Generation and contextual presentation of statistical data reflective of user selections from an electronic catalog

• Main Authors: SMITH BRENT, LEE DENNIS, HSU DAVID, HENNE RANDAL, HOLDEN JEFFREY, VADON ERIC
• Format: Patent
• Language: English
• Published: 04.12.2012
• Subjects: CALCULATING; COMPUTING; COUNTING; DATA PROCESSING SYSTEMS OR METHODS, SPECIALLY ADAPTED FORADMINISTRATIVE, COMMERCIAL, FINANCIAL, MANAGERIAL, SUPERVISORYOR FORECASTING PURPOSES; PHYSICS; SYSTEMS OR METHODS SPECIALLY ADAPTED FOR ADMINISTRATIVE,COMMERCIAL, FINANCIAL, MANAGERIAL, SUPERVISORY OR FORECASTINGPURPOSES, NOT OTHERWISE PROVIDED FOR

An electronic catalog system monitors browsing actions of users to generate user activity data. A data mining component analyzes the user activity data to generate conditional probability data that is presented to users contextually to assist users in selecting items from the electronic catalog. The conditional probability data reflects the frequencies with which users that have performed specific actions, such as viewing a particular item, set of items or web page, or conducting a specific search, have thereafter acquired specific items from the catalog. For example, in one embodiment, when a user selects a first item for viewing in the catalog, the user is notified, for at least one second item, of a frequency with which users who have viewed the first item and then made a purchase have acquired the second item.