Back to results
US 7,680,698 B2Granted
Method for selecting a merchant for a trial mode of a referral service
AssigneeCfph, LLC
InventorHoward W. Lutnick
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
Disclosure includes receiving an indication of an order, receiving an indication of a payment for the order, transmitting the indication of the order to a merchant, and allocating at least a merchant portion of the payment to the merchant based, at least in part, on a trial status of the merchant.
Claims26
A method comprising:
- selecting, by a computer system, a merchant for a trail mode of a referral service from a plurality of merchants, in which the selected merchant did not request to be selected;
- enabling, by a processor of the computer system, the trial mode of the referral service for the selected merchant;
- receiving, by the computer system, an indication of a first order for at least one of a good and a service offered by the selected merchant from a remote device of a customer;
- forwarding, by the computer system, the indication of the first order to the selected merchant;
- receiving, by the computer system, an indication of receipt of a payment for the first order;
- determining, in response to receiving the indication of the payment, whether the trial mode for the merchant is enabled;
- and
- allocating, by the computer system, a part of the first payment for the first order to the selected merchant based on whether the trial mode is enabled.
5 more elements
A method comprising:
- providing referral services, by a computer system, to a plurality of merchants;
- selecting, by the computer system, a merchant from the plurality of merchants for a trial mode of a referral service, in which the selected merchant did not request to be selected;
- enabling, by the computer system, the trial mode of the referral service for the selected merchant;
- receiving, by the computer system, an indication of prices of each of a plurality of products offered to walk-in customers of the selected merchant;
- providing, by the computer system, an indication of the prices to at least one remote device;
- receiving, by the computer system, an indication of an order for the at least one product from the at least one remote device;
- forwarding, by the computer system, the indication of the order to the selected merchant;
- receiving, by the computer system, an indication of receipt of the payment for the order;
- determining, by the computer system, whether the trial mode of the selected merchant with the referral service is enabled;
- and
- allocating, by the computer system, a portion of the payment to the selected merchant based, at least in part, on the trial mode of the selected merchant with the referral service.
8 more elements
A method comprising:
- providing a referral service to a first plurality of merchants by a computer system;
- selecting, by the computer system, a merchant from a second plurality of merchants for a free trial of the referral service, in which the selected merchant did not request to be selected;
- enabling, by the computer system, free trial of the referral service for the selected merchant;
- receiving, by the computer system, an indication of an order for at least one product of the selected merchant from a remote device of a customer;
- receiving, by the computer system, an indication of receipt of payment for the order;
- initiating, by the computer system, delivery of the product from the selected merchant to the customer;
- and
- determining, by the computer system, an allocation of the payment for the order between the selected merchant and a provider of the referral service, based, at least in part, on the free trial of the selected merchant with the referral service.
5 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.