Claims:We Claim:
1. A notification method in a computer database system comprising:
a. Receiving a notification instruction from an owner associated with a short link stored in the computer database system.
b. The notification instruction specifying a condition type and parameters for the condition type, a notification time, a notification mode and a notification action type for the search listing;
c. By getting response to the received notification instruction from the owner, a software agent to automatically monitor and responding to the notification instruction from the owner
d. The notification being sent at the specified notification time using the specified notification mode and including a suggested corrective action of the specified action type.
2. The notification method of claim I wherein receiving the notification instruction identification information for one or more search listings for which the associated owner or user desires a notification.
3. The notification method of claim 2 wherein receiving the notification method have monitoring conditions specified by the notification instruction-for the upcoming and promotional event listing.
, Description:Technical Field of the Invention
The technical field of the invention is computer system network provides a notification method in a computer database system receiving a notification instruction from an owner associated with an upcoming event and promotional listing stored in the computer database system.
Background of the Invention
The transfer of information over computer networks has become an increasingly important means by which institutions, corporations, and individuals do business. Computer networks have grown over the years from independent and isolated entities established to serve the need of a single group into vast internets which interconnect disparate physical networks and allow them to function as a coordinated system. Currently, the largest computer network in existence is the Internet. The Internet is a worldwide interconnection of computer networks that communicate using a common protocol. Millions of computers, from low end personal computers to high end super computers, are connected to the Internet. The Internet has emerged as a large community of electronically connected users located around the world who readily and regularly exchange 5 significant amounts of information. The Internet continues to serve its original purposes of providing for access to and exchange of information among government agencies, laboratories, and universities for upcoming and promotional event and education. In addition, the Internet has evolved to serve a variety of interests and forums that extend beyond its original goals. In particular, the Internet is rapidly transforming into a global electronic marketplace of goods and services as well as of ideas and information. This transformation of the Internet into a global marketplace was driven in large part by the introduction of an information system known as the World Wide Web ("the web"). The web is a unique distributed database designed to give wide access to a large universe of documents. The database records of the web are in the form of documents known as "pages". These pages reside on web servers and are accessible via the Internet. The web is therefore a vast database of information dispersed across countless individual computer systems that is constantly changing and has no recognizable organization or morphology. Computers connected to the Internet may access the web pages via a program known as a browser, which has a powerful, simple-to-learn graphical user interface. One powerful technique supported by the web browser is known as hyperlinking, which permits web page authors to create links to other web pages which users can then retrieve by using simple point-and-click commands on the web browser. The pages may be constructed in any one of a variety of formatting conventions, such as Hyper Text Mark-up Language (HTML), and may include multimedia information content such as graphics, audio, and moving pictures. Any person with a computer and a connection to the Internet may access any publicly accessible page posted on the web. Thus, a presence on the World Wide Web has the capability to introduce a worldwide base of consumers to businesses, individuals, and institutions seeking to advertise their products and services to potential customers.
Object of the Invention
The object of the present invention is to Systems and Methods for getting Automatic events and promotional notifications by short link
Summary of the Invention
The notification instruction specifying a condition type and parameters for the condition type, a notification time, a notification mode and a notification action type for the upcoming and promotional event listing; in response to the received notification instruction from the owner, establishing a software agent to automatically monitor conditions specified by the notification instruction for the upcoming and promotional event listing; the software agent automatically responding to the notification instruction from the owner by sending a notification to the owner upon detection of a change in the specified condition of the upcoming and promotional event listing, the notification being sent at the specified notification time using the specified notification mode and including a suggested corrective action of the specified action type. Another aspect of the present invention provides a database upcoming and promotional event system comprising: a database of upcoming and promotional event listings, each upcoming and promotional event listing being associated with a respective user or customer, each upcoming and promotional event listing including a upcoming and promotional event term and at least one of a variable cost per click (CPC) and a variable display rank; a upcoming and promotional event engine configured to identify upcoming and promotional event listings matching a upcoming and promotional event query received from a upcoming and promotional eventer, the matching upcoming and promotional event listings being ordered in a upcoming and promotional event result list according to the at least one of the display rank and the bid amount of the matching upcoming and promotional event listings; and a software agent responsive to a condition definition received by the software agent for a specified upcoming and promotional event listing from an user or customer to automatically provide condition update information for the specified upcoming and promotional event listing to the user or customer in response to conditions specified by the user or customer in the condition definition, the software agent further receiving an user or customer action instruction for the specified upcoming and promotional event listing provided by the user or customer in response to the condition update information and automatically adjusting at least one of a cost per click and display rank for the specified upcoming and promotional event listing according to the user or customer action instruction, the display rank for the listing defining position of the upcoming and promotional event listing among upcoming and promotional event results when the upcoming and promotional event listing is referred to a upcoming and promotional eventer in response to a upcoming and promotional event query from the upcoming and promotional eventer, the cost per click being an economic value payable by the owner when the upcoming and promotional event listing is referred to a upcoming and promotional eventer in response to a upcoming and promotional event query from the upcoming and promotional eventer. Another aspect of the present invention provides a notification method in a computer database system comprising: receiving a notification instruction from an owner associated with a upcoming and promotional event listing stored in the computer database system; in response to the received notification instruction from the owner, establishing a software agent to automatically monitor conditions specified by the notification instruction for the upcoming and promotional event listing; and the software agent automatically responding to the notification instruction from the owner by sending a notification to the owner upon detection of a changed condition of the upcoming and promotional event listing by providing one of an active link embedded in the notification, an inactive link in the notification, a response e-mail template, and a response telephone number in the notification to the owner, according to notification mode information specified by the owner, and the software agent automatically adjusting the upcoming and promotional event listing in response to a correction received from the owner, including receiving an action from the owner, extracting action parameters from the action, executing a corrective action based on the extracted action parameters, and, if the correction action was successfully executed, notifying the user or customer.
Brief description of Drawings:
FIGS. 1 are flow diagrams illustrating operation of a system in accordance with the present embodiments.
Detailed Description of Invention:
Figs. 1 are flow diagrams illustrating procedures which may be used to implement an automatic notification functionality to the system described. In accordance with the automatic notification functionality, a user who has one or more associated upcoming and promotional event listings stored in a upcoming and promotional event listings database may specify one or more conditions related to the one or more upcoming and promotional event listings. When a condition becomes true or the automatic notification functionality is otherwise actuated, a notification is sent to the user or customer. The user may respond in any appropriate manner or not respond at all. The automatic notification is an independent feature under the 0 user or customer's control which operates automatically on behalf of the user or customer to advise the user or customer of status information about upcoming and promotional event listings of the user or customer. One embodiment is implemented as a notification method in a computer database system. The method includes receiving a notification instruction from an owner associated with an upcoming and promotional event listing stored in the computer database system. The owner in one embodiment is a user or customer who is associated with a marketplace operator who owns, operates and maintains the computer database system. One embodiment of the method is practiced in conjunction with a database system accessible via the World Wide Web. In this exemplary embodiment, the upcoming and promotional event listing is one stored in the database upcoming and promotional event system and accessible by an upcoming and promotional event engine in response to an upcoming and promotional event query submitted by a third party upcoming and promotional eventer. Information about the upcoming and promotional event listing is presented to the upcoming and promotional eventer along with other upcoming and promotional event results. Factors such as the cost charged to the owner and the display rank of the upcoming and promotional event listing may be controlled by information contained in the notification instruction. The notification instruction may be received at the computer database system in any suitable fashion. In one embodiment, the notification instruction is received when the owner or user or customer accesses a World Wide Web page of the marketplace operator and specifies one or more conditions and associated data states about which the owner should be automatically notified.
The notification method further includes monitoring conditions specified by the notification instruction-for the upcoming and promotional event listing. Exemplary conditions include those specified herein and their equivalents. Exemplary conditions include conditions related to a variable state of the upcoming and promotional event listing such as its associated cost and display rank. Other exemplary conditions include economic conditions such as an account balance of the owner or user or customer with the marketplace operator. The notification method further includes sending a notification to the owner upon detection of a changed condition of the upcoming and promotional event listing. The notification may be communicated in any convenient way or combination of ways. The notification may include built-in information for responding to the notification, so that the condition can be corrected. Another embodiment is implemented as a database upcoming and promotional event system. The database upcoming and promotional event system includes a database of upcoming and promotional event listings associated with user or customers. Each user or customer may initiate and maintain one or more upcoming and promotional event listings. The upcoming and promotional event listings may be upcoming and promotional event to produce upcoming and promotional event results. The database upcoming and promotional event system further includes a processing system which sends a notification to a user or customer when a change condition of a upcoming and promotional event listing of the user or customer has occurred. The change condition may be D specified by the, user or customer or may be a default or other operator-specified condition. In one embodiment, the change condition is identified by the user or customer and threshold values or limits are specified by the user or customer. The state of the condition is preferably automatically tracked or monitored until a change in the condition is detected. Subsequently, a notification is sent to the 5 user or customer to alert of the change or some other action is taken by the system. Another embodiment is implemented as a database upcoming and promotional event system which includes a database of upcoming and promotional event listings. Each upcoming and promotional event listing is associated with a user or customer. The database upcoming and promotional event system further includes an upcoming and promotional event engine. Still further, the database upcoming and promotional event system includes means responsive to condition specifying information from one or more user or customers for providing an indication to a user or customer when a specified condition of one or more upcoming and promotional event listings is satisfied.