JP2008021202A - Customer information utilization device - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a customer information utilization device for unitarily accumulating and utilizing customer information such as requests and needs from customers acquired through various information transmission paths. <P>SOLUTION: A customer information utilization system 1 capable of providing customer information to browsing terminals 50 though a network 2 is provided with a control part 71 or the like for converting the customer information acquired through a plurality of paths into a predetermined first format at the browsing terminal 50 through the network 2, a customer information DB 22 or EC customer information DB 23 for storing the customer information into the first format converted by the control part 72 or the like, a second format conversion part 31a for acquiring the customer information in the first format from the customer information DB 22 or the EC customer information DB 23 and converting the acquired customer information into a predetermined second format retrievable or browsable by the browsing terminals 50 through the network 2, and a customer information DB 32 for storing the customer information in the second format converted by the second format conversion part 31a. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2008,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention relates to a customer information utilization apparatus for centrally accumulating and utilizing information such as requests and needs from customers acquired through various information transmission paths.

  Customer purchase histories and customer requests and opinions regarding each company and each company's products are extremely useful information for product development and marketing. For this reason, each company has conventionally acquired information from customers through various routes. For example, as an information acquisition route that has been around for a long time, information is acquired through letters and faxes sent from customers, and information is acquired by calling a company call center from customers. In recent years, information has been acquired through e-mail, homepages and community sites developed by companies on the Internet (see, for example, Patent Document 1).

JP 2004-038731 A

  However, in the conventional method of collecting customer information, customer information is acquired through various routes, so the storage location and storage format of customer information are not unified, and the acquired customer information is efficient for corporate activities. It was difficult to utilize. For example, information acquired through letters and faxes is filed as is in the sales department as paper media, and information acquired through the call center is stored in the quality management department as text data of call records created by the operator. Information acquired through homepages and community sites on the Internet is stored as electronic data on the server of the business division, and each piece of information is scattered in different forms in different departments. Therefore, it is difficult to share such information within a company, and there is a problem that information is divided, information is wasted, and information utilization efficiency is low.

  The present invention has been made in order to solve such problems of the prior art, and stores and uses customer information such as requests and needs from customers acquired through various information transmission paths in an integrated manner. It is an object of the present invention to provide a customer information utilization device that can be used.

  In order to solve the above-described problems and achieve the object, the present invention according to claim 1 is a customer information utilization device that can provide customer information to a terminal device via a network. Customer information acquired through a route is converted into a predetermined first format via the network by the terminal device, and the first format converted by the first format conversion unit. First format information storage means for storing the customer information, and the customer information in the first format is acquired from the first format information storage means, and the customer information is retrieved via the network by the terminal device. Second format conversion means for converting to a predetermined second format that is possible or viewable; second format information storage means for storing the customer information of the second format converted by the second format conversion means; Having And features.

  The present invention described in claim 2 is characterized in that, in the present invention described in claim 1, the first format is XML.

  The present invention described in claim 3 is characterized in that, in the present invention described in claim 1 or 2, the second format is RDF.

  According to a fourth aspect of the present invention, in the present invention according to any one of the first to third aspects, the first format conversion means is based on customer information acquired through the plurality of routes. Identifying customer identification information for uniquely identifying the customer who presented each customer information, and storing the identified customer identification information and the customer information in the first format information storage means in association with each other, It is characterized by.

  Further, the present invention described in claim 5 relates to the present invention described in claim 4, wherein the customer specifying information and the customer specifying reference information that can contribute to specify the customer specifying information are associated with each other. And storing the customer identification information storage means, wherein the first format conversion means corresponds to the customer identification reference information when the customer identification reference information is included in the customer information acquired through the plurality of routes. Customer specific information is obtained from the customer specific information storage means.

  Moreover, the present invention according to claim 6 is the present invention according to any one of claims 1 to 5, wherein the first format conversion means specifies the customer information acquisition timing of the customer information. The second format conversion means refers to the acquisition timing specification information stored in the first format information storage means, and stores the first format information storage means in association with the acquisition timing specification information for It is characterized in that the customer information for the predetermined number of items acquired at the latest is acquired at every predetermined time interval and converted into the second format.

  According to the first aspect of the present invention, customer information obtained from various routes is converted into a common first format or second format and stored in a unified manner, whereby the customer information is stored in the terminal device. Can be easily and quickly searched and viewed via the network. Therefore, the acquired customer information can be shared by each department in the company, and the customer information can be used effectively. In particular, by converting customer information into the first format and storing it, the customer information can be browsed via the terminal device, and the readability of the customer information can be improved and its utility value can be improved. In addition, by converting customer information into a second format that can be searched or browsed by the terminal device and storing it, it is possible to easily search for desired customer information even if the customer information is enormous, It is possible to improve the use value by improving the classification and searchability of customer information.

  Further, according to the present invention described in claim 2, by converting customer information into XML, the customer information can be structured into a unified structure with a unique tag, and the readability of the customer information is improved. The utility value can be improved.

  In addition, according to the present invention as set forth in claim 3, by converting customer information into RDF, it is possible to easily obtain formal information of customer information via a network at a terminal device, and to classify customer information. Can improve the utility value and searchability. In particular, since titles and summaries can be easily acquired from customer information and displayed in a list, desired information can be easily specified even when the customer information is enormous.

  Further, according to the present invention as set forth in claim 4, it is possible to identify the customer who sent the customer information by storing the customer identification information and the customer information in association with each other. It is possible to analyze in relation to the customer information and improve the utility value of customer information.

  Further, according to the present invention described in claim 5, by acquiring the customer identification information corresponding to the customer identification reference information, the customer identification information is obtained even when the customer identification information itself is not included in the customer information. It becomes possible to specify.

  According to the present invention as set forth in claim 6, since the customer information for the predetermined number of items acquired at the latest is acquired every predetermined designated time interval and converted into the second format, the second format information storage means Can always store the latest customer information, and can increase the freshness of customer information and improve its utility value.

  The best mode for carrying out a customer information utilization apparatus according to the present invention will be described below in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings. However, the present invention is not limited by this embodiment.

  The customer information utilization system according to the present embodiment is a system that acquires and accumulates customer information and makes it possible to provide this customer information to a terminal device via a network.

(Definition)
In the following, the customer information (customer voice) is the various information that is stored and used by the customer information utilization system, the customer (individual or company) that sends the customer information is the customer, and the customer information utilization system The entity that constructs and operates the system is the “system operator”, the entity that uses the customer information accumulated in the customer information utilization system (mainly a company, for example, a client for the system operator) is the “use company”, and this usage A person who belongs to a company and actually browses customer information is referred to as a “use employee”.

  This customer information utilization system mainly uses the customer information sent by the customer when the customer purchases and uses the product provided by the user company (hereinafter referred to as “product etc.”). It is assumed that it will be used by employees. However, when a customer uses a product provided by a company other than the user company (for example, the user company is a monitoring company that commissions market research and consumer testing of products sold by companies other than the user company) In some cases), and customers may use products provided by the user company free of charge (for example, if the customer is a monitor member of the product of the user company). The mutual relationship with the user company is arbitrary. The customer information includes all information related to products and the like, for example, evaluations, requests, complaints, rumors, purchase histories, or usage histories. Also, customer information is not limited to information sent directly from customers who actually purchased or used products, etc. For example, information sent from this customer may be used in some form by other customers or employees. In the case of seeing and hearing, information transmitted by these other customers and employees may be included.

(System overview)
In this customer information utilization system, customer information acquired through various routes is converted and stored in a predetermined first format via a network, and a summary of customer information in the first format can be easily searched and viewed. It is converted into a predetermined second format and stored. Then, the user employee searches the customer information in the second format through his / her browsing terminal to identify desired customer information, or directly browses the customer information in the first format. , Customer information can be utilized.

  Here, the first format is a format for unifying the format of customer information acquired from each server, and examples thereof include XML (eXtensible Markup Language) and CSV (Comma Separated Values). Here, since customer information can include various information other than standard characters, such as emoticons, it is difficult to distinguish information other than standard characters from CVS separators in the CSV format. Therefore, in the following description, it is assumed that XML is used as the first format. In other words, by using the XML format, various information can be smoothly unified.

  In addition, the second format corresponds to a format in which employees of the first format can easily and quickly search or browse customer information of the first format. In the following, RDF (Resource Description Framework) is used as the second format. explain. In this RDF format, information is composed of three elements: a subject, a predicate, and an object. The subject and the object are nodes, and these are connected by a predicate (arc). Express. As a specific structure, an element indicating the subject and an element indicating the predicate are expressed as a nested XML structure. When an object becomes a subject, it is expressed by a chain model in which this object and another object are connected by a predicate. When the subject has a plurality of predicates, a plurality of predicates are described between the subject and the object. In this RDF format, the relationship between resources such as metadata can be described in a descriptive manner without depending on a specific application, so that the classification and searchability of customer information can be improved.

(System configuration)
Next, the system configuration of the customer information utilization system 1 will be described. FIG. 1 is a configuration diagram conceptually showing the main configuration of the customer information utilization system 1. As shown in FIG. 1, the customer information utilization system 1 is configured by connecting an information acquisition server group 10, a concentrating server 20, and a portal server 30 so that they can communicate with each other as shown. In addition, the customer information utilization system 1 is connected to the information collection device group 40, the user's browsing terminal 50, and the customer's browsing terminal 60 so that they can communicate directly or indirectly via the network 2. Yes.

(System configuration-information acquisition server group 10)
The information acquisition server group 10 is for acquiring customer information from a customer. For example, an intra blog (Weblog, blog) server 70, a customer blog server 80, an EC (Electric Commerce) server 90, a call server 100, an OCR (OCR) Optical Character Reader) server 110 and mail server 120 are included.

  The intra blog server 70 is a blog server for developing an intra blog on the intranet of a user company, and accumulates blog data displayed on the intra blog. The intra blog server 70 includes, for example, a control unit 71 that controls generation of intra blogs and posting of articles, and a blog DB (Date Base) 72 that stores blog data such as articles.

  The customer blog server 80 is a blog server for developing a blog that a customer can participate on the Internet (hereinafter referred to as a “customer blog” to distinguish it from an intra blog), and is displayed on the customer blog. Accumulate blog data. The customer blog server 80 includes, for example, a control unit 81 that controls generation of customer blogs and article posting, and a blog DB 82 that stores blog data such as articles.

  The EC server 90 is a server for developing an EC site for a customer to purchase products and the like of a user company on the Internet, and accumulates information related to a purchase history of products etc. made through the EC site. . The EC server 90 includes, for example, a control unit 91 that controls settlement processing for generating an EC site and purchasing products and the like, and a purchase history DB 92 that stores purchase history data of products and the like. .

  The call server 100 is a server for accumulating information acquired when a customer calls a call center of a user company. The call server 100 includes, for example, a control unit 101 that provides a CTI (Computer Telephony Integration) function, a voice character conversion function, and the like, and a conversation DB 102 that records conversation data between a customer and an operator.

  The OCR server 110 is a server for accumulating information on paper media such as letters and faxes delivered from customers to users. The OCR server 110 stores, for example, a control unit 111 that provides an OCR function and the like, a text DB 112 that records text data read by the OCR function, and information on customer attributes (customer attribute information). And a customer attribute information DB 113. This customer attribute information correlates, for example, a customer ID for uniquely identifying a customer (corresponding to the customer identification information in the claims), name, address, e-mail address, occupation, age, and gender. (Hereinafter, customer attribute information shall be configured similarly).

  The mail server 120 is a server that provides an electronic mail transmission / reception function between a customer and a user company and accumulates information included in the electronic mail. The mail server 120 includes, for example, a control unit 121 that provides an email transmission / reception function, a mail DB 122 that records email data, and a customer attribute information DB 123 that stores customer attribute information. ing.

  Here, the control units 71, 81, 91, 101, 111, and 121 of each server convert the information acquired from the customer into the XML format that is the first format, and the first format conversion in the claims. Corresponds to the means. Further, the customer attribute information DBs 113 and 123 of the OCR server 110 and the mail server 120 receive a customer ID and information that can contribute to specify the customer ID (customer specific reference information, here, the above-described customer attribute information). The information is stored in association with each other, and corresponds to the customer specifying information storage means in the claims.

(System Configuration-Concentration Server 20)
Next, the concentration server 20 will be described. The concentrator server 20 collects and accumulates customer information in XML format transmitted from each server of the information acquisition server group 10, and stores this customer information as required by the portal server 30 or the viewing terminal of the employee. 50 to collect customer information. The concentrator server 20 includes a control unit 21 that controls communication with each server and the browsing terminal 50, a customer information DB 22, and an EC customer information DB 23.

  Among these, the customer information DB 22 is customer information storage means for storing customer information acquired by a server other than the EC server 90 in the information acquisition server group 10 and converted into the XML format. The EC customer information DB 23 is EC information storage means for storing customer information acquired by the EC server 90 and converted into the XML format (hereinafter referred to as EC customer information to distinguish it from other customer information). Note that the customer information DB 22 and the EC customer information DB 23 are separately provided in this way because the EC customer information acquired by the EC server 90 and the customer information acquired by a server other than the EC server 90 are provided. This is because the forms of are different from each other. However, when this difference in format does not become a problem, the customer information DB 22 and the EC customer information DB 23 may be integrated with each other.

(System configuration-portal server 30)
Next, the portal server 30 will be described. The portal server 30 is a server that functions as a central point of contact when user employees utilize customer information, and includes, for example, a control unit 31, a customer information DB 32, and a customer attribute information DB 33. Among these, the customer information DB 32 is customer information storage means for storing customer information collected by the concentrator server 20 in a state converted into RDF format. The customer attribute information DB 33 is customer attribute information storage means for storing customer attribute information.

  The control unit 31 includes a control program such as an OS (Operating System), a program that defines various processing procedures, and an internal memory for storing necessary data, and is a processing unit that executes various processes using these. . The control unit 31 is configured to include a second format conversion unit 31a and a browsing control unit 31b in terms of functional concept. The second format conversion unit 31a converts the customer information collected by the concentrator server 20 into the RDF format, and corresponds to the second format conversion means in the claims. The browsing control unit 31b is a browsing processing unit that processes a browsing request from the browsing terminal 50 of the user employee.

(System configuration-information collection device group 40)
The information collection device group 40 in FIG. 1 is for collecting customer information. For example, a call system 41 for a call center operator to make a telephone call with a customer, or for optically reading a letter or a FAX. An optical scanner 42 is included. However, since each device of the information collecting device group 40 can be configured in the same manner as in the past, the description thereof is omitted.

(System configuration-browsing terminals 50, 60)
The browsing terminals 50 and 60 in FIG. 1 are for acquiring customer information from a user employee or a customer, or for presenting customer information to a user employee. For example, a known PC (Personal Computer), a workstation, a mobile phone is used. It is configured as an information processing apparatus such as a telephone or PDA (Personal Digital Assistant). In the following example, a case where a PC is used as the browsing terminals 50 and 60 will be described as an example. However, since the browsing terminals 50 and 60 can be configured in the same manner as in the past, the description thereof is omitted.

(Processing content)
Next, each process performed using the customer information utilization system 1 configured as described above will be described. This process is a “first format storage process” in which customer information is acquired by the information collection device group 40 or the information acquisition server group 10 and stored in the customer information DB 22 or EC customer information DB 23 of the collection server 20 in XML format. , “Second format storage processing” for storing customer information stored in the customer information DB 22 and EC customer information DB 23 in the customer information DB 32 of the portal server 30 in the RDF format, and using information stored in the customer information DB 32 It is roughly divided into “information browsing processing” presented on the employee browsing terminal 50.

(Processing content-first format storage process)
First, the first format accumulation process will be described. First, a process for transmitting customer information from the intrablog server 70 to the concentrator server 20 will be described. A flowchart of this process is shown in FIG. When an article is posted from the employee through the browsing terminal 50 (step SA-1, Yes), the control unit 71 of the intra blog server 70 stores the article in the blog DB 72, thereby obtaining the blog article information. Update (step SA-2). Further, the control unit 71 converts the article information (title, summary, article body, and date, time, and day of the week on which the article was posted) into the XML format and distributes it to the concentrator server 20 (step SA). -3, SA-4). This conversion is performed, for example, by adding XML format metadata to each piece of information included in the article information (this is also true for the processing of the customer blog server 80).

  On the other hand, when receiving the article information in the XML format (step SA-5, Yes), the control unit 21 of the concentration server 20 stores the article information in the XML format in the customer information DB 22 as customer information together with the time stamp at that time. (Step SA-6), a reception confirmation notification indicating that this data has been received is transmitted to the intrablog server 70 (Step SA-7). The control unit 71 of the intra blog server 70 that has received the reception confirmation notification (Step SA-8, Yes) associates the transmitted flag indicating that the transmission of information has been completed with the article information distributed to the concentrating server 20. And stored in the blog DB 72 (step SA-9). Here, every time an article is posted on the intra blog, the article is delivered to the collecting server 20 so that customer information is accumulated in the collecting server 20 in real time. Alternatively, it is possible to reduce the load on the network 2 by distributing articles to the concentrating server 20 at a predetermined time (the point that the distribution timing to the concentrating server 20 can be changed in this way is the information acquisition server) The same applies to the delivery timing from other servers in group 10).

  Next, a process for transmitting customer information from the customer blog server 80 to the concentrator server 20 will be described. A flowchart of this process is shown in FIG. When the customer logs in to the blog site via the browsing terminal 60, the control unit 81 of the customer blog server 80 requests the customer ID and password, and performs a known login process based on the entered customer ID and password. (Step SB-1). Then, when an article is posted from the logged-in customer via the viewing terminal 60 (step SB-2, Yes), the article information of the blog is updated by storing this article information in the blog DB 82 (step SB-). 3). Further, the control unit 81 converts the article information and the previously acquired customer ID into the XML format and distributes it to the concentration server 20 (steps SB-4 and SB-5).

  On the other hand, when receiving the customer ID and article information in the XML format (step SB-6, Yes), the control unit 21 of the concentrator server 20 sends the customer ID and article information in the XML format together with the time stamp of the customer information. Is stored in the customer information DB 22 (step SB-7), and a reception confirmation notification that this data has been received is transmitted to the customer blog server 80 (step SB-8). The control unit 81 of the customer blog server 80 that has received the reception confirmation notification (Step SB-9, Yes) associates the transmitted flag indicating that the transmission of the article is completed with the article delivered to the concentrating server 20. Store in the blog DB 82 (step SB-10).

  Next, a process for transmitting customer information from the EC server 90 to the concentration server 20 will be described. A flowchart of this processing is shown in FIG. 4 (note that in FIGS. 4 to 7, the processing on the concentration server 20 side is the same as in FIGS. 2 and 3 and is omitted). When the customer logs in to the EC site via the browsing terminal 60, the control unit 91 of the EC server 90 requests the customer ID and password, and performs a known login process based on the entered customer ID and password. (Step SC-1). When the logged-in customer orders a product and the like by specifying the product name and quantity on the EC site, it is determined whether or not the product can be purchased through a predetermined settlement process, and the order of the product is confirmed. (Step SC-2, Yes), the customer ID acquired at the time of the previous login, and the order information acquired at the time of the previous order (the product name and quantity specified by the customer, the unit price of the product name in advance as the EC server 90 The purchase history is updated by storing the price stored in the purchase history DB 92 and the date, time, and day of the week at this time in the purchase history DB 92 (step SC-3). In addition, the control unit 91 converts the customer ID and the order information into the XML format and distributes it to the concentrator server 20 (steps SC-4 and SC-5). This conversion is performed, for example, by assigning XML format metadata to each piece of information included in the customer ID and order information.

  On the other hand, when receiving the customer ID and order information in the XML format, the control unit 21 of the concentration server 20 stores the customer ID and order information in the XML format as EC customer information in the EC customer information DB 23 together with a time stamp at that time. Then, a reception confirmation notification that this data has been received is transmitted to the EC server 90. The control unit 91 of the EC server 90 that has received this reception confirmation notification (Step SC-6, Yes) associates the transmitted flag indicating that the transmission of information is completed with the order information distributed to the concentrating server 20. Store in the purchase history DB 92 (step SC-7).

  Next, a process for transmitting customer information from the call server 100 to the concentrating server 20 will be described. Schematically, the control unit 101 of the call server 100 acquires information transmitted when a customer calls the call center via the CTI function. For example, when a customer calls a call center, he / she asks the customer to dial his / her customer ID, the purpose of the conversation, or the product number of the purchased product via the CTI and call the information. Acquired via the line, the customer ID is stored as part of the customer information. Alternatively, when each operator of the call center has a conversation with a customer using the call system 41 and inputs information acquired by the conversation through an input terminal (not shown), the control unit 101 of the call server 100 inputs in this way. The acquired information is acquired as customer information. Alternatively, the control unit 101 of the call server 100 electromagnetically records the conversation contents between each operator and the customer and the voice input by each operator, and converts this record into text data by voice recognition software. Customer information.

  For example, as shown in the flowchart of FIG. 5, the control unit 101 of the call server 100 utters a conversation between the customer and the operator when a call is received from the customer with the customer ID (step SD-1, Yes). Data is recorded in the conversation DB 102 (step SD-2), and at an arbitrary time after the call ends (step SD-3, Yes), the stored voice data is converted into text data by voice recognition software (step S2). SD-4). Then, the control unit 101 converts the call information including the text data (text data, date, time, and day of the week when the text data was acquired) and the customer ID acquired previously into the XML format, and collects the server. 20 (step SD-6). This conversion is performed, for example, by assigning XML format metadata to each piece of information included in the customer ID and call information.

  On the other hand, when receiving the customer ID and call information in the XML format, the control unit 21 of the concentration server 20 stores the customer ID and call information in the XML format in the customer information DB 22 together with the time stamp at that time, and stores this data. A reception confirmation notification indicating that it has been received is transmitted to the call server 100. The control unit 101 of the call server 100 that has received this reception confirmation notification (step SD-7, Yes) converts the transmission completion flag indicating that the transmission of information has been completed into the conversion source of the text data distributed to the concentrating server 20 Is stored in the conversation DB 102 in association with the voice data (step SD-8).

  Next, a process for transmitting customer information from the OCR server 110 to the concentration server 20 will be described. A flowchart of this process is shown in FIG. The controller 111 of the OCR server 110 scans the paper medium by driving the optical scanner 42 after a paper medium such as a letter or FAX is set on the optical scanner 42 by the operator (step SE-1, Yes). In step SE-2), the scanning data is converted into text data by OCR software and stored in the text DB 112 (step SE-3). And the control part 111 searches customer specific reference information from text data (step SE-4), and when this customer specific reference information exists (step SE-4, Yes), this customer specific reference information By referring to the customer attribute information DB 113 based on the above, the customer ID corresponding to the customer specific reference information is acquired (step SE-5). Examples of customer specific reference information include a name, an address, a telephone number, and an e-mail address. As a specific example, when the telephone number is included in the text data, the customer ID corresponding to this telephone number is acquired from the customer attribute information DB 113. Then, the OCR server 110 converts the customer ID acquired in this way and the OCR information (text data, date, time, and day of the week when the text data was acquired) into the XML format. The data is converted and distributed to the concentration server 20 (steps SE-6 and SE-7). This conversion is performed, for example, by assigning XML format metadata to each piece of information included in the customer ID and OCR information.

  On the other hand, when receiving the customer ID and OCR information in the XML format, the control unit 21 of the concentration server 20 stores the customer ID and OCR information in the XML format in the customer information DB 22 together with the time stamp at that time, and stores this data. A reception confirmation notification indicating that it has been received is transmitted to the OCR server 110. The control unit 111 of the OCR server 110 that has received the reception confirmation notification (Step SE-8, Yes) associates the transmitted flag indicating that the transmission of information is completed with the text data distributed to the concentrating server 20. Store in the text DB 112 (step SE-9).

  Next, a process for transmitting customer information from the mail server 120 to the concentrator server 20 will be described. A flowchart of this process is shown in FIG. When the control unit 121 of the mail server 120 receives an e-mail via the customer viewing terminal 60 (step SF-1, Yes), the control unit 121 stores the e-mail in the mail DB 122 and also includes the customer included in the e-mail. The customer ID corresponding to the customer specific reference information is acquired by referring to the customer attribute information DB 123 based on the specific reference information (here, the e-mail address of the transmission source) (step SF-2). Then, the control unit 121 converts the acquired customer ID and mail information (e-mail subject, text, date, time, and day of week when the e-mail was received) into an XML format, Deliver to the server 20 (step SF-3). This conversion is performed, for example, by adding XML format metadata to each piece of information included in the customer ID and mail information.

  On the other hand, when receiving the customer ID and mail information in the XML format, the control unit 21 of the concentration server 20 stores the customer ID and mail information in the XML format in the customer information DB 22 together with the current time stamp, and stores this data. A reception confirmation notification indicating that it has been received is transmitted to the mail server 120. The control unit 121 of the mail server 120 that has received this reception confirmation notification (Step SF-4, Yes) stores a transmission completion flag indicating that the transmission of information is completed in the mail DB 122 in association with the mail information (Step S4). SF-5).

  This completes the transmission of customer information from each server of the information acquisition server group 10 to the concentrating server 20, and the first format storage process is completed. A specific definition format of customer information in the XML format stored in the concentration server 20 in this way is illustrated in FIG. This definition format is configured by sequentially layering each tag of “customer information”, “customer information reception source”, and “content”. Further, below the “content” tag, tags of “title”, “summary”, “date”, “time”, “day of the week”, “customer ID”, and “text” are included.

  Here, information (for example, the name of each server of the information acquisition server group 10 that is the acquisition source of customer information) that can identify the reception source of customer information is associated with the “customer information reception source” tag. The “title” tag includes text data that directly expresses the contents of customer information (for example, a title included in article information acquired by the intra blog server 70 or the customer blog server 80, acquired by the mail server 120). Subject included in the received email information). The “summary” tag includes text data summarizing the contents of customer information (for example, a summary included in article information acquired by the intra blog server 70 or the customer blog server 80), a “date” tag, and a “time” tag. In the “day of the week” tag, the date, time, day of the week when customer information is transmitted from the customer (for example, article information acquired by the intra blog server 70 or the customer blog server 80, acquired by the call server 100) Call date, OCR information acquired by the OCR server 110, or mail information acquired by the mail server 120, respectively, date, time, and day of week) are associated with each other. The “customer ID” tag is associated with a customer ID acquired at the time of customer login by the customer blog server 80 or the call server 100, or a customer ID automatically acquired by the OCR server 110 or the mail server 120. The “text” tag includes the central content of the customer information (for example, the article text of the article information acquired by the intra blog server 70 or the customer blog server 80, or the mail information acquired by the mail server 120). Text).

  Further, a specific definition format of the EC customer information in the XML format stored in the concentration server 20 is illustrated in FIG. This definition format is configured by sequentially layering each tag of “EC customer information”, “EC customer information reception source”, and “order contents”. Further, the tags of “product”, “price”, “date”, “time”, “day of the week”, “customer ID”, and “quantity” are included below the “order details” tag. Among these, the “EC customer information reception source” tag is associated with information (for example, the name of the EC server) that can identify the reception source of the EC customer information. The “product” tag, “price” tag, “quantity” tag, “date” tag, “time” tag, and “day of the week” tag include the product name included in the order information acquired by the EC server 90, Price, quantity, date, time and day of the week are associated with each other. The “customer ID” tag is associated with a customer ID acquired at the time of customer login by the EC server 90.

(Processing content-second format storage processing)
Next, the second format accumulation process will be described. First, a flowchart of the second format accumulation process is shown in FIG. The system operator, at an arbitrary timing prior to this processing, sets the timing for data conversion to the second format (specified output timing) and the number of data to be converted to the second format (specified number). The concentrating server 20 is set by an arbitrary method. Under this premise, the control unit 21 of the concentration server 20 monitors the arrival of the designated output timing (step SG-1). When this designated output timing arrives (step SG-1, Yes), the control unit 21 selects the customer information stored in the customer information DB 22 and the EC customer information stored in the EC customer information DB 23. From this, information for the designated number is acquired (step SG-2). At this time, by referring to the time stamp stored in association with each customer information or each EC customer information, and acquiring sequentially from the information having the new time stamp, only the information for the latest specified number of items is in the second format. It becomes conversion object.

  Then, the control unit 21 converts the acquired customer information and EC customer information in the XML format into an RDF format that is a predetermined second format, and generates an RDF file (step SG-3). In this conversion, an element indicating a subject, an element indicating a predicate, and an element indicating an object are acquired from the customer information and EC customer information in XML format, and the element indicating the subject and the element indicating the predicate are converted into an XML structure. This is done by nesting them alternately. After generating the RDF file in this way, the control unit 21 transmits this RDF file to the portal server 30 (step SG-4).

  On the other hand, when the portal server 30 receives the RDF file (step SG-5, Yes), the portal server 30 stores the RDF file in the customer information DB 32 (step SG-6). At this time, by overwriting the newly transmitted RDF file over the already stored RDF file, only the latest specified number of RDF files are always stored in the customer information DB 32. This completes the second format storage process.

(Processing content-information browsing process)
Finally, the information browsing process will be described. Schematically, when the control unit 31 of the portal server 30 receives a browsing request for customer information transmitted from the user through the browsing terminal 50, the HTML of the portal screen using a predetermined HTML template to which CSS is applied. Data is generated and this HTML data is transmitted to the browsing terminal 50. The browsing terminal 50 displays the portal screen on a monitor (not shown) included in the browsing terminal 50 by interpreting the HTML data with a Web browser. In general, when the employee makes various browsing requests to the portal screen via the browsing terminal 50, the browsing request is transmitted to the portal server 30, and the portal server 30 acquires necessary information. Or the HTML data of the portal screen is regenerated, and the HTML data is transmitted to the browsing terminal 50, whereby the portal screen of the browsing terminal 50 is updated.

  FIG. 11 shows a display example of the portal screen. The portal screen includes a reputation information display area A1, a topic information display area A2, a customer information direct display area A3, a message search area A4, an interest information display area A5, and an analysis information display area A6. The reputation information display area A1 includes a critical message display area A1a, a neutral message display area A1b, and a favorable message display area A1c. Each of these display areas A1a to A1c has a word registration button for registering a word. B1 to B3 and display areas D1 to D3 for displaying a list of customer information titles and summaries are provided. The topic information display area A2 is provided with an input field IN1 for designating a topic extraction period, and a display area D4 for displaying frequent words and their messages. In the customer information direct display area A3, selection buttons B4 to B9 for selecting customer information to be displayed are provided. In the message search area A4, an input field IN2 for inputting a search word is provided. The interest information display area A5 is provided with a word registration button B10 for registering words and a display area D5 for displaying a list of titles and summaries of customer information. In the analysis information display area A6, selection buttons B11 to B13 for specifying an analysis method are provided.

  When the employee selects the word registration button B1 in the critical message display area A1a in the reputation information display area A1 via the browsing terminal 50, a word registration dialog (not shown) is registered, and an arbitrary word is registered in this dialog. This word can be registered in the portal server 30 as a critical word. Similarly, the user can register a favorable word using the word registration button B3. The portal server 30 selects an RDF file including a critical word from among the RDF files stored in the customer information DB 32 as information including a critical message, and selects an RDF file including a favorable word as the information including the favorable message. In addition, an RDF file other than the RDF file selected as containing a critical word or a favorable word is selected as information including a neutral reputation. The portal server 30 acquires “title” and “summary” from the RDF files selected in this way. In the title, a hyperlink to the customer information that is the conversion source of the selected RDF file in the customer information DB 22 of the concentrator server 20 is set. And the HTML data of the portal screen which displays these in the critical message display area A1a, the neutral message display area A1b, and the display areas D1 to D3 in the favorable message display area A1c is regenerated, and this is viewed. By transmitting to 50, the portal screen including this information is displayed on the browsing terminal 50. In particular, since customer information and EC customer information are stored in RDF format, “Title” and “Summary” can be easily obtained from the customer information and displayed in a list, and the customer information is enormous. The desired information can be easily specified.

  Further, when the employee uses the browsing terminal 50 to input an extraction period in the input field IN1 of the topic information display area A2 on the portal screen, the portal server 30 may select customer information or EC customer information corresponding to the specified extraction period. Are extracted from the customer information DB 22 and the EC customer information 23 of the concentrating server 20, and the extracted data is subjected to morphological analysis to divide words and count the number of appearances of each word. Then, ranking the data using this count number as a key, regenerating the HTML data of the display screen displaying the words sorted in descending order of the number of appearance counts, and transmitting this to the viewing terminal 50 Thus, a display screen including this information is displayed on the browsing terminal 50.

  When the employee selects any of the selection buttons B4 to B9 in the customer information direct display area A3 via the browsing terminal 50, the control unit 31 of the portal server 30 responds to the selected selection buttons B4 to B9. Obtained customer information or EC customer information from the customer information DB 22 or EC customer information 23 of the concentrator server 20, regenerates the HTML data of the portal screen that displays this customer information or EC customer information as it is, and browses it By transmitting to the terminal 50, the portal screen including this information is displayed on the browsing terminal 50. For example, when the selection button “voice of customer blog” is selected, customer information in HTML format collected from the customer blog server 80 and stored in the customer information DB 22 of the concentration server 20 is extracted, and this customer information is displayed on the display screen. Is displayed. At this time, the customer information can be easily and accurately extracted based on the “customer information reception source” tag.

  When the user employee inputs a word to be searched for in the input field of the message search area A4 via the browsing terminal 50, the control unit 31 of the portal server 30 collects customer information or EC customer information including the word. This information is acquired from the customer information DB 22 of the server 20 or the EC customer information 23, and the HTML data of the portal screen that directly displays the customer information or the EC customer information is regenerated and transmitted to the browsing terminal 50. Is displayed on the browsing terminal 50.

  Further, when the employee uses the interest information display area A5 as a window via the browsing terminal 50 and registers a word of interest in the same manner as the reputation information display area A1, the portal server 30 is stored in the customer information DB 32. The RDF file including this word is selected from the RDF files currently being acquired, and “title” and “summary” are acquired from the RDF file. In the title, a hyperlink to the customer information that is the conversion source of the selected RDF file in the customer information DB 22 of the concentrator server 20 is set. Then, HTML data of the portal screen for displaying them in the display area in the interest information display area A5 is regenerated and transmitted to the browsing terminal 50, so that the portal screen including this information is displayed on the browsing terminal 50. Is done. In particular, since customer information and EC customer information are stored in RDF format, “Title” and “Summary” can be easily obtained from customer information including words of interest and displayed as a list. Desired information can be easily specified even in an enormous amount of cases.

  When the user employee selects any of the selection buttons B10 to B12 in the analysis information display area A6 via the browsing terminal 50, the control unit 31 of the portal server 30 responds to the selected selection buttons B10 to B12. Analyzing customer information or EC customer information stored in the customer information DB 22 or EC customer information DB 23 of the concentrator server 20 by a predetermined analysis algorithm, and regenerating HTML data on a display screen for displaying the result. Is transmitted to the browsing terminal 50, a display screen including this information is displayed on the browsing terminal 50.

[III] Modifications to Each Embodiment Although the embodiments of the present invention have been described above, the specific configuration and method of the present invention are within the scope of the technical idea of each invention described in the claims. It can be arbitrarily modified and improved. Hereinafter, such a modification will be described.

(About problems to be solved and effects of the invention)
The problems to be solved by the invention and the effects of the invention are not limited to the above-described contents, and the present invention solves the problems not described above or produces the effects not described above. In addition, only a part of the described problems may be solved or only a part of the described effects may be achieved.

(About configuration and control)
Further, all or any part of the control described as being automatically performed in the above embodiment may be performed manually, and conversely, all or any one of the control described as being performed manually is performed. The part may be automated based on a known technique or the above-described idea. In addition, each functional block of each component shown in the above embodiment may be configured by hard wired logic. Further, each of the electrical components described above is functionally conceptual and does not necessarily need to be physically configured as illustrated. In other words, the specific form of distribution / integration of each unit is not limited to the one shown in the figure, and all or a part thereof is functionally or physically distributed / integrated in arbitrary units according to various loads and usage conditions. Can be configured. For example, the customer information DB 22 and the EC customer information DB 23 may be separately arranged from the concentration server 20. Alternatively, the customer attribute information DBs 32, 113, and 123 of the portal server 30, the OCR server 110, and the mail server 120 may be shared, and the customer attribute information DB may be accessed when the customer attribute information is necessary. .

(About the form of provision)
The service form that the system provider can provide to the user company is arbitrary. For example, the system provider can provide customer blogs and EC sites via the network 2 using ASP (Application Service Provider), or set up a call center. It is conceivable that BPO (Business Process Outsourcing) entrusts the conversion of text data from voice data and text data, and conversion from paper media into OCR text data.

(About the first format storage process)
Regarding the first format storage process, in the above-described embodiment, each server of the information acquisition server group 10 transmits customer information and EC customer information to the concentrating server 20. May be acquired periodically to collect customer information and EC customer information. Alternatively, each server in the information acquisition server group 10 sends a ping (Packet Internet Groper) to the concentrator server 20 when the customer information or EC customer information is updated. Customer information and EC customer information may be acquired by accessing each server. In the above-described embodiment, each server of the information acquisition server group 10 converts customer information and EC customer information into the XML format.

(About the second format storage process)
Regarding the second format storage processing, in the above embodiment, the concentrator server 20 converts customer information and EC customer information into RDF files. However, the portal server 30 may convert them.

(About information browsing process)
Regarding the information browsing process, in the above-described embodiment, an RDF file is acquired based on the operation of the browsing terminal 50 of a user employee. The latest information of customer information and EC customer information may be browsed collectively using an RSS reader or RSS aggregator at the browsing terminal 50.

  The present invention is useful for centrally accumulating and utilizing various information transmitted from customers through various routes.

It is a block diagram which shows notionally the main structure of the customer information utilization system which concerns on embodiment of this invention. It is a flowchart of the 2nd format storage process which transmits customer information from an intrablog server to a concentration server. It is a flowchart of the 2nd format storage process which transmits customer information from a customer blog server to a concentration server. It is a flowchart of the 2nd format storage process which transmits customer information from an EC server to a concentration server. It is a flowchart of the 2nd format storage process which transmits customer information from a call server to a concentration server. It is a flowchart of the 2nd format storage process which transmits customer information from an OCR server to a concentration server. It is a flowchart of the 2nd format storage process which transmits customer information from a mail server to a concentration server. It is a figure which illustrates the definition format of the customer information of an XML format. It is a figure which illustrates the definition format of EC customer information of an XML format. It is a flowchart of a 2nd format storage process. It is a display example of a portal screen.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Customer information utilization system 2 Network 10 Information acquisition server group 20 Concentration server 21, 31, 71, 81, 91, 101, 111, 121 Control part 22, 32 Customer information DB
23 EC customer information DB
30 Portal server 31a Second format conversion unit 31b Browsing control unit 33, 113, 123 Customer attribute information DB
40 Information Collecting Device Group 41 Call System 42 Optical Scanner 50, 60 Viewing Terminal 70 Intra Blog Server 72, 82 Blog DB
80 Customer Blog Server 90 EC Server 92 Purchase History DB
100 Call server 102 Conversation DB
110 OCR server 112 Text DB
120 mail server 122 mail DB

Claims (6)

A customer information utilization device that can provide customer information to a terminal device via a network,
First format conversion means for converting customer information acquired through a plurality of routes into a predetermined first format via the network at the terminal device;
First format information storage means for storing the customer information in the first format converted by the first format conversion means;
The customer information in the first format is acquired from the first format information storage means, and the customer information is converted into a predetermined second format that can be searched or browsed via the network in the terminal device. Two format conversion means;
Second format information storage means for storing the customer information in the second format converted by the second format conversion means;
A customer information utilization apparatus characterized by comprising: The first format is XML;
The customer information utilization apparatus according to claim 1. The second format is RDF;
The customer information utilization apparatus according to claim 1 or 2, characterized by the above. The first format conversion means specifies customer specifying information for uniquely specifying the customer who presented each customer information based on the customer information acquired through the plurality of routes, and the specified customer specifying information and Storing the customer information in the first format information storage means in association with each other;
The customer information utilization apparatus according to any one of claims 1 to 3, wherein: Customer identification information storage means for storing the customer identification information and customer identification reference information that can contribute to identify the customer identification information in association with each other;
When the customer specific reference information is included in the customer information acquired through the plurality of routes, the first format conversion means converts the customer specific information corresponding to the customer specific reference information into the customer specific information storage means. To get from the
The customer information utilization apparatus according to claim 4, wherein: The first format conversion means stores the customer information in the first format information storage means in association with acquisition timing specifying information for specifying the acquisition timing of the customer information,
The second format conversion means refers to the acquisition timing specifying information stored in the first format information storage means, and acquires a predetermined number of pieces of customer information acquired at the latest every predetermined time interval. Converting to the second format,
The customer information utilization apparatus according to any one of claims 1 to 5, wherein:

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