Merchant Watch List Notification System
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Consumers find it difficult to track and be informed of sale events sponsored by merchants with whom they have an existing business relationship, leading to missed opportunities for both merchants and consumers to benefit from these events.
Innovation Solution
A system and method that utilizes financial transaction data and geographic position data to identify and alert consumers about nearby sale events sponsored by their regularly used merchants, within a defined threshold distance, by analyzing financial data to generate a merchant watch list and combining it with sale event data and location information.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Loss of information
If consumers manually track sale events from multiple merchants, then they can stay informed about sales, but this requires significant time and effort that consumers do not have in their mobile and hectic lives
Solution Approach 1:
The system automatically performs the tracking function without requiring consumer intervention. Financial transaction data is analyzed to identify merchants, sale event data is obtained from sources, geographic position data is monitored, and matched sale events are automatically identified and communicated to consumers. The entire process serves itself rather than requiring manual consumer effort.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces an intermediary system (the notification system with processor) that mediates between consumers and sale event information. This intermediary automatically collects data from multiple sources, processes it, and delivers relevant information to consumers, eliminating the need for consumers to manually track sales across multiple merchants.
2Loss of information
If merchants announce sale events through traditional channels, then they can reach existing customers, but many customers still miss these announcements due to the difficulty of keeping track of multiple merchants' events
Solution Approach 1:
The system automatically identifies and delivers sale event information without requiring consumers to actively seek it out. The processor monitors geographic position data, analyzes financial transaction data to identify merchants, obtains sale event data, and automatically communicates matched events to consumers based on their location and merchant relationships.
Solution Approach 2:
The system performs preliminary analysis of financial transaction data to identify merchants used by the consumer, and pre-establishes the merchant watch list before sale events occur. This preliminary action enables the system to quickly match and notify consumers about relevant sale events without requiring real-time manual processing.
3Measurement precision
If the system analyzes all financial transaction data to identify relevant merchants, then it can provide accurate merchant watch list data, but this increases system complexity and processing requirements
Solution Approach 1:
The system extracts only the necessary information from financial transaction data - specifically identifying merchants and their locations - without processing the entire transaction dataset in detail. The processor extracts merchant identities from transaction records, creates a simplified merchant watch list, and uses this extracted information for matching with sale events, reducing overall processing complexity.
Solution Approach 2:
The system segments the analysis process into distinct stages: first analyzing financial transaction data to identify merchants and create a merchant watch list, then separately analyzing sale event data, and finally matching the two datasets based on geographic proximity. This segmentation reduces the complexity of any single processing step while maintaining overall accuracy.
Data Source
AI summary
Financial data associated with a consumer is obtained and analyzed to generate merchant watch list data associated with consumer. Sale events data is obtained associated with one or more sale events being sponsored by one or more merchants. Geographic position data associated with the consumer is the monitored and obtained. The merchant watch list data, the sale events data, and the geographic position data associated with the consumer, is then analyzed to identify matched sale event data representing sale events being sponsored by one or more merchants identified in the merchant watch list data and having sale event location data indicating a sale event location within a defined threshold distance of the approximate current geographic location of the consumer, and/or an anticipated future geographic location of the consumer. Sale event alert data is then provided to the consumer.