Patent Application
20090234716
1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to the field of computer programming and is more particularly, but not by way of limitation, directed toward a method of monetizing online personalized beauty product selections by a computer user.
2. Description of the Related Art
The old adage is true—you never get a second chance to make a first impression. Americans particularly seem to love to improve and reinvent themselves. Cosmetics, personal care products, clothing and accessories and personal improvement services are marketed to women and men of all ages for the purpose of creating, varying or maintaining an image. The personal product and personal care industry, which includes such diverse products and services as cosmetics, hair, skin and nail care products, cosmetic surgery providers, supplement manufacturers, drugs, programs and devices for losing weight, erasing wrinkles, acne treatment, removing cellulite, easing tired muscles and otherwise improving health and appearance, among other examples, is a multi-billion dollar industry in the United States alone.
While in the past “makeovers” occurred in the privacy of a consultant's shop or in the makeup chair at a department store's beauty section, today's imaging technology enables “virtual makeover” programs to be accessible to all in the privacy of their own homes. Internet consumers are particularly attuned to the need to present a “best face” to the world, as the existing online virtual makeover websites demonstrate. However, these websites fail to monetize fully the potential of advertising and marketing to online virtual makeover users.
Some existing makeover websites provide users with a gallery of model images, others also offer users the opportunity to upload a photograph, edit and save edited images, and apply brand name cosmetics and designer hairstyles to an image. Some makeover websites charge a monthly fee for access to their library of products and styles, such as TheHairStyler.com. All these websites monetize their services by providing traditional Internet advertising models including banner ads, pop-up advertising, and search engine placement ads such as Google® AdWords® placements. While some ads on the sites are at least somewhat context sensitive, such as ads targeted at women or ads for make-up, none of these prior art websites provide the technology to create a platform for a finely targeted advertising campaign using information that can be derived from the users of virtual makeover websites.
What would be preferred is a method of monetizing online virtual makeover websites using technology to create new advertising models that could creatively combine new and older advertising technologies to allow low cost expansion in a results driven environment. A flexible online advertising program would allow for quick expansion to multiple websites, easily increase bid rates, and allow for easy alteration of premier page placements. Such an approach would be an advancement because it would allow the advertiser to abandon a failed approach and retool the campaign at a lower cost than in traditional marketing. Presently, an online advertising campaign might begin by placing an ad on comparison-shopping search engine feeds, and/or using low bid keywords for paid search sponsored listings to test an advertisement. If the ad succeeds, it may be improved by the addition of sound, flash animation and other newer techniques, and eventually moved to placements that are more expensive. Tools such as content-sensitive placement engines can be applied for slightly higher cost to better place ads in front of the right consumers. However, no technology presently exists to offer vendors of cosmetic and personal care products and services, for example, the ability to tailor advertising placements for particular color or variety of a product or service directly to a consumer, with for example, a given facial type, coloring, or facial feature.
While most virtual makeover websites provide advertising space on the pages of the website or in popup advertisements, these advertisements are not targeted to the particular consumer through computational analysis of the facial features or other visual criteria of an uploaded photograph to better identify key market demographics for an individualized consumer. It would be desirable to provide an advertising method that combines traditional Internet advertising techniques with advanced technology to better target advertisements to consumers based on, for example, demographics as determined by image analysis of a photograph of the user, such as, for example, the user's facial type, approximate age, hair type, or presence of blemishes. Because of the limitations discussed above in the prior virtual makeover websites, there is a need for a method of better monetizing online makeover websites.
The invention is directed generally toward a plurality of methods for monetizing online personalized beauty product selections utilizing a technology for content-targeted Internet advertising on a virtual makeover website. Traditional content-sensitive advertising simply selects ads for display that are related to a keyword that appears on a web page. Content-targeted advertising, on the other hand, generates more awareness and clicks because the products being advertised are directly relevant to the theme or content of a webpage.
One or more embodiments of the invention may take the form of a computer program or programs accessible, by example but not by way of limitation, via the Internet and/or the World Wide Web using, for example, a traditional web browser program, other software program, or device capable of viewing a website or similar type of static and/or dynamic document. Various embodiments may be created as a single computer program or multiple computer programs, scripts, object, modules or the like executing and communicating on one or more servers or computers in a manner well understood by those of ordinary skill in the art, and thus not detailed herein so as to avoid obscuring the invention. As used herein, then, the term “the program” or “the computer program” may refer to one or more embodiments of the invention, but is not intended to be limiting as to a particular form of a given embodiment. Further, it is within the scope of the invention that a user of the program described herein may access the program through a computer with a web browser, a mobile web device, personal data assistant, a virtual terminal, kiosk, application program installed on a particular computer, through a framed interface using one or more servers, or through any similar access device or method or mechanism known to Internet users, but referred to herein as a “browser” not by way of limitation but for simplicity of description.
Further, the computer program or programs referred to herein may perform transformations (“editing”) of images such as photographic representations of people, artistic renderings of people, or other types of representations of people known to those in the graphic and photographic arts. Images, captured in digital format or later digitized, subject to the present invention may contain a representation of a single person, or in some embodiments that of more than one person. The virtual makeover computer program described herein may also transform “avatars” (representations of players in a virtual world) or other objects in a digital or digitized image. Some images subject to the present invention's method may therefore be of animals or fantasy creatures or any image subject to improvement by the addition of color. Not all embodiments of the program described herein may perform recommendations for non-human or non-photographic subjects, as such is not required by the methods herein.
Virtual makeover websites may provide free “makeover” editing, image storage, and image sharing functions to create “cyber stickiness,” a term used to describe a website whose design encourages users to return time and again in the subject website. Advertisers prefer websites with cyber stickiness, because visitors will view more ads and be exposed to ads for a longer time. One or more methods of the program may allow, for example, co-branding by cosmetic companies whose products are offered for use in the makeover editor. The term “editor” is used herein as a noun, in a colloquial sense to describe a computer software program, module, function or other software embodiment programmed to allow a user to alter the appearance of a digital image. A “makeover editor” may then be understood to allow a user to makeover (or “edit”) an image of a user to have a different, hopefully more attractive, appearance. Thus, a makeover editing session will virtually simulate a real-world makeover session. A real-world makeover session, in that sense, might include anything in the colloquial understanding of the term such as the application of cosmetics, accessories, plastic or cosmetic surgery, dental surgery, or other similar methods for altering the appearance of a subject. Cosmetic manufacturers may have product data such as logos, color palettes, product names, product pictures, and product descriptions of their products, for example, they wish advertised only to a particular user demographic determined by facial features, personal characteristics and/or personal profile (called herein collectively, a “user's personal features.”)
The program described herein may perform an analysis of a user's personal features that may include a computed analysis of an uploaded photograph, digital image, line drawing, cartoon, painting or other representation (“portrait”) of a user, person, character, virtual entity or other image for makeover. Such an analysis may include details, when available, such as face shape, facial features shape and placement (such as eye shape and location, nose shape, lip size, chin shape and other distinct facial features.) Such an analysis may also identify a user among a like-group based on other personal features such as perceived age, hair, skin and other aspects of the portrait, herein after referred to as a “personal profile,” may be discernible from a portrait or may be obtained from data input by the user direct to the program. Product data may thus be displayed to the user for an extensive period of time while the user enjoys the use of the makeover program. The makeover image editor of the program may even record which products the user tries in the editor, and use that information to effect the selection and placement of related banner advertising on the makeover website.
It will be understood by those of skill in the art that the information gained from a makeover program may be used to select advertisements for the user when visiting websites other than those of the program itself. For example, if the data gleaned from the makeover program indicates that the user has blue eyes, that information may be used to queue up advertisements directed at people with blue eyes when the same user visits a different website.
The combination of cyber stickiness and the opportunity for co-branding makes virtual makeover websites desirable platforms for advertisement of personal products such as cosmetics, accessories, clothing, and other personal care products and services. In one or more embodiments of the program, image processing technology makes it possible to computationally analyze a portrait for facial features and personal characteristics in order to categorize a user of a virtual makeover editor for various marketing criteria such as a personal color profile type from which recommended products will be selected for presentation to the user as a color/product palette for the virtual makeover, based on the user's personal features.
In one or more embodiments, an auction of co-branding opportunities for cosmetic manufacturers and other vendors based on any of a user's personal features, broken down by product type, is also in keeping with the spirit of the program. Products recommended to the user may change for a given product type, depending, for example, on the color of the product selected from the presented palette, the user's personal features, a personal color profile, or other similar basis as determined by the program disclosed herein.
One or more embodiments may enhance monetizing of an online virtual makeover website by providing an advertising auction system related to particular facial features of a portrait. Using this method, the program provides a method of selecting preferred on-page advertising placements for auction for specialty targeted leaderboard, sky scraper and other on-page advertisements to be selected by bidder rank depending in part on various bid categories, such as for example the profile group and/or personal color profile type of the portrait. This is a hybrid advertising model that uses sophisticated image analysis software to separate consumers into more refined groups for traditional advertisement placement bidding. For example, hair color manufacturers may wish to advertise a particular hair-coloring product only to users with gray hair. Or a particular color of eye shadow may be perfect for consumers with blue eyes. Alternatively, a dermatologist may wish to advertise services to consumers with drooping eyelids, weak chins or sagging jowls. All these advertisers can achieve their target audience by using facial feature auction ad placement. Any facial feature that can be identified by the software algorithms may be employed to provide a sophisticated content-targeting basis for bidding for advertisement placement.
In one or more embodiments of the program, the advertising model may be an improvement over the prior art because it both allows a finer granularity to bidding based on facial features in a portrait discerned from image interpretation instead of keyword bidding, and also because it may generate more revenue for the website sponsor (in this case, the virtual makeover website operator) by charging more for advertising placement when the desired user's personal features are present in the current portrait, even if the user does not click on the sponsored link.
One or more embodiments the program may offer the user the opportunity to translate the “look” they have created in the makeover editor into different lighting conditions, and automatically select alternative products that will produce the same look, for example, under the alternate lighting conditions. The additional products may then be added to the user's shopping cart with a single click of the mouse, for example, enhancing the monetization of the makeover program. The terms “look” and “makeover” are used together herein as nouns, in a colloquial sense to describe a person's overall style, appearance and conformance to societal norms. As such, giving a subject's image a “makeover” may also include providing a digital image editor for directly editing the portrait to give the subject a new look. This feature would correspond to a real world effort to, for example, pluck eyebrows, change hair color, or don a wig. Creating a new look may also include changes beyond makeup and hairstyles, such as adding or removing accessories such as color contact lens, eyeglasses, or hats. In some instances changing accessories alone may create a new look.
In one or more embodiments of the program, a user may upload a portrait of a friend, perform a makeover, and purchase the products used to create the new image for shipping to the subject as a gift. In this embodiment, the makeover image may be packaged on or with the gifted cosmetics and/or accessories in a gift box, and/or sent by electronic or other means to the recipient of the gift. Various embodiments may also offer the option of sending the makeover image as part of an electronic gift announcement in advance of or with the delivery of the gifted cosmetics and/or accessories. In one or more additional embodiments, a user may create a look for someone else, either from scratch or by copying a look from a celebrity or other individual, and that look may be “gifted” to a recipient.
One or more embodiments illustrate a method for monetizing an online virtual makeover website utilizing post-sale add on opportunities related to capturing users who would cancel a sale with an offer of less expensive comparable products.
Finally, a “virtual makeover terminal” in Second Life and other virtual reality programs may be provided using all or any of the marketing techniques disclosed herein to allow users to makeover a Second Life avatar. Similarly, a virtual makeover website in the real world Internet may also be used to makeover the appearance of a portable avatar, artistic rendering, or other image of a face that meets the spirit of a portrait as defined herein. Further, makeovers created in a “virtual world” may be gifted to other denizens of the virtual world as a “virtual gift,” or in world makeovers may be gifted or purchased in the same way as makeovers in the real world, as discussed herein. Marketing the real world advertiser's products and systems “in world” through virtual billboards, a virtual salon, virtual department stores and through links to real world information can bring additional customers to the real world virtual makeover website, further increasing monetization thereof.
The above and other aspects, features and advantages of the invention will be more apparent from the following more particular description thereof, presented in conjunction with the following drawings wherein:
The following descriptions of the various embodiments of the invention are exemplary, rather than limiting, and many variations and modifications are within the scope and spirit of the invention. Although numerous specific details are set forth in order to provide a thorough understanding of the program, it will be apparent to one of ordinary skill in the art that embodiments of the invention may be practiced without these specific details. In other instances, well-known features have not been described in detail in order to avoid unnecessarily obscuring the program. The preferred embodiments of the inventions are described herein in the figures, Detailed Description, and Claims. Unless specifically noted, it is intended that the words and phrases in the specification and claims be given the ordinary and accustomed meaning as understood by those of ordinary skill in the applicable art or arts. If any other meaning is intended, the specification will specifically state that a special meaning is being applied to a word or phrase.
While the various exemplars of the invention may be described herein in terms of an online personalized beauty product selection website, one or more embodiments of the invention may not be so limited. One of ordinary skill in the art of marketing will recognize that the techniques described herein may be applied to other types of applications, as well as to other platforms. For example, the application described could be expanded by one of ordinary skill in the art to include body makeovers, fashion makeovers, home makeovers or other types of applications where the user is offered options to alter or improve an image. Similarly, various alternative platforms may host the subject application of the herein described marketing methods, including but not limited to such platforms as kiosks, private enterprise networks, VPNs, WANs, mobile phones, video music players, PDAs, game consoles, handheld gaming devices, and other electronic devices.
One or more embodiments of the invention described hereafter are directed toward a method of monetizing online personalized beauty product selections. This application relies in part on the novel programming algorithms and user interface elements disclosed in two copending U.S. Patent applications filed on the same day by the same inventors and owned by the same assignee. These applications are entitled “SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR CREATING AND SHARING PERSONALIZED VIRTUAL MAKEOVERS,” Ser. No. ______, hereinafter known as the “Personalized Makeovers co-pending patent application” and “GRAPHICAL USER INTERFACE FOR SELECTION OF OPTIONS FROM OPTION GROUPS AND METHODS RELATING TO SAME,” Ser. No. ______, hereinafter, “the Graphical User Interface (GUI)” co-pending patent application. These patent applications are hereby incorporated by reference into this specification.
The program provides a plurality of methods for monetizing online personalized beauty product selections utilizing an improved technology for content-targeted Internet advertising on a virtual makeover website. A more common “content-sensitive” or “keyword” advertising approach is well known in the industry and is exemplified by Google's® AdSense® program. A webmaster may insert a java script from Google® into a webpage. Each time the page is accessed the java script pulls advertisements from Google's® AdSense® engine that match keywords found on the webpage by Google's® advertisement placement software engine and displays the ads on the webpage. These ads are typically small text items of 10-20 words, and are often referred to as “sponsored links.” Because the ads are selected by Google® based on keywords found in content on the webpage, the ads are said to be “content-sensitive.” If a user clicks on an advertisement served from Google the user is redirected to the advertisers' website and the website serving the ad earns a portion of the money that the advertiser is paying Google® for the referral or click. This final aspect of the model is often referred to as “pay-per-click” (PPC) advertising.
Content-sensitive advertising uses very broad-brush techniques such as searching a webpage for metatags and/or keywords to select ads to place on a website. Thus, in a simplified example, an ad bidding for the keyword “makeover” might end up on a virtual makeover website, or on a website about the “Extreme Makeover Home Edition”® TV show.
Content-targeted advertising, on the other hand, generates more awareness and clicks because the products being advertised are directly relevant to the theme or content of a webpage, not just a metatag or keyword. Under this model, cosmetic advertisers placing content-sensitive ads for BOTOX® would specifically bid that it appear on a virtual makeover websites—perhaps as large leaderboards (banner ads typically 728×90 pixels) or skyscrapers (vertical banners usually around 120×600 pixels), for example. However, there is no way to know if the advertisement for BOTOX® in this context is being shown to a 20 year-old or a 70 year-old woman. Is the top bidder for today's home page leaderboard an ad for BOTOX® or mascara? The 20 year-old is unlikely to click on the former, but may be willing eyeballs for the later. Content-targeted advertising gathers data from multiple sources to place advertisements on the right page in front of the right user.
The program may allow advertisers to place advanced content-targeted advertisements because it may provide data about the user related to more than website context (virtual makeovers) and user profiles (which may be blank or intentionally misleading). By detecting information about the user or subject from the uploaded photograph, an embodiment of the program may provide advertisers information about the user's age, gender, hair color, eye color, and skin tone, among other information described elsewhere herein. Further, the program comprises the concept of correlating the information discerned from image analysis with information provided by the user in profile or other user provided data. Where image processing may detect a user has olive skin, but the user provides information that the skin is “light,” both of these may be used to arrive at an answer that is more accurate than each of the individual data items alone. One or more embodiments of the program may review the user's behavior to determine if the user is examining “night” looks and provide advertisements for night clubs and cocktail dresses, or if a user is trying on curly hair styles, providing advertisements for hair curling devices and products. This information may be used to provide other such more targeted ad selection, improving the monetization of the virtual makeover program.
In broad strokes, the more advanced prior art virtual makeover websites may allow users to upload one or more digital images, usually in exchange for viewing advertisements. Preferred digital images are portrait photographs, particularly “head shots.” A portrait, as used herein, means a headshot photograph, digital image, streaming video image, animation, avatar or artistic rendering or other image of a person's face. The user then uses the graphical user interface of the website to perform a “virtual makeover”—editing the appearance of the image in terms of hairstyle, hair color, makeup, and eye color by selecting generic cosmetic colors or brand name cosmetics and applying them to the image using the technology of the program. Users may then save, print, email, post to a social networking website or otherwise share the edited image with others. Some such websites may then offer to sell the products used in the makeover to the consumer, providing great convenience in allowing the user to obtain the exact brands and colors desired without having to shop extensively to find the precisely desired products. Numerous cosmetic manufacturers operate virtual makeover websites in order to promote their own products. For example, MaryKay.com is one such website. Other virtual makeover websites may be operated by media companies that provide site content in order to sell Internet advertising, as well as companies that sell products from more than one personal care product manufacturer.
Virtual makeover websites may provide free makeover editing, image storage, and image sharing functions to create “cyber stickiness.” Cyber stickiness, the ability to hold the attention of a website visitor and keep them returning to the site over and over, is a trait greatly desired by advertisers. The method of the program allows co-branding by cosmetic companies whose products are offered for use in the makeover editor. Cosmetic manufacturers may have their logos, color schemes and product names displayed to the users for extensive time period, and the use of the products may be recorded to effect the placement of banner advertising on the editor page, home page, check out page, gallery and other pages of the website using traditional cookie and other advertising techniques well known to those of ordinary skill in the art. The combination of cyber stickiness and co-branding makes virtual makeover websites desirable platforms for advertisement of cosmetics and other personal care products and services.
Companies that may be interested in marketing to users of virtual makeover websites are varied, including producers and providers of goods and services as diverse as: lipstick, lip liner, lip gloss, blush, foundation, skin care products such as anti-aging creams and lotions, wrinkle removers, fade cream, acne products, mascara, eye liner, eye shadow, makeup brushes, hair color, hair styling products, shampoo, teeth whitening products, exercise equipment, perfume, and hair dryers, as examples. Accessory manufacturers may also be interested in marketing to users of virtual makeover websites that may allow users to apply their products to makeover images. Examples of accessories that may be available in one or more embodiments of the program include, but are not limited to: eyeglasses, sunglasses, jewelry, hats, scarves, colored and regular contact lenses, tattoos, and piercings. In addition, providers of services, by way of example but not limitation such as: face lifts and implants, dental services, hair styling, weight loss programs, liposuction, tanning services, and portrait studios may be customers for well targeted Internet advertising to particularly identified users. As used herein, the term product class may include any of the products and services listed in this paragraph, as well as similarly related products and services of interest to users of virtual makeover websites.
The novel image processing technology aspect of the program, as described in the Personalized Makeovers and GUI copending applications referenced and incorporated above, makes it possible to computationally analyze a portrait for facial features and personal characteristics in order to categorize a user of a virtual makeover editor for various marketing criteria. For the purposes of this description, facial features encompass a broad range of characteristics that can be identified by image processing technology as applied to a portrait. By way of example, but not limitation, facial features may include detailed physical characteristics such as: face shape, eye shape, eye color, width between eyes, lip thickness, hair type, hair line, hair color, gray hair, droopy eyelids, brow width, nose shape, fat deposits, wrinkles, blotches, freckles, acne, skin tone, skin type (oily, dry, normal), teeth color, teeth alignment, and chin shape, among others. Facial features, as used herein, may also include individual characteristics and demographic classes that can be discerned from image processing, alone or in combination with other information entered into the virtual makeover system by the user such as: gender, race, ethnicity, skin color, age and weight.
For the purposes of this description a personal color profile type may include any aspect of facial similarity to one of any number of models, as supported in the copending Personalized Makeovers patent application, as well as including but not limited to characteristics related to: face shape, skin tone, skin color, skin discolorations, eye placement, eye color, eye shape, nose size and shape, lip placement, lip thickness, lip shape, indications of ethnicity, indications of gender, indications of age, indications of weight, hairline, hair color, and ambient lighting. The algorithms and methods described in the Personalized Makeovers co-pending patent application, incorporated above, support this step in part. Briefly, factors considered by the algorithms include evaluation of skin type, face shape and other similar facial characteristics to determine a personal color profile type. Factors such as hue and saturation, and/or other mathematical evaluations may be used to determine the similarity of the portrait face's personal color profile type to the closest predetermined profile group in order to recommend a preferred color palette for that portrait. For the purposes of the discussion herein, and not by way of limitation, a profile group may include, for example: skin types (oily, dry, normal); hair color (red head, brunette, blonde, dark haired); various ethnic types such as Asian, African American, Caucasian, Hispanic and others; face shape such as oval, heart shaped, round, flat and others; and eye color such as blue eyed. A profile group may be extended into other marketing categories such as, for example: seniors; teens; men; children; overweight; gray haired; wrinkled; and tanned. A preferred color palette for a personal color profile group may be established either by a professional cosmetician or by another expert, or may be established by mathematical computations as described in the previously referenced copending system and method application. Additionally, selection of the elements of a preferred color palette may be based on preferred selections of prior users (popularity) using techniques such as regression, pattern classification or machine learning.
At step 120, the software then may compute or otherwise determine the closest profile group for the portrait in relation to its personal color profile type. At step 125, the program may test to see if the user has selected a preferred manufacturer. If so then at step 140, a list of products for all product types for that manufacturer, for the portrait's corresponding profile group, will be retrieved from a products data store, to be used to constitute the color palettes for the makeover editor. For the purposes of this description, the term product type may include at least makeover products such as: foundation, blush, concealer, lipstick, lip liner, lip gloss, eyeliner, eye shadow, mascara, colored contact lenses, hair color, hairstyle, and facial accessories such as sunglasses, hair clips, hats, henna images and other such products. Processing may then proceed to step 180. If the user has not selected a preferred manufacturer, a list of recommended products for this profile group is retrieved at step 130 and processing may proceed to step 150.
At step 150, the program may consider that certain advertisers may have bid to have their products more highly placed on the preferred product list for this profile group. Products selected for placement in this way will be co-branded with logo, color palette, color identifiers and other brand and product specific information. The user may be able to apply the exact color of the product to the portrait and see the effect under particular lighting conditions. This offers the cosmetic manufacturer a tremendous advantage in terms of advertising opportunity. The system of the program may use bidding systems familiar to those of ordinary skill in Internet advertising to create a bid list for placement on the preferred products list for a given profile group. This system may be as specific as to allow manufactures to bid for some facial types, ethnicities, ages and other characteristics described above using a particular palette, product line, or other brand segment. This approach provides a highly tailored context for advertisers and particularly advertisers of beauty products, accessories and personal care services.
Where an advertiser has a bid for a particular profile group, for example, at step 160, the software may determine the highest bidder for each product type and re-rank the product list so that the highest bidder for each product type for that profile group has its product appear at the top of the recommended products list for a given portrait's determined personal color profile type. The program may select a second or lower ranking bidder's products for presentation as an alternative product in one or more embodiments of the intervention. The program may record the change of ranking to bill the winning bidder at step 170. In some embodiments, the program may select a group of high bidders instead of a single winning bidder, where all bids exceed some predetermined minimum or threshold. In that case, the winning bidders may have their ads presented in an unordered series. Alternative embodiments may use other forms of bid ranking understood to those of ordinary skill in the art.
At step 180, the ranked recommended products list for each product type is presented to the user when the appropriate tab for that product type is selected on the graphical user interface, as detailed in the co-pending GUI patent application referenced above.
In one or more embodiments, auctioning co-branding opportunities for cosmetic manufacturers and others based on profile group, broken down by product type, is also in keeping with the spirit of the program. Products recommended to the user may change for a given product type, depending on the color of the product selected from the presented palette, as further explained in the GUI patent application referenced above.
In a typical Internet auction-based advertising system, advertisers do not pay for the display of their advertisement, usually shown as a small “sponsored link” in a sidebar of the web page. Other systems allow advertisers to bid to place in-page advertisements on portal pages, home pages and other content rich environments. Typically, in auction-based online advertising, if a visitor clicks on an advertisement a browser redirects the user to the associated website, and then the advertiser is billed its “bid price” for the placement. Advertisements that appear without receiving a click, with the exception of some prime placement ads, are generally displayed without cost to the advertiser. Bidding for various placements, typically on key words applied to a search engine or portal, is a dynamic free market system. Some ad placements have minimum bids while others do not. Bidders may monitor, up and lower their bids at will. Sophisticated software is also available to support advertisers in managing their bids and bid prices. As ads may rotate in a given placement on the display page, a bidder does not always have to be the highest bidder to receive traffic from a pay-per-click (PPC) advertisement. Because the ad sponsor also profits when a user clicks an ad, a high bid price for a stagnant ad benefits no one. Alternatively, some systems allow an advertiser to pay for ads based the number of times the ad is shown, such as the common Cost per Thousand-type (a.k.a. CPM) advertisement model. Under this model, a publisher's advertisement inventory may also be sold by auction.
Such an auction-based advertising system is a traditional advertising model for Internet websites. However, the method of the program may provide a hybrid advertising model by using sophisticated image analysis software to separate consumers into more refined groups for advertisement placement bidding. Instead of a traditional bidding system, the program provides a method to allow advertisers to bid for users who have particular facial features. For example, hair color manufacturers may wish to advertise a particular hair coloring product only to users with gray hair. A particular color of eye shadow may be perfect for consumers with blue eyes. Alternatively, a dermatologist may wish to advertise services to consumers with drooping eyelids, weak chins or sagging jowls. Any facial feature that can be identified by the software algorithms of the copending Personalized Makeovers patent application, identified above, may be employed to provide a sophisticated content-targeting basis for bidding for advertisement placement.
In one or more embodiments of the program, the advertising model may be an improvement over the prior art, because it both allows a finer granularity to bidding based on facial features in a portrait discerned from image interpretation instead of keyword bidding, and also because it generates more revenue for the website sponsor (in this case, the virtual makeover website provider) by charging more for ad placement when the desired facial feature or features are present in the current portrait, even if the user does not click on the sponsored link. This method provides added value to the advertiser who is being charged a premium even without PPC traffic to its website, because an ad is being displayed to a key demographic. One or more embodiments of the program may allow the bidder to display a sponsored link, or alternatively to display a full leaderboard or skyscraper ad, or similar in-page graphic advertisement on a rotating basis.
One attractive aspect of Internet marketing is the ease with which shoppers may be enticed to purchase add-on products before completing an online transaction, commonly referred to as “up-selling.” Once a “shopping cart” is reviewed and complete, the shopper can easily be offered additional impulse-type products for purchase, especially when enticed with bonus or bargain pricing or shipping. In the program, up-selling options can be made especially attractive by offering the shopper the option of increasing the value of their time invested in creating the makeover and select the products by offering to “retool” the makeover for additional lighting conditions. Using methods of “color correcting” described in the copending Personalized Makeovers patent application, the program may offer the user the opportunity to translate the look they have created in the makeover editor into different lighting conditions, and automatically select alternative products that will produce the same look for the new conditions.
The program may inform the shopper that certain looks may not translate well into all lighting conditions where a user may appear. For example, a look designed for bright daylight may look washed out under the florescent lights of a business office. An elegant look designed for a date at a dark nightclub or an evening on the Vegas strip will look garish in bright daylight. If the purchaser plans to be seen outdoors in bright sunlight or moonlight, candlelight, or perhaps soft incandescent light of a home, different variations of the makeover may be computed and displayed. Each such display may instruct the user as to alternative products to achieve the look in the altered lighting condition. A single click may add all the products to the user's checkout basket, increasing the total sale of products.
The methods of monetizing an online virtual makeover website described herein may also be extended to encompass gift sales. Two exemplary methods of “gifting” a virtual makeover will be described in this section, though other methods including the monetizing approaches described herein are also in keeping with the spirit of this disclosure.
A makeover using the methods of the program may be performed on any uploaded portrait and does not require that the user be the subject of the portrait. In fact, many virtual makeover websites allow users to makeover portraits of models and celebrities for fun and practice with the tool. This flexibility allows a program in the spirit of the program to permit users to upload portrait of a friend or anyone else and perform a makeover on that portrait.
The program may embody a concept of a “look” as a collection of makeup, hairstyle components, accessories and other makeover items, selected for form a package referred to herein as a “look.” From a marketing perspective, a “look” is a product, sometimes composed of multiple items, which may be thought of in abstract terms. A “look” may be stored, sold, purchased, given away, shared, transmitted, “thrown” (as on Facebook, for example,) applied to other images, posted on a social network or website, sent by instant message, or turned into a new digital image or photograph.
In one or more embodiments of the program, a user may upload a portrait of a friend, perform a makeover, and purchase the products used to create the new image for shipping to the subject as a gift. In one or more embodiments, the makeover image may be packaged on or with the gifted cosmetics and/or accessories in a gift box, and/or sent by electronic or other means to the recipient of the gift. As a further embodiment, a celebrity look may be applied to a portrait, and that look may be “gifted” to a subject.
Other vehicles for gifting a makeover that are well known to those of ordinary skill in the art of Internet marketing may be used to provide this unique service. For example, a user may use Instant Messaging (IM) to gift a makeover. Makeovers may be posted via websites, chat rooms, bulletin boards or any other means of electronic communications that supports communications that may include images or image references or links. Where a gifted makeover is applied to an image other than a person, for example an avatar, or perhaps a cartoon, pet, or other image, the makeover may be considered one or more embodiments of a “virtual makeover.” A virtual makeover may or may not be associated with the same of products to create the makeover.
In an additional or alternate embodiment, a user of a social networking site may use the program to “gift” a makeover to another such user. For the purposes of this description, the website Facebook will be used as an example, but any other similarly enabled social networking site may be used to perform a similar monetization of a virtual makeover website. In the case of a social network member, the member may use a program in the spirit of the program to gift a makeover to a Facebook friend using the gifting mechanism of the Facebook system, and send the actual gift of products to subject of the makeover as described above. The social networking embodiment has the added benefit of the viral marketing of word-of-mouth excitement that can be generated on social networking websites, allowing increased hits and sales on the virtual makeover website.
Users may approach a virtual makeover website as a low risk way to experiment with a new image or look, but with no intention of purchasing anything from the website. Other users may enjoy time spent trying alternative images without the resources to purchase their preferred high-end cosmetic products. When such a user has completed a makeover session, the user may place the cosmetics used in the makeover into a shopping cart just to find out what this “dream makeover” would cost. These dabblers will use the resources of the virtual makeover website, including storage and bandwidth, with no hope for a return on investment.
A method to capture these consumers is needed to provide manufacturers with new customers in the cutthroat cosmetics market. More and more prestige (high-end) brand cosmetic manufacturers have realized the need for diversified marketing channels as sales of products at high-end retail outlets has stagnated in a competitive market. Prestige products are moving to mass retail locations and taking market share from mass brands. Prestige product manufacturers are also repackaging and retooling products into down-market alternative brands to attract the more conservative shopper. Dabblers on a virtual makeover website are prime targets for down-market alternative products. This consumer desires the prestige brand, but will not or cannot pay the price point of the premium brand products.
Other embodiments for post-sale add on opportunities include allowing the user to select a color for a product and then offering a set of choices of similar products that match a user's selected preferences, such as, for example but not by way of limitation: organic products, products developed without animal testing, products for a particular skin type, products from a particular manufacturer, or products in a particular price range. Alternative product selections may also be offered for multiple products at a time, for example in a matrix arranged on criteria and product type and sorted by price.
The marketing method of the program may be used on the Internet in real world websites, and may translate equally well into virtual reality (VR). In VR programs and/or websites, such as Second Life, users create avatars to represent their physical presence as they explore, meet others, conduct commerce and play online. Second Life provides a true international economy, where “Linden Dollars” may be converted to actual legal tender at a floating rate reported world wide in many currencies. A “virtual makeover” terminal, store, kiosk, island or other “location” in Second Life or other VR world may use all or any of the marketing techniques disclosed herein to allow users to makeover an avatar. Avatars may use the virtual makeover location embodiment to apply one or more makeover options presented to the avatar by the virtual makeover location embodiment, including recommended products and gifting of makeovers as discussed elsewhere herein. Similarly, a virtual makeover website in the real world Internet may also be used to makeover the appearance of a portable avatar, artistic rendering, or other image of a face that meets the spirit of a portrait as described herein. Marketing the real world system “in world” in a virtual world through virtual billboards, a virtual salon, virtual department stores and through links to real world information, can bring additional customers to the real world virtual makeover website, further increasing monetization thereof.
Additional embodiments of a program in the spirit of the invention may provide other marketing vehicles for product manufacturers, such as providing a makeover game, where the prize may be sponsored by a particular product brand or advertiser and customized to the winner's personal features. For example, a game prize may include a custom formulated foundation product that a given manufacturer will award to some number of contest winners, where each shade is custom designed for the user. In this way, the program may provide increased monetization by providing additional marketing vehicles that are both a product and a promotional advertisement.
One or more embodiments for monetizing online personalized beauty product selections may include providing advertisers with a customized venue for presenting a product to customer, such as a particular palette of looks created just for a particular cosmetic brand, or a shop-front of looks programmed for a particular hairstylist, for example, which can be provided free of charge, or for a fee, to vendors and service providers who may choose to advertise through the program.
One or more embodiments of the program may evaluate and categorize the looks or styles based on user-specific criteria as described elsewhere herein, and recommend to the user those that are appropriate and preferable based on criteria such as brand or look. The program may then further monetize the makeover opportunity by charging such advertisers for providing this customized additional venue for their advertisements and/or products.
Other embodiments of the program may provide a bidding or recommendation system based on user's color selection independent of correlation to a user's personal features or profile. In one or more embodiments, a user may select a product color and that alone may trigger a product recommendations and/or placement advertising of a winner of an auction for the color alone. For example, a user selecting “Berry Red” lipstick may receive an ad placed by the winner of an auction for “Berry Red.” Thus, the recommendation engine may key off the user's choice of color alone. This embodiment may be implemented irrespective of product line. In one or more embodiments, a matrix or table may be used to where the columns correspond to a product category, such as lipstick, foundation, mascara, and others. The rows of the matrix may be product choices sorted in any user-preferred order, such as decreasing price. In the first column, lipsticks whose colors are close to the selected color are presented in price sorted order. Each cell of such a matrix may have a radio button for the user to select that cell, and only one cell may be selected in each column. In this example, a user may select a cell in each column and the entire makeover may be transformed to utilize the selected products. The user may then choose the most expensive options for similar colors, or the least expensive options or some combination thereof, for example. This and related embodiments may be used to recommend products, as well as to provide opportunities for second chance sales. Those in the art will recognize that these embodiments may provide other options for recommendations or second chance sales where the user may restrict choices, select alternative products, or express product preferences other than color such as, for example, a preferred brand, organic products, products not tested on animals, products for sensitive skin or other criteria known by those in the art.
One or more embodiments of the invention may be implemented in the form of one or more computer programs that when executed in computer memory may cause one or more computer processors to initiate the methods and processes described herein. The files assembled to makeup the software program may be stored on one or more computer-readable medium and retrieved when needed to carry out the programmed methods and processes described herein. Within the scope of a computer-implemented embodiment of the invention, readers should note that one or more embodiments of the invention may comprise computer programs, data and other information further comprising but not limited to: sets of computer instructions, code sequences, configuration information, data and other information in any form, format or language usable by a general purpose computer or other data processing device, such that when such a computer or device contains, is programmed with, or has access to said computer programs, the data and other information transforms said general purpose computer into a machine capable of performing the methods and processes described herein, and specifically such as those described above.
Various embodiments of the invention may be implemented as a method, apparatus, or article of manufacture using standard programming and/or engineering techniques to produce software, firmware, hardware, computer-readable media or any combination thereof. The term “article of manufacture” (or alternatively, “computer program product,”) as used herein is intended to encompass a computer program of any form accessible from any computer-readable device, carrier or media. In addition, the software in which various embodiments are implemented may be accessible through a transmission medium, such as for example, from a server over the network. The article of manufacture in which the program is implemented may also employ transmission media, such as a network transmission line and/or a wireless transmission media. Those skilled in the art will recognize that many modifications may be made to this configuration without departing from the scope of the invention.
A computer-readable medium suitable to provide computer readable instructions and/or computer readable data for the methods and processes described herein may be any type of magnetic, optical, electrical or other storage medium including disk, tape, CD, DVD, flash drive, thumb drive, storage card, distributed storage or any other memory device, location, approach or other storage medium or technique known to those of skill in the art.
In one or more embodiments of the invention, the methods described here may not be limited as to the type of computer it may run upon and may for instance operate on any generalized computer system that has the computational ability to execute the methods described herein and can display the results of the user's choices on one or more display devices. Display devices appropriate for providing interaction with the invention described herein includes, but is not limited to, computer monitors, cell phones, PDAs, televisions, or any other form of computer controllable output display. As used herein, a computer system refers to but is not limited to any type of computing device, including its associated computer software, data, peripheral devices, communications equipment and any required or desired computers that may achieve direct or indirect communication with a primary computing device.
In one or more embodiments of the invention, a general-purpose computer may be utilized to implement one or more aspects of the invention. In one or more embodiments of the invention, the computer may include various input and output means, including but not limited to a keyboard or other textual input devices, a display device such as a monitor or other display screen, and a pointing device and/or user selection indicator such as a mouse, keypad, touch screen, pointing device, or other known input/output devices known to those of skill in the art. The general purpose computer described herein may include one or more banks of random access memory, read only memory, and one or more central processing unit(s). The general purpose computer described herein may also include one or more data storage device(s) such as a hard disk drive, or other computer readable medium discussed above. An operating system that executes within the computer memory may provide an interface between the hardware and software. The operating system may be responsible for managing, coordinating and sharing of the limited resources within the computer. Software programs that run on the computer may be performed by an operating system to provide the program of the invention with access to the resources needed to execute. In other embodiments the program may run stand-alone on the processor to perform the methods described herein.
In one or more embodiments of the invention, the method(s) described herein, when loaded on or executing through or by one or more general purpose computer(s) described above, may transform the general purpose computer(s) into a specially programmed computer able to perform the method or methods described herein. In one or more embodiments of the invention, the computer-readable storage medium(s) encoded with computer program instructions that, when accessed by a computer, may cause the computer to load the program instructions to a memory there accessible, thereby creates a specially programmed computer able to perform the methods described herein as a specially programmed computer.
The specially programmed computer of the invention may also comprise a connection that allows the computer to send and/or receive data through a computer network such as the Internet or other communication network. Mobile computer platforms such as cellular telephones, Personal Desktop Assistants (PDAs), other hand-held computing devices, digital recorders, wearable computing devices, kiosks, set top boxes, games boxes or any other computational device, portable, personal, real or virtual or otherwise, may also qualify as a computer system or part of a computer system capable of executing the methods described herein as a specially programmed computer.
Main memory 606 may provide a computer readable medium for accessing and executed stored data and applications. Display Interface 608 may communicate with Display Unit 610 which may be utilized to display outputs to the user of the specially-programmed computer system. Display Unit 610 may comprise one or more monitors that may visually depict aspects of the computer program to the user. Main Memory 606 and Display Interface 608 may be coupled to Communication Infrastructure 602, which may serve as the interface point to Secondary Memory 612 and Communication Interface 624. Secondary Memory 612 may provide additional memory resources beyond main Memory 606, and may generally function as a storage location for computer programs to be executed by Processor 607. Either fixed or removable computer-readable media may serve as Secondary Memory 612. Secondary Memory 612 may comprise, for example, Hard Disk 614 and Removable Storage Drive 616 that may have an associated Removable Storage Unit 618. There may be multiple sources of Secondary Memory 612 and systems of the invention may be configured as needed to support the data storage requirements of the user and the methods described herein. Secondary Memory 612 may also comprise Interface 620 that serves as an interface point to additional storage such as Removable Storage Unit 622. Numerous types of data storage devices may serve as repositories for data utilized by the specially programmed computer system of the invention. For example, magnetic, optical or magnetic-optical storage systems, or any other available mass storage technology that provides a repository for digital information may be used.
Communication Interface 624 may be coupled to Communication Infrastructure 602 and may serve as a conduit for data destined for or received from Communication Path 626. A Network Interface Card (NIC) is an example of the type of device that once coupled to Communication Infrastructure 602 may provide a mechanism for transporting data to Communication Path 626. Computer networks such Local Area Networks (LAN), Wide Area Networks (WAN), Wireless networks, optical networks, distributed networks, the Internet or any combination thereof are some examples of the type of communication paths that may be utilized by the specially program computer system of the invention. Communication Path 626 may comprise any type of telecommunication network or interconnection fabric that can transport data to and from Communication Interface 624.
To facilitate user interaction with the specially programmed computer system of the invention, one or more Human Interface Devices (HID) 630 may be provided. Some examples of HIDs that enable users to input commands or data to the specially programmed computer of the invention may comprise a keyboard, mouse, touch screen devices, microphones or other audio interface devices, motion sensors or the like, as well as any other device able to accept any kind of human input and in turn communicate that input to Processor 607 to trigger one or more responses from the specially programmed computer of the invention are within the scope of the system of the invention.
While
One or more embodiments of the invention are configured to enable the specially programmed computer of the invention to take the input data given and transform it into a computer system that monetizes online personalized beauty product selections by applying one or more of the methods and/or processes of the invention as described herein. Thus the methods described herein are able to transform the raw input data provided to the system of the invention into a resulting output of the system using the specially programmed computer as described. Particularly, the systems and methods described herein transform an image or digital portrait and user selections into sales of personalized beauty products, gifted “looks,” advertising revenue and revised digital images.
It is believed that a method of monetizing online personalized beauty product selections will be understood from the foregoing description, and it will be apparent that various changes may be made in the form, construction and arrangement of the parts without departing from the spirit or scope of the program or sacrificing all of the material advantages, the forms herein above described being merely preferred or exemplary embodiments thereof.
This application claims priority to three U.S. Provisional Patent Applications, all filed on Mar. 17, 2008, and all co-owned by the same assignee. These applications are entitled “SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR CREATING AND SHARING PERSONALIZED VIRTUAL MAKEOVERS,” Ser. No. 61/037,323, “GRAPHICAL USER INTERFACE FOR SELECTION OF OPTIONS FROM OPTION GROUPS AND METHODS RELATING TO SAME,” Ser. No. 61/037,319, and “METHOD OF MONETIZING ONLINE PERSONALIZED BEAUTY PRODUCT SELECTIONS,” Ser. No. 61/037,314, filed 17 Mar. 2008. These provisional patent applications are hereby incorporated by reference in their entirety into this specification.
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 61037323 | Mar 2008 | US | |
| 61037319 | Mar 2008 | US | |
| 61037314 | Mar 2008 | US |
