associated with one or more offers. If, at step
606, OE 108 determines that the transaction data is associated with
one or more offers, then method 600 proceeds to step 608, where OE
108 matches the transaction data with one or more transactions
executed by one or more customers according to the techniques
described above in conjunction with FIG. 2.
[0058] Referring now back to step 506, if OE 108 determines that
the transaction data is not associated with one or more offers,
then method 600 proceeds to step 610, where OE 108 optionally
performs one or more calculations on the transaction data based on
the request. Such calculations include, for example, determining a
number of unique customers who have purchased a particular product,
as described above in conjunction with FIG. 5.
[0059] At step 612, OE 108 returns the transaction data and/or the
results of the one or more calculations, which may then be
displayed to, e.g., a campaign manager via output 504 described
above in conjunction with FIG. 5.
[0060] Advantageously, embodiments of the invention provide an
improved technique for determining the effectiveness of an online
ad campaign. In particular, an administrator is able to query
transaction data that is associated with a particular ad campaign.
The query may specify one or more parameters that filter the
transaction data to provide the administrator with a more granular
view of aspects of the ad campaign. As a result, the merchant is
able to determine a total cost per transaction in addition to areas
in which the ad campaign needs improvement.
[0061] While the foregoing is directed to embodiments of the
present invention, other and further embodiments of the invention
may be devised without departing from the basic scope thereof. For
example, aspects of the present invention may be implemented in
hardware or software or in a combination of hardware and
software.
One embodiment of the invention may be implemented as a program
product for use with a computer system. The program(s) of the
program product define functions of the embodiments (including the
methods described herein) and can be contained on a variety of
computer-readable storage media. Illustrative computer-readable
storage media include, but are not limited to: (i) non-writable
storage media (e.g., read-only memory devices within a computer
such as CD-ROM disks readable by a CD-ROM drive, flash memory, ROM
chips or any type of solid-state non-volatile semiconductor memory)
on which information is permanently stored; and (ii) writable
storage media (e.g., floppy disks within a diskette drive or
hard-disk drive or any type of solid-state random-access
semiconductor memory) on which alterable information is stored.
Such computer-readable storage media, when carrying
computer-readable instructions that direct the functions of the
present invention, are embodiments of the present invention.
[0062] In view of the foregoing, the scope of the present invention
is determined by the claims that follow.
* * * * *