Referral tracking

Abstract

A computer system is configured as a referral-tracking system that responds to receipt of a listing from a recruiter by generating an identifier, associating it with that listing, and giving it to the recruiter. If, before the listing is withdrawn, the system thereafter receives from a requester a message offering to forward the listing and incorporating that identifier or another identifier that the system has associated with that listing, it generates a further identifier as a child of the received identifier, associates that further identifier with the listing and the requester, and sends it to the requester. Consequently, if the listing is fulfilled by someone identified to the system as having received a message that incorporated one of those identifiers, the system determines that identifier's ancestors and thereby compute the chain of referring requesters that led to the listing's being fulfilled. It can also compute an appropriate incentive-award distribution to the referring requesters.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.