System and method for dynamic price setting and facilitation of commercial transactions

Abstract

The present invention provides methods and systems for defining commercial transaction components; defining rules for mapping customer transactions into individual components; market segmentation in light of these individual definitions and bundling individual components of an offer into optimized packages for presentation and sale. A data processing system in accordance with one embodiment of the present invention, examines the commercial behavior of enrolled customers, breaks each of the constituent transactions into purchases of atom-level components; catalogues those components; extracts demographic information from said transactions and other sources; facilitates demographic studies of groups of such customers; optimizes offerings to such groups; and facilitates the consummation of those offers of sale. The processing system may also facilitate customers fiscal management through the communication of data necessary to practice the instant invention.

Description

RELATED APPLICATIONS[0001]The present application claims the benefit of priority to U.S. Provisional Patent Applications Ser. Nos. 60 / 249,232 filed Nov. 14, 2000 and 60 / 249,920 filed Nov. 15, 2000, and U.S. Utility patent application Ser. No. 09 / 714,853 filed Nov. 15, 2000 which are assigned to the assignee of the present patent application and incorporated herein by reference.FIELD OF THE INVENTION[0002]This invention relates generally to a method and system for more efficiently matching desired goods and services and offer terms for those goods and services to willing consumers to facilitate commercial transactions.BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION[0003]Traditional Marketing[0004]The marketing of goods and services to consumers has always been more art than science, and the science aspect has been rather inexact. The inexactness of the science derives primarily from the fact that vendors are unable to obtain, at least without prohibitive cost, sufficiently accurate information concernin...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

[0059]Towards that same end, the system allows the vendor to construct a bundle of goods or services in a manner to assure greater market economies. For instance, should a vendor elect to sacrifice margin in order to secure market share, that vendor can project market penetration with greater accuracy with the assistance of the DPS data engine. In light of the projection, the vendor can continue to optimize the offer, without risk, in order to assure greatest effect.

[0060]A second incentive exists for optimizing offers. The system allows increased consumer mobility. By facilitating the consumer's immediate and automatic move from one periodic provider of goods or services to another, the vendor that does not change to meet the desires of the market risks nearly immediate market isolation. Thus, the system envisions a very mobile market.

[0061]The mobility of the market is maximized if the transaction cost, especially search cost, for moving from one vendor to another is minimized. To accomplish this capability, the system is designed to allow the customer to define the factors for optimization and then to back away from the system. This “set and forget” mode allows the system to optimize in the background, with no transaction costs in terms of consumer time or effort spent in shopping for periodic p

Problems solved by technology

The marketing of goods and services to consumers has always been more art than science, and the science aspect has been rather inexact.

The inexactness of the science derives primarily from the fact that vendors are unable to obtain, at least without prohibitive cost, sufficiently accurate information concerning consumer's actual preferences, either individually, or in the aggregate.

The vendor's strategy for ascertaining aggregated consumer preference data is, presently, to concentrate on segments of the consumer market, but they are only able to isolate or define these segments at a prohibitively high cost.

Generally, the factors the vendor selects to define a market segment are based upon demographic data which is costly to compile.

In practice, these assumptions generally prove to be reliable enough to justify the cost of the survey, but all too often, just barely justified.

Knowing, for instance, that most members of a constructed demographic group, (or “market segment”) report the purchase of a particular product will not justify a vendor in presuming the same purchase by each member of that group.

If either the model is flawed or the group's behavior does not accurately reflect the market place, the resulting impressions of the marketplace are misleading.

Even once they have targeted an audience; vendors then must spend a tremendous amount of money to deploy the marketing plan.

For example, if a bicycle manufacturer has learned that 25-45 year old, college educated, white males are more likely to buy mountain bikes costing over $900 than any

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