US 11,537,644 B2Granted

Method and system for conversational input device with intelligent crowd-sourced options

AssigneeMastercard International Incorporated

InventorsAndrew J. Smith, Saravana Perumal Shanmugam, Adam Kenneth Hosp, Ted P. Sanders, Jr., Michael K. Forbis, Sarala Buradagunta

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Abstract

A method and system are described that provide responses to natural language queries regarding the performance of a business. The method and system provide for crowd-sourced data to determine natural language query suggestions to transmit to a user, based upon previously submitted questions of the user and/or similar merchants to the user. Natural language query suggestions may be provided as utterances to a keyboard of a merchant user. The merchant user may select one or more suggestions provided. The use of natural language queries and responses allows a merchant without a business intelligence background to obtain business insights easily and accurately assess his performance (e.g., against similar merchants, etc.) without personally identifiable or confidential information of other merchants being compromised.

Claims20

Dependent claims

A method of providing intelligent natural language query suggestions comprising:

storing, in a user database, user data entries from one or more merchant users, each user data entry comprising at least a user identifier and associated user characteristic data, wherein each user identifier corresponds to a respective merchant identifier;
identifying upon a triggering event, in the user database, a first user data entry from a first user, the triggering event being an opening of a user application by the first user, the opening of the user application including authentication of the first user;
retrieving, from the first user data entry, first user characteristic data, the first user characteristic data being merchant characteristic data;
querying, based upon the first user characteristic data, a query database, wherein the query database stores a plurality of query data entries from the one or more merchant users and the query data entries comprise at least natural language query data and query characteristic data;
identifying, from the plurality of query data entries in the query database, at least one query data entry having characteristic data similar to the first user characteristic data, wherein the at least natural language query data of the at least one query data entry identified in the query database comprises a natural language query received from one or more of a plurality of users, the one or more of the plurality of users being the same and/or different than the first user;
retrieving, the natural language query data associated with the identified at least one query data entry identified in the query database;
and, at least one of:
storing, in a first user suggestion database, at least one natural language query suggestion, the at least one natural language query suggestion being based on the retrieved natural language query data, and
transmitting, to a user device of a user associated with the first user identifier, a notification comprising the at least one natural language query suggestion.

6 more elements

A system for providing intelligent natural language query suggestions comprising:

a user database storing a plurality of user data entries from one or more user merchants, each user data entry comprising at least a user identifier and associated user characteristic data, wherein each user identifier corresponds to a respective merchant identifier;
a query database storing a plurality of query data entries from the one or more merchant users, each query data entry comprising at least natural language query data and query characteristic data;
a processing device configured to:
identify upon a triggering event, in the user database, a first user data entry from a first user, the triggering event being an opening of a user application by the first user, the opening of the user application including authentication of the first user;
retrieve, from the first user data entry, first user characteristic data, the first user characteristic data being merchant characteristic data;
query, based upon the first user characteristic data, the query database,
identify, from the plurality of query data entries stored in the query database, at least one query data entry having characteristic data similar to the first user characteristic data, wherein the at least natural language query data of the at least one query data entry identified in the query database comprises a natural language query received from one or more of a plurality of users, the one or more of the plurality of users being the same and/or different than the first user;
retrieve, the natural language query data associated with the at least one query data entry identified in the query database;
and, at least one of:
store, in a first user suggestion database, at least one natural language query suggestion, the at least one natural language query suggestion being based on the retrieved natural language query data, and
transmit, to a user device of a user associated with the first user identifier, a notification comprising the at least one natural language query suggestion.

8 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.