Method and system to connect consumers to information
View Patent ↗A method and apparatus for recruiting, communicating with, and paying participants of interactive advertising are described. The present invention is a system through which advertisers can recruit, communicate with, and pay their potential customers for their time. The system achieves these functions without the advertiser or the customer having to be in the same location—all logistics are handled through the system's web site, database, and communications interfaces. The system enables advertisers to promote interactive seminars in which they try to sell products to potential customers. Most importantly, the advertisers are able to offer their potential customers financial rewards for their time, such as 25 cents per minute to reward a customer for listening to a sales pitch. The system then provides a real-time communications link between the advertiser and customer. The system automatically bills the advertiser and rewards the customer for the time that they interact.
1. A method, comprising:
a first party providing an advertisement to a computer of a customer, via an advertisement server on a computing device, the advertisement being provided on behalf of an advertiser to advertise an interactive marketing session, the first party different than the advertiser and the customer, the advertisement to include:
a temporary visually actuatable reference to a telephonic connection with the advertiser for the customer to actuate in order to join the interactive marketing session,
an indication of whether the interactive marketing session is currently in process, and
a price to reward the customer for voice communications with the advertiser over the telephonic connection in the interactive marketing session, wherein the price is specified by the advertiser and is based at least in part on a duration of the voice communications monitored by the first party;
the first party registering the customer to allow the customer to use the visually actuatable reference to request the telephonic connection with the advertiser to anonymously join the interactive marketing session and to earn rewards from the interactive marketing session, the telephonic connection permitting the voice communications between the first party and the advertiser;
upon customer actuation of the reference, the first party connecting a user communication device of the customer, via the advertisement provided using the advertisement server, to the advertiser using the communications interface for the interactive marketing session over the telephonic connection, wherein the user communication device is separate from the user computer;
the first party monitoring the duration of the voice communications over the telephonic connection provided using a communications interface;
the first party charging a fee according to the price, specified by the advertiser to reward the customer, in response to the telephonic connection for the interactive marketing session being established between the advertiser and the customer via the reference;
the first party rewarding the customer according to the price and the duration of voice communications with the advertiser in the interactive marketing session over the telephonic connection established via the reference;
removing the customer actively participating in the interactive marketing session based on an input from the advertiser, and in response to the input automatically halting provision of rewards to the customer; and
removing the temporary visually actuatable reference in the advertisement automatically when a number of customers participating in the interactive marketing session reaches a maximum number determined by one of the advertiser and the first party to preclude further customers from joining the interactive marketing session.
2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the advertisement is placed on a media channel.
3. The method of claim 2 , wherein the media channel is an Internet.
4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the first party providing the advertisement includes providing a reference to be selected by a customer to initiate a telephone call to the advertiser.
5. The method of claim 4 , wherein the reference includes a hyper-link to be selected by a customer to initiate a telephone call to the advertiser.
6. The method of claim 4 , wherein the first party providing the advertisement includes providing a reference to be selected by a customer to initiate a voice-over IP telephone call to the advertiser.
7. The method of claim 1 , further including
the first party providing advertisements on a media channel on behalf of multiple advertisers, the advertisements to include at least a reference to a telephonic connection with the respective advertisers; and
the first party billing the respective advertisers in response to a telephonic connection being established between the respective advertiser and a customer.
8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the advertisement is provided in response to a search performed by a consumer.
9. The method of claim 8 , wherein the advertisement is provided in response to a search performed by a consumer for geographic location.
10. The method of claim 8 , wherein the advertisement is provided in response to a search performed by a consumer for a subject matter.
11. The method of claim 8 , wherein the advertisement is provided in response to a key word search performed by a consumer.
12. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
the first party charging the customer on behalf of the advertiser for a purchase made by the customer, from the advertiser, over the telephonic connection between the advertiser and the customer;
wherein the advertisement further includes an instruction to the customer on how to purchase an item over the telephonic connection.
13. The method of claim 1 , wherein the fee comprises an advertisement fee.
14. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
rewarding the customer in response to input requested by the advertiser and received from the customer over the telephonic connection between the advertiser and the customer.
15. A system comprising:
at least one server for:
a first party providing an advertisement to a computer of a customer, via an advertisement server, the advertisement being provided on behalf of an advertiser to advertise an interactive marketing session, the first party different than the advertiser and the customer, the advertisement to include:
a temporary visually actuatable reference to a telephonic connection with the advertiser for the customer to actuate in order to join the interactive marketing session,
an indication of whether the interactive marketing session is currently in process, and
a price to reward the customer for voice communications with the advertiser over the telephonic connection in the interactive marketing session, wherein the price is specified by the advertiser and is based at least in part on a duration of the voice communications monitored by the first party using a communications interface coupled to the advertisement server;
the first party registering the customer to allow the customer to use the visually actuatable reference to request the telephonic connection with the advertiser to anonymously join the interactive marketing session and to earn rewards from the interactive marketing session, the telephonic connection permitting the voice communications between the first party and the advertiser;
upon customer actuation of the reference, the first party connecting a user communications device of the customer to the advertiser using the advertisement and the communications interface for the interactive marketing session over the telephonic connection, wherein the user communication device is separate from the user computer;
the first party monitoring the duration of the voice communications over the telephonic connection provided using the communications interface;
the first party charging a fee according to the price, specified by the advertiser to reward the customer, in response to the telephonic connection for the interactive marketing session being established between the advertiser and the customer via the reference;
the first party rewarding the customer according to the price and the duration of voice communications with the advertiser in the interactive marketing session over the telephonic connection established via the reference;
removing the customer actively participating in the interactive marketing session based on an input from the advertiser, and in response to the input automatically halting provision of rewards to the customer; and
removing the temporary visually actuatable reference in the advertisement automatically when a number of customers participating in the interactive marketing session reaches a maximum number determined by one of the advertiser and the first party to preclude further customers from joining the interactive marketing session.
16. A non-transitory machine-readable storage medium having stored thereon a set of instructions, which when executed by a machine, perform a method comprising:
a first party providing an advertisement server and a communications interface coupled to the advertisement server;
the first party providing an advertisement to a user computer of a customer, via the advertisement server, the advertisement being provided on behalf of an advertiser to advertise an interactive marketing session, the first party different than the advertiser and the customer, the advertisement to include:
a temporary visually actuatable reference to a telephonic connection with the advertiser for the customer to actuate in order to join the interactive marketing session,
an indication of whether the interactive marketing session is currently in process, and
a price to reward the customer for voice communications with the advertiser over the telephonic connection in the interactive marketing session, wherein the price is specified by the advertiser and is based at least in part on a duration of the voice communications monitored by the first party;
the first party registering the customer to allow the customer to use the visually actuatable reference to request the telephonic connection with the advertiser to anonymously join the interactive marketing session and to earn rewards from the interactive marketing session, the telephonic connection permitting the voice communications between the first party and the advertiser;
upon customer actuation of the reference, the first party connecting a user communication device of the customer, via the advertisement provided using the advertisement server, to the advertiser using a communications interface for the interactive marketing session over the telephonic connection, wherein the user communication device is separate from the user computer;
the first party monitoring the duration of the voice communications over the telephonic connection provided using the communications interface;
the first party charging a fee according to the price, specified by the advertiser to reward the customer, in response to the telephonic connection for the interactive marketing session being established between the advertiser and the customer via the reference;
the first party rewarding the customer according to the price and the duration of voice communications with the advertiser in the interactive marketing session over the telephonic connection established via the reference;
removing the customer actively participating in the interactive marketing session based on an input from the advertiser, and in response to the input automatically halting provision of rewards to the customer; and
removing the temporary visually actuatable reference in the advertisement automatically when a number of customers participating in the interactive marketing session reaches a maximum number determined by one of the advertiser and the first party to preclude further customers from joining the interactive marketing session.