An automated method for identifying for purchase one or more products in digital content, comprising:
- displaying digital content on a display of an electronic display device, the digital content representing at least one product;
- analyzing via one or more processors the digital content to identify the product;
- ascertaining via said one or more processors any product placement data associated with the product;
- communicating electronically, if there is no product placement data associated with the product, data representing the identified product or data corresponding to the product with at least one external server over a computer network, said at least one external server representing a recognition server;
- receiving a recognized product from the recognition server that performs product recognition processing on the communicated data to ascertain the recognized product;
- ascertaining via data from one or more external servers if the recognized product is available for purchase;
- receiving input from a viewer of the digital content to initiate purchase of the recognized product available for purchase.