Systems and methods to connect people for real time communications
View Patent ↗Methods and apparatuses to present information to sellers/advertisers/advisors for connections to customers for real time communications. One embodiment includes: responsive to a request from a customer, determining a telephonic reference of the customer; presenting to at least one entity an option to be connected to the customer; responsive to a first entity selecting the option, initiating a telephonic connection to the customer using the determined telephonic reference of the customer to provide a telephonic connection between the customer and the first entity; and charging the first entity a fee for a lead to the customer in response to establishing the telephonic connection between the customer and the first entity.
1. A method, comprising:
providing to an entity a user interface, accessible via a network, for creation of an advertisement;
selecting a tracking mechanism to be embedded in the advertisement;
providing a communication reference to the entity for distribution to customers, wherein the communication reference is selected to correspond to the tracking mechanism;
establishing connections for real time communications between the entity and the customers in response to requests made via the communication reference;
presenting a service of the entity to customers on behalf of the entity; and
charging a combination of fees, comprising:
charging the customers a communication fee on behalf of the entity using a process to establish the connections for the service of the entity provided to the customers over the connections;
charging the entity a first fee according to what the entity charges a customer for the service provided over a connection established between the customer and the entity; and
charging the entity a second fee according to a bid price specified by the entity in response to a determination that the presenting of the service of the entity on behalf of the entity leads to the customer.
2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the first fee is a predetermined percent of what the entity charges the customer for the service of the entity.
3. The method of claim 2 , wherein the first fee is based on a time duration of real time communications over the connection between the entity and the customer.
4. The method of claim 2 , further comprising:
determining the second fee based on the bid price specified by the entity and a bid price of a competitor of the entity.
5. The method of claim 2 , wherein both the first fee and the second fee are based on a time duration of real time communications over the connection between the entity and the customer.
6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the communication reference comprises a telephonic reference; and the method further comprises:
monitoring the connection to determine a duration of a telephonic conversation related to the service to charge the customer on behalf of the entity.
7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the communication reference comprises a link selectable to request a connection server to call back the customer for the connection between the customer and the entity.
8. The method of claim 7 , further comprising:
responsive to the link being selected, determining whether the link is embedded in a presentation of the service of the entity provided on behalf of the entity to determine whether to charge the entity the second fee.
9. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
providing a separate communication reference in a presentation of the service of the entity provided on behalf of the entity; and
determining whether to charge the entity the second fee based on whether the customer is connected to the entity via the separate communication reference.
10. The method of claim 9 , wherein the separate communication reference comprises one of a telephone number of a connection server without an extension, a telephone number of a connection server with an extension, a session initiation protocol uniform resource identifier, a Voice over Internet Protocol user identifier, and a user identifier in an instant messaging network.
11. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
establishing a first connection with the customer via the communication reference;
establishing a second connection with the entity; and
bridging the first and second connections to connect the customer and the entity for real time communications.
12. The method of claim 11 , further comprising:
prompting the customer over the first connection to receive an input from the customer; and
determining whether the presenting of the service of the entity leads to the customer based on the input from the customer.
13. The method of claim 12 , further comprising:
prompting the customer over the first connection to receive an identifier assigned to the entity; and
determining a communication reference of the entity based on the identifier to establish the second connection.
14. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
determining an identifier of the customer; and
determining, based on the identifier of the customer, whether the customer is a new customer led to the entity within a predetermined period of time via the presenting of the service of the entity.
15. The method of claim 14 , wherein the identifier of the customer comprises one of a telephone number of the customer, an email address of the customer, an Internet address of the customer, and a member account of the customer.
16. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
responsive to a request for information from the customer, selecting, based at least in part on the bid price specified by the entity, a listing of the entity for the presenting of the service of the entity to the customer.
17. The method of claim 16 , wherein the selecting of the listing is further based on a rating determined based on feedback from prior customers of the entity.
18. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
responsive to a request for information from the customer, sorting a plurality of listings, including a listing of entity, based at least in part on bid prices of the listings for presentation to the customer.
19. A tangible non-transitory machine readable media embodying instructions, the instructions causing a machine to perform a method, the method comprising:
providing to an entity a user interface, accessible via a network, for creation of an advertisement;
selecting a tracking mechanism to be embedded in the advertisement;
providing a communication reference to the entity for distribution to customers, wherein the communication reference is selected to correspond to the tracking mechanism;
establishing connections for real time communications between the entity and the customers in response to requests made via the communication reference;
presenting a service of the entity to customers on behalf of the entity; and
charging a combination of fees, comprising:
charging the customers a communication fee on behalf of the entity using a process to establish the connections for the service of the entity provided to the customers over the connections;
charging the entity a first fee according to what the entity charges a customer for the service provided over a connection established between the customer and the entity; and
charging the entity a second fee according to a bid price specified by the entity in response to a determination that the presenting of the service of the entity on behalf of the entity leads to the customer.
20. A system, comprising:
means for providing to an entity a user interface, accessible via a network, for creation of an advertisement;
means for selecting a tracking mechanism to be embedded in the advertisement;
means for providing a communication reference to the entity for distribution to customers, wherein the communication reference is selected to correspond to the tracking mechanism;
means for establishing connections for real time communications between the entity and the customers in response to requests made via the communication reference;
means for presenting a service of the entity to customers on behalf of the entity;
means for charging a combination of fees, comprising:
means for charging the customers a communication fee on behalf of the entity using a process to establish the connections for the service of the entity provided to the customers over the connections;
means for charging the entity a first fee according to what the entity charges a customer for the service provided over a connection established between the customer and the entity; and
means for charging the entity a second fee according to a bid price specified by the entity in response to a determination that the presenting of the service of the entity on behalf of the entity leads to the customer.