Patent Application
20200111114
This invention relates to the general field of digital marketing, and more particularly to digital marketing systems which utilize social media.
A long-standing marketing method involves “give-aways” of products and services in order to introduce them to customers and promote follow-up sales to the same customers or to their friends and families. One of the limitations of traditional “give-away” marketing promotions is that they are segregated by brands, so that a customer seeking to participate in a give-away promotion of a particular product or service must visit the websites of each business offering such give-aways. The present invention addresses the unmet need for a centralized digital platform for promotional give-away of products and services.
The present invention is a web-based marketing system which solicits donations of products and services from affiliated businesses and distributes donated items to interested system members on a random selection basis. The system posts on one or more social media platforms for each donated item and also lists it under the relevant categories on a dedicated website which members can browse. Each social media and webpage listing of the donated item has an affiliate link which enables members to purchase more items from the donor business, thereby promoting the products/services of the affiliated businesses. Members can tag web pages of businesses they would like to have affiliated with the system and tag social media friends for referrals to donor businesses and/or specific donated items. For larger donations, the system generates a promotional YouTube video about the donor business. The foregoing summarizes the general design features of the present invention. In the following sections, specific embodiments of the present invention will be described in some detail. These specific embodiments are intended to demonstrate the feasibility of implementing the present invention in accordance with the general design features discussed above. Therefore, the detailed descriptions of these embodiments are offered for illustrative and exemplary purposes only, and they are not intended to limit the scope either of the foregoing summary description or of the claims which follow.
Referring to
On the Donor Page 12, the donor enters its business information and selects a service level associated with a service fee. The basic service fee covers a one-cycle advertising campaign for the promotional give-away on at least one social media platform, which in the exemplary embodiment is Instagram. Other participating social media platforms can include Facebook, Twitter and Snap-Chat. A higher premium service fee covers a multi-cycle advertising campaign on the social media platform(s), as well as a promotional YouTube video, which is linked to the social media ads.
The Donor Page 12 contains a link to a Donations Page 14 on which the Donor can donate one or more give-away items by entering descriptions of the products and/or services. The Donations Page 12 will then generate a link to at least one social media page, which in this example is an Instagram Page 15, on which the Donor can post photos and/or videos of the give-away item(s).
In addition to photos and/or videos of the give-away item(s), the Instagram Page 15 (and other participating social media pages) contains links to the System Home Page 11 and the Donor Business Website 16. The link to the System Home Page 11 enables a viewer of the
Instagram Page 15 to follow the link to the Member Page 13, from he/she can enter the give-away for the item(s) shown on the Instagram Page 15. The link to the Donor Business Website 16 enables the viewer to shop for products and/or services related to those shown on the Instagram Page 15. Where the Donor has signed up for the premium service level 12, the Instagram Page 15 will also contain a link to the YouTube Video 17 that the Donor has posted promoting its products and/or services. From the YouTube Video page 17, there is also a link to the Donor Business Website 16, further enhancing the promotional benefits of the YouTube Video 17.
People become eligible for random-selection for the give-aways by becoming Members through the Member link on the System Home Page 11. On the Member Page 13, a person becomes a Member by signing up and creating an account by providing his/her e-mail, social media handles and friend referrals. Once registered in the system, the Member can follow a link from the Member Page 13 to a Give-Away Page 18, where the Member can browse products and/or services that have been donated and enter for the give-away of specific items. The number of give-aways in which a Member can participate will depend upon the number of friend referrals the Member has provided.
The Give-Away Page 18 also has links to the social media postings for each give-away item—in this example the Instagram Page 15—as well as links to the Donor Business Websites 16. Using an App downloadable from the System Homepage 11, a Member can tag items on Donor and non-Donor websites that the Member would like to have included in the system's give-away products/services.
Although the preferred embodiment of the present invention has been disclosed for illustrative purposes, those skilled in the art will appreciate that many additions, modifications and substitutions are possible, without departing from the scope and spirit of the present invention as defined by the accompanying claims.
