{
  "patent_number": "US 10204358",
  "country": "US",
  "title": "How Referral-Based Text Message Marketing Systems Work",
  "original_title": "Systems and methods for text message alerts and referrals",
  "summary": "A system that tracks web browsing to send personalized text message offers to users, incentivizing them to share those offers with friends to grow a subscriber database.",
  "what_it_does": "This patent describes a software system that manages text message marketing campaigns by linking user activity to referral incentives. It uses a web beacon to track a user's browser activity and then generates a personalized text message containing an offer to subscribe to alerts. This message is designed to be forwarded by the original recipient to others. When the new recipient clicks a hyperlink in the forwarded message, the system registers them as a new subscriber and links that referral back to the original user, often triggering a reward for the referrer.",
  "what_it_does_not_cover": [
    "Does not cover general text messaging systems that lack a referral or reward tracking mechanism.",
    "Does not cover physical mail or email-based referral systems.",
    "Does not cover systems that do not use web beacons to personalize the initial message content.",
    "Does not cover peer-to-peer messaging that occurs without a centralized subscriber database or automated offer generation."
  ],
  "filed": "2014-01-28",
  "granted": "2019-02-12",
  "expires": null,
  "status": "active",
  "holder": "Zeta Global Corp",
  "holder_url": "https://patentbrief.org/company/zeta-global-corp",
  "inventors": [
    {
      "name": "George Vincent Friborg, JR.",
      "url": "https://patentbrief.org/inventor/george-vincent-friborg-jr"
    }
  ],
  "times_cited": 3,
  "tags": [
    "consumer_electronics",
    "software",
    "ecommerce"
  ],
  "abstract": "A system comprising a computer-readable storage medium storing at least one program, and a computer-implemented method for referring contacts to receive text message alerts. An accounts module receives first user data including an indicator that a first user requested to subscribe to receive text messages alerts. The account module adds, based at least on the received first user data, a first user account to a database of subscribers. A message generator module generates, using the processor in response to receiving the first user data, a first text message corresponding to an offer to subscribe to receive text message alerts. A communication module transmits to the first user the first text message corresponding to the offer to subscribe to receive text message alerts. The transmitted first text message can be forwarded to a second user.",
  "url": "https://patentbrief.org/patent/us/10204358/shopify-payments",
  "markdown_url": "https://patentbrief.org/patent/us/10204358/shopify-payments/md",
  "google_patents_url": "https://patents.google.com/patent/US10204358",
  "relatedPatents": []
}