Patent Application
20170330224
The present invention relates to a system and method for providing a viral marketing service, and more particularly, to a system and method for providing a viral marketing service by an advertisement module being generated by a service providing server, providing the generated advertisement module to a user terminal over a wired/wireless network, causing a user to make a valid click on a landing page of an advertiser through the advertisement module, and distributing advertising costs to the user according to rumor reliability calculated based on the valid click.
Along with the recent development of Internet technology over wired/wireless networks, advertisements using Internet media are getting the spotlight from advertisers and users instead of advertisements using voice or video media such as conventional radios or televisions. The advertisements using Internet media can be provided to portable mobile devices as well as personal desktops or notebooks of users. Initial advertisements through Internet media simply showed advertisement pages. However, as systems and programs capable of providing a social network service (SNS) are introduced, viral marketing methods similar to offline methods have become very popular on the basis of such systems and programs.
Viral marketing is a marketing technique that makes Internet users spontaneously promote companies or products through communication media such as emails, messengers, or blogs. Viral marketing is named because it spreads like a computer virus and may be broadly referred to as word-of-mouth marketing.
Viral marketing is different from pre-existing advertisements delivered to consumers in one way in that advertisements are not directly promoted by companies but are delivered by word of mouth of customers. According to viral marketing, Internet users who have viewed products or advertisements of advertisers deliver advertisement content to one another through copying and posting or the like, and thus the products or advertisements naturally become talked about on the Internet. Also, the use of viral marketing has quickly increased in frequency in the current advertisement market because it requires much lower costs than medium advertisements using film such as a pre-existing television show or movie.
Such viral marketing is being further activated in an Internet community through an SNS such as Facebook, Twitter, and KakaoStory or an instant messenger service (IMS) such as KakaoTalk and Line.
Some advertisements using viral marketing may use an incentive approach (a reward or compensation method) in which people are compensated for an action of spreading product information. A conventional compensation system for viral marketing provided through a SNS has a problem in that it is difficult to distribute advertising costs to users on the basis of an accurate compensation criterion because compensation is simply calculated on the basis of data such as the number of clicks or visits of users, and also has another problem in that highly loyal users avoid using the service because it is difficult to distinguish highly loyal users from abusing users.
In order to solve the above-described problems, the present invention is intended to provide a system and method for providing a viral marketing service, the system and method enabling authenticated users to effectively spread viral information to other users and enabling the other users to perform valid activities in a landing page of an advertiser.
The present invention is also intended to provide a system and method for providing a viral marketing service, the system and method capable of recording an order of recommenders, such as a user who participated in viral marketing and a next-level user, to generate a virtual URL, directly performing viral marketing (or word of mouth) on other users through the generated virtual URL, and providing the viral marketing through a social network service (SNS).
The present invention is also intended to provide a system and method for providing a viral marketing service, the system and method capable of using a relative criterion for distribution of advertising costs in consideration of either reliability of a rumor or reliability, spreadability, and influence of the rumor when users who participate in viral marketing perform valid viral marketing activities in a landing page of an advertiser and then spread rumors about the activities to other users.
In order to achieve the above-described objectives, a system for providing a viral marketing service according to the present invention includes an advertisement module generation unit configured to generate an advertisement module, an advertisement module provision unit configured to provide the advertisement module, in which a landing page of an advertiser is included, to a terminal of a 1st user, a user authentication unit configured to authenticate the 1st user, a virtual URL issuing unit configured to issue a virtual URL to the authenticated 1st user, a valid click checking unit configured to check valid clicks from among activities of users (2nd to nth users) to which a rumor is to be spread in the landing page of the advertiser, a storage unit configured to record or store the virtual URL, types of the activities of the users, and data on the activities, a rumor reliability calculation unit configured to calculate rumor reliability of the users by using the types of the activities of the users and the data on the activities, an advertising cost calculation unit configured to calculate an advertising cost distribution proportion through the calculated rumor reliability, and an advertising cost payment unit configured to pay advertising costs to users who trigger the valid clicks according to the advertising cost distribution proportion. Also, a method of providing a viral marketing service according to the present invention includes generating an advertisement module in which a landing page of an advertiser is included and providing the generated advertisement module to a terminal of a 1st user, authenticating the 1st user, issuing a virtual URL to the authenticated 1st user, checking valid clicks from among activities of users (2nd to nth users) to which a rumor is spread in the landing page of the advertiser, recording or storing the virtual URL, types of the activities of the users, and data on the activities in a storage unit, sequentially calculating rumor reliability of the users by using the types of the activities and the data on the activities, calculating an advertising cost distribution proportion through the calculated rumor reliability, and paying advertising costs to users who trigger the valid clicks according to the calculated proportion.
According to an embodiment and a technical spirit of the present invention, since a user who participates in viral marketing receives an advertising cost on a relative and accurate basis according to a marketing participation contribution and an influence thereof in subsequent steps, the user who has received the advertising cost can have high satisfaction in comparison to when other viral marketing is participated in, and thus can actively deliver an advertisement to other users. Also, it is possible to provide an advertiser with a systematic viral marketing service at low cost instead of a pre-existing searching advertisement.
Hereinafter, example embodiments will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings so that they can be easily practiced by those skilled in the art to which the present invention pertains. However, the accompanying drawings are described to facilitate understanding of the present invention, and the present invention may be embodied in many different forms and is not limited to the embodiments set forth herein. Accordingly, the scope of the present invention is not to be construed as being limited to these embodiments.
In the accompanying drawings, portions irrelevant to the description of the present invention will be omitted for clarity. Moreover, like reference numerals refer to like elements throughout.
Referring to
The user terminal 100 is shown as a wireless terminal or a cell phone in the drawings, but is not limited thereto. The user terminal 100 may be any kind of computer or mobile device that is used by a user, and may be any hardware device capable of inputting, searching for, and displaying information through wired/wireless communication. Also, software that drives a device is installed by default, and it is possible to access the service providing server 200 by using such a terminal.
Recently, smartphones are widely used as wireless terminals or cell phones. Accordingly, it is preferable that the user terminal 100 for implementing a function to be described below be a smartphone in which an appropriate application or program is installed.
Next, the service providing server 200 serves to connect the advertiser server 210 and the user terminal 100, receive a member registration in order for an advertiser and a user to provide and consume advertisements, and provide a landing page 701 for an advertisement provided by the advertiser to the user terminal 100 together with an advertisement module.
As shown in
The advertisement module generation unit 201 and the advertisement module provision unit 202 may generate an advertisement module and provide the advertisement module to the user terminal 100 as an entire page or place the advertisement module at a portion of the user terminal 100 as shown in
Here, the advertisement module may include a function needed to provide a viral marketing service of the present invention as well as a landing page desired to be advertised.
The advertisement module generated by the advertisement module generation unit 201 includes the landing page 701 of the advertiser and performs a start rumor function through a start rumor button 702. Here, the start rumor function performs viral marketing in the form of word of mouth and refers to a function that can be used by clicking the start rumor button 702 in the landing page of the advertiser or through a separate menu.
The start rumor function allows an advertisement to be spread to friends of a user in the form of word of mouth in linkage with a social network service (SNS) or an instant messenger service (IMS) or by using a virtual URL, which will be described below.
As described above, the advertisement module may be provided at a portion of the screen of the user terminal in the form of a separate clickable button, bar, or layer surrounding the landing page of the advertiser as well as to the landing page 701 of the advertiser, and may also be embedded and provided with a size or form that cannot be manipulated by a user on the screen of the user terminal 100.
Also, the advertisement module is switched to a start rumor page 800 and displayed on the user terminal 100 as shown in
The start rumor function included in the advertisement module may be used through a clickable button 702 or a menu provided by the advertisement module. The function may be performed in linkage with an SNS or an IMS or through a virtual URL.
Also, the user authentication unit 203 may authenticate a user who wants to perform viral marketing through the advertisement module, and may check a valid activity of a user who participates in viral marketing by authenticating the user. Accordingly, checked data may be used as one piece of reference data for distribution of advertising costs.
Also, the authentication of a user may be performed through two methods. A first method is capable of performing the authentication through a member login after a service providing company is joined as a member, and a second method is capable of authenticating a user who is not a member through a cell phone authentication.
As described above, an element such as a virtual URL is used in the viral marketing service provided by the present invention, and the virtual URL has a structure including three pieces of data such as “arbitrary address value,” “actual URL,” and “user information.”
The “arbitrary address value” is generated when the virtual URL is issued. When the virtual URL is generated as “http://Qping.kr/q/Oy34apP,” “Oy34apP,” which is composed of letters and numbers of the last part of the virtual URL, corresponds to any address value. Also, the “actual URL” corresponds to an actual home page address of the landing page 701 of the advertiser. For example, an actual product homepage address for the Samsung Electronics GALAXY S5 is “http://www.samsung.com/sec/galaxys5,” a URL link of this address is the “actual URL.” Last, the “user information” is various kinds of personal information data of a user who is authenticated using one of the above-described two user authentication methods.
Since an “actual URL” having a long length, such as the address of the GALAXY S5, is not practically suitable to be used in an SNS or a messenger, a virtual URL that includes all data, is short, and is also needed in a viral marketing service is proposed and used. The virtual URL is called a short URL due to a short length, and a tiny URL can be used as the virtual URL.
Such a virtual URL is issued by a user authenticated by the virtual URL issuing unit 204. When 1st and 2nd users authenticated as shown in
As described above, the virtual URL issuing unit 204 has three kinds of data of the virtual URL. When the virtual URL is issued to a corresponding user, the virtual URL is recorded or stored in the storage unit 209 including a database. The stored virtual URL may be used when a layered structure between users is checked later in an advertising cost distribution step and a higher distribution proportion is allocated to a higher-priority user such as the 1st user.
The storage unit 209 including the database mainly has a storage space in the service providing server 200, but may have a storage module or unit outside the server.
Generally, in viral marketing, the 1st user serves to spread an advertisement through a rumor, and 2nd to nth users (n is a number greater than 2) who receive the advertisement start an activity desired by an advertiser.
In this case, as shown in
When any one of the 2nd to nth users clicks a virtual URL sent by the 1st user, the virtual URL provides an advertisement module generated through the advertisement module generation unit 201 to the user who clicked the virtual URL through the advertisement module provision unit 202, and the user who clicked the virtual URL sent by the 1st user starts several activities in the landing page 701 provided by the advertisement module from the advertiser.
The activities include various activities such as an action of clicking the virtual URL to open the landing page 701 of the advertiser, an action of merely staying on the landing page 701, an action of viewing a product or an advertisement copy on the landing page 701, an action of joining the landing page 701, and an action of purchasing a product on the landing page 701. When the advertiser is an app associated company, an activity of downloading an app may also be included.
The valid click checking unit 205 examines the activities, extracts the total number of clicks during activities of the 2nd to nth users, and extracts, as the number of valid clicks, the number of clicks that are thought to be valid among the total number of clicks extracted by the advertiser.
The total number of clicks refers to the sum of the numbers of clicks of the 2nd to nth users who clicked the virtual URL sent by the 1st user to open the landing page 701 of the advertiser, and the number of valid clicks is determined by determining whether the 2nd to nth users stay on the landing page 701 of the advertiser during the activities of the 2nd to nth users in a certain time range and whether the 2nd to nth users performed activities (the above-described product purchase, advertiser landing page member registration, app download, etc.) desired by the advertiser on the landing page 701.
The total number of clicks and the number of valid clicks that are determined in such a way are recorded or stored in the storage unit (i.e., a DB) 209 and then used to calculate reliability.
The 1st user who first starts the rumor delivers the virtual URL issued from the service providing server 200 to the 2nd to nth users to trigger clicks of the 2nd to nth users, extracts the number of valid activities, which are pre-defined, among the triggered clicks through the valid click checking unit 205, and calculates a rumor reliability of the 1st user.
The rumor reliability of the 1st user is obtained by spreading the virtual URL received by the 1st user to users at a subsequent stage (e.g., the 2nd to nth users) through viral marketing or word of mouth and calculating a degree to which the spread word of mouth brings a valid advertisement-associated result for the users at the subsequent stage, and refers to an index or a numerical value for the 1st user, who is the rumor spreader, to check a degree of reliability of the viral marketing or word of mouth while the viral marketing is underway.
The rumor reliability may be calculated and extracted by the rumor reliability calculation unit 206. In this case, the rumor reliability is calculated by using the total number of clicks and the number of valid clicks that are prestored in the storage unit 209. In the case in which the rumor reliability is calculated as shown in
Accordingly, referring to the above-described example, it is preferable that the rumor reliability be defined as “(reliability of rumor)=(number of valid clicks)/(total number of clicks).”
The rumor reliability may be calculated and extracted for each of the users forming a layered structure while the viral marketing is underway. The rumor reliability for each user may be a criterion for classifying the users according to reliability levels. Also, a weight is assigned to each of the reliability levels of the users. In this case, the advertising cost calculation unit 207 calculates advertising costs distributed to the users in consideration of the rumor reliability for each of the users and also the weight for each of the reliability levels.
For example, by assigning a high weight to a user with a high reliability when comparing a user with the rumor reliability of “1” and a user with the rumor reliability of “0.5,” a high advertising cost is allocated to the user with high rumor reliability even when the advertising costs are finally distributed.
The distributed advertising costs are allocated to the users by the advertising cost payment unit 208.
Also, other than the rumor reliability, a “rumor spreadability” index and a “rumor influence” index may be calculated and used through a spreadability calculation unit and an influence calculation unit. “Rumor spreadability” is an index for checking a degree to which a rumor started by a user has spread by extracting the number of rumors started by users who participate in the viral marketing and dividing the extracted number of rumors by the total number of clicks of the 2nd to nth users.
For example, when the 1st user starts a rumor ten times through several SNSs or messengers and the 2nd to nth users who received the rumor from the 1st user click a total of twenty times, the rumor started by the 1st user may have a spreadability of “2.” This means that a total of twenty clicks are triggered by spreading the rumor ten times.
Next, when the 2nd user spreads the rumor twenty times through the SNS or messenger, but the total number of clicks of the 2′nd to n′th users who receive the rumor from the 2nd user is twenty like that described above, the spreadability of the rumor started by the 2nd user is “1.” It can be seen that the 2nd user has a lower actual click triggering degree than the 1st user although the 2nd user spreads the rumor more frequently than the 1st user. That is, it can be seen that the 2nd user has lower contribution than the 1st user in terms of rumor spreadability.
Similar to the above-described rumor reliability, the rumor spreadability of the user may be defined as “(rumor spreadability)=(total number of clicks)/(number of times user starts rumor).”
Here, when both the “rumor reliability” and the “rumor spreadability” are high, an influence on the rumor of the user who spread the rumor is naturally high. The “rumor influence” may be calculated by multiplying the “rumor reliability” by the “rumor spreadability.”
Considering the rumor reliability and rumor spreadability of the 1st and 2nd users in the above-described example, the rumor reliability and rumor spreadability of the 1st user is “1” and “2,” respectively. Thus, it can be seen that the rumor influence of the 1st user is 2 (=1×2) through “(rumor influence)=(rumor reliability)×(rumor spreadability).” On the other hand, the rumor influence of the 2nd user is 0.5 (=0.5×1). Thus, it can be seen through the calculation that the 2nd user is a user having a rumor influence approximately equal to ¼ the rumor influence of the 1st user in the viral marketing.
As a reference, when the equation of rumor influence is obtained using the equation of rumor reliability and the equation of rumor spreadability, the equation of rumor influence can be seen as (rumor influence)=(rumor reliability)×(rumor spreadability)={(number of valid clicks)/(total number of clicks)}×{(total number of clicks)/(number of times user spreads rumor)}=(number of valid clicks)/(number of times user spreads rumor). This equation shows that the valid numbers of clicks of users at the subsequent stage who received the rumor relative to the number of times the user spreads the rumor is equal to the influence to the rumor of the user who has spread the rumor. That is, it can be seen that the definition is mathematically or semantically accurate.
The calculated rumor influence may be extracted for each user like the above-described rumor reliability and written as a list. When a request is made by the advertiser, the list can be read from the service providing server 200 according to the request of the advertiser.
Also, the “rumor spreadability” and the “rumor influence,” as well as to the “rumor reliability,” may be considered when calculating advertising costs. The advertising costs may be distributed and paid to the users by the advertising cost payment unit 208 in consideration of the three indices.
Next, a method in which viral marketing advertisement is performed for a 1st user will be described in detail with reference to
Referring to
The received virtual URL is delivered to 2nd to nth user terminals through an SNS or a messenger service that is accessible by the 1st user terminal 300, and the delivered virtual URL is clicked to allow the 2nd to nth user terminals to receive the advertisement module from the service providing server 200.
Referring to
A history of the layered structure is stored in the aforementioned storage unit 209 in a data schema form of a virtual URL, and all records of previous rumor spreaders are stored in a virtual URL received by the final nth user. The layered structure may be read and used when the advertising costs are calculated.
A virtual URL for the authenticated 1st user is issued (S504), and then the virtual URL is delivered to 2nd to nth users to which a rumor is spread by the user to trigger clicks of the 2nd to nth users. Also, the virtual URL, which includes user layer information, is stored in the storage unit 209.
The number of valid clicks defined as valid activities among the clicks of the 2nd to nth users is checked (S505), and main data such as the above-described total number of clicks and number of valid clicks is stored in the storage unit 209 (S506).
The above-described virtual URL or data such as the total number of clicks and the number of valid clicks is recorded or stored in the storage unit 209 when data is generated, and then read and used when necessary. Accordingly, even when the flowchart does not include a corresponding step, data that needs to be stored may be considered as being immediately stored in the storage unit 209 when generated and as being used later.
Rumor reliability is calculated for each user by using the stored main data (S507). Subsequently, reliability levels of the users are classified according to the rumor reliability, and level weights are assigned to the reliability levels. Advertising costs to be allocated to the users are calculated in consideration of the rumor reliability and the level weights (S508).
Subsequently, the advertising costs are paid to the users according to a calculated advertising cost distribution proportion (S509).
The method of providing a viral marketing service through the service providing server 200 can be carried out by the service providing server 200 through a unit for each step as shown in
A user who participates in the viral marketing through the advertisement list 600 receives an advertisement module including the landing page 701 of an advertiser and a start rumor function as shown in
A simple introduction message to be sent to 2nd to nth users may be written through the switched to start rumor page 800, and a virtual URL is issued to an authenticated user, who is an initial spreader.
In the following description, as described above, the initial spreader selects an SNS or messenger used to spread a rumor, and the 2nd to nth users who received the virtual URL determine whether to spread the rumor or start a valid activity on the landing page 701. The number of valid clicks is extracted from the valid activity. An advertisement distribution proportion is calculated for each user. Then, advertising costs are paid to the users according to the advertisement distribution proportion.
According to the present invention, a touch input for selecting the advertisement list or an input for clicking a button for a start rumor function, selecting an SNS or messenger, and clicking a button for spreading a virtual URL corresponds to an initial input or an intermediate input for passing data to a subsequent step. The touch input or the button click input corresponds to a mechanical input action irrelevant to a decision of a user.
The method of providing a viral marketing service according to an embodiment of the present invention can be implemented in the form of computer-readable program instructions and stored in a computer-readable recording medium. The computer-readable recording medium includes any type of recording device in which data readable by a computer system is stored. The program instructions recorded or stored in the storage medium may be designed and configured specifically for the present invention, or can be publicly known and available to those skilled in the field of software. The computer-readable recording medium can also be distributed over network-coupled computer systems, and computer-readable codes may be stored and executed in a distributed manner. Examples of the program instructions include not only machine codes made by a compiler but also high-level language codes executable by a device for electronically processing information using an interpreter, for example, a computer.
The above exemplary hardware device may be configured to operate as one or more software modules in order to perform the operation of the present invention, and vice versa.
While the present invention has been described with reference to the preferred embodiments, it should be understood by those skilled in the art that various modifications and changes may be made herein without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention as defined by the appended claims. The above embodiments are to be accordingly regarded as illustrative rather than restrictive.
Therefore, all changes or modifications within the appended claims and their equivalents should be construed as being included in the scope of the invention.
| Number | Date | Country | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 10-2014-0184247 | Dec 2014 | KR | national |
| Filing Document | Filing Date | Country | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| PCT/KR2015/000135 | 1/7/2015 | WO | 00 |
