KR100372919B1 - Electronic Commerce System and Selling Method in the Same - Google Patents

Abstract

In order to implement an internet shopping mall or a content site, it is linked with a database of other shopping malls or content sites, thereby providing an electronic commerce system that allows a buyer to easily purchase a plurality of products by ordering related products together.

The merchandise database stores information about a number of merchandise that a client computer can order over a communications network. The index database stores a list of linked products for each of at least some of the plurality of products. The server sends a list of items to the buyer, allowing the buyer to request at least one item of information from the list of goods. The data processing means calls the product information requested by the purchaser from the product database and sends it to the client computer via a server, and if there is a product linked to the product related to the requested product information, the list of linked products Is transmitted to the client computer via the server, and when the buyer selects any one of the linked products, information about the linked product stored in the external system server is transmitted to the client computer.

Description

Electronic Commerce System and Selling Method in the Same

The present invention relates to an electronic commerce system, and more particularly, to an electronic commerce system for selling goods or information through a communication network such as a shopping mall or a content site.

Electronic commerce, which enables commerce in the real world to be performed in a virtual space using communication media, is becoming more and more common. Among the various types of electronic commerce, shopping malls using the Internet have attracted much attention as a method of selling products to an unspecified majority. A shopping mall is a database that stores data about various product information, etc., is connected to a web server of a shopping mall, and a plurality of web pages are provided for providing product information and ordering, so that a buyer selects a product to purchase and selects a selected product by web browsing. A virtual shopping space that can be purchased. A user who wants to purchase a product in a shopping mall first selects a desired product by a product classification list or a search engine of the shopping mall. At this time, the product information stored in the database is shown to the user, if the user wants to purchase the product is put in the shopping basket. You may repeat this process if you add another product. When the product selection is completed, the user confirms the order for all or part of the selected product and selects a payment method.

Among the shoppers who shop in such Internet shopping malls, they often purchase related products together instead of buying only a single product. For example, a buyer purchasing a book on C ++ programming may want to purchase C ++ compiler software together. Also, a buyer who purchases women's clothing may want to purchase a scarf or handbag that goes well with the clothing. As another example, a buyer who purchases a men's suit may want to purchase a shirt or tie that matches the suit. However, in the conventional Internet shopping mall, there is no method for easily and simultaneously purchasing the related items. Accordingly, the buyer who wants to purchase the related item together must go back to the upper menu screen, select the appropriate product category from the product menu, check the product information for the products included in the selected category, and then select the product to be purchased. do.

Therefore, in the case of purchasing multiple products at the same time, even if the current shopping mall deals with the second desired product, the buyer has to search the second product with considerable time and attention after selecting the first purchased product. You will be uncomfortable. In particular, if the item that the buyer wants to purchase at the same time is heterogeneous, such as 'book' and 'software', the buyer may have to log in to the mall selling the second product separately from the mall selecting the first product. Moreover, if the address of the shopping mall selling the second product is not clearly known, the buyer must also go through the step of retrieving the address of the shopping mall.

In order to solve this problem, a method of interlocking shopping malls that handle related products is required. Conventional methods for linking sites include mutual banner exchange, mirroring, or recommendation site presentation. However, this method is merely a URL linkage, and it can be said that it is not enough to reduce the time and effort for the product search to the buyer.

Meanwhile, the Internet content business refers to a business that sells video information or other data through the Internet. Content sites are typically in the form of webzine or hypertext markup language (HTML) documents, and in some cases, some directories are built into databases. In order to search for information on a content site, a keyword search or a topic search is generally performed. Therefore, it can be said that the content site has a technical configuration that is approximately similar to that of the shopping mall, and the problems related to the interworking of the shopping mall described above may similarly occur in the content site. In a website that provides information in the form of a webzine, related products may be displayed together between contents information, but this cannot be seen as being systematically linked with a shopping mall. It is simply a sale in the form of a catalog that leads to a purchase.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention has been made to solve the above-mentioned problems, and when the Internet shopping malls or content sites are implemented, the present invention is linked to a database of other shopping malls or content sites, so that product information is displayed when the product information is displayed in a browser of a buyer. It is a technical challenge to provide an e-commerce system that allows a plurality of products to be displayed together, and allows a buyer to order related products together to easily purchase a plurality of products.

1 is a block diagram showing one embodiment of an electronic commerce system according to the present invention;

FIG. 2 is a detailed block diagram showing the configuration of the application shown in FIG.

FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating the types of unit databases included in the database shown in FIG. 1 and the field configuration of each unit database. FIG.

4 is a flowchart illustrating an online shopping process in a general shopping mall.

Figure 5 is a flow chart showing in more detail the purchase and payment steps in the online shopping process.

6 is a flowchart illustrating an online shopping process in an electronic commerce system according to the present invention.

7 illustrates an example of data transmission when a transaction is made in the system of FIG.

8A to 8D sequentially illustrate an example of an image displayed on a computer screen of a buyer in a transaction process.

The electronic commerce system of the present invention for achieving the above technical problem is connected to the client computer of the buyer via a communication network to receive a product order from the buyer and process the product order, it can be linked to an external system server through the communication network have. In a system, a commodity database stores information about a plurality of commodities that a client computer can order over the communication network, and an index database at each external system server for each of at least some of the plurality of commodities. Store a list of related products to handle. The server provides the information of the first goods stored in the goods database in accordance with the request of the client computer and performs the order and payment process. The associated product list providing means checks whether there is a related product for the first product in the index database at any point in time of providing information on the first product or performing a payment process, and if the related product exists, the associated product The product list is transmitted to the client computer via the server. When the buyer selects a second product included in the related product list, the related product information providing means obtains information about the second product from the external system server and transmits the information about the second product to the client computer via the server. . Accordingly, the buyer can order the second product together with the first product.

In a preferred embodiment, the server is configured to display a first screen for displaying product information requested by the buyer and a second screen for displaying the linked product list as a separate screen that can at least partially overlap. Send the requested product information and the linked product list to the client computer. The index database stores a list of related products handled by a plurality of external system servers.

In addition, each of the product database and the external system server database are accessed through respective database interface means having a unique address, and the index database represents the unique address of the database interface means of the external system server associated with it for each associated product. Having a field, the associated product information providing means accesses a database of the external system server based on the unique address of the second product selected by the purchaser and obtains information about the second product.

In such an electronic commerce system, merchandise sales are performed as follows. First, after the connection between the client computer and the server is initiated, the product information requested from the client computer is transmitted from the server to the client computer. After it is determined from the client computer that the linked product exists for the product related to the requested product information, if the linked product exists, a linked product list for the product related to the requested product information is displayed on the server. Sent to the client computer. When the client computer selects any of the linked goods, information about the linked goods stored in the external server system is transmitted to the client computer, allowing the client computer to order the linked goods.

Hereinafter, with reference to the accompanying drawings will be described in detail a preferred embodiment of the present invention.

1 is a view showing an embodiment of an electronic commerce system according to the present invention, which is shown based on a shopping mall. The shopping mall system 20 of FIG. 1 includes a shopping mall 20 connected to the Internet 10 and a plurality of buyer computers 40 selectively connected to the shopping mall 20 via the Internet 10. The shopping mall 20 includes a World Wide Web server 22 (hereinafter, abbreviated as 'web server'), a plurality of Internet documents 24 in hypertext markup language (HTML), and Active-X ( ActiveX (26) server, application program (28), ODBC (Open DataBase Connectivity: 29), and database (30). The purchaser computer 40 is loaded with a web browser, and can accept data from the shopping mall 20 and display the received data on the screen.

In FIG. 1, another shopping mall 60 is shown together. The shopping mall 60 may be selectively connected to the shopping mall 20 through the Internet 10. In the following description, the main shopping mall 20 is referred to as "A shopping mall" and the additional shopping mall 60 is referred to as "B shopping mall". In particular, the application 28 of the shopping mall A may access the database 66 of the shopping mall B through the ODBC 68 of the shopping mall B, and may call all or part of the product information of the shopping mall B. In Fig. 1, the application 28 of the shopping mall A and the ODBC 68 of the shopping mall B are directly connected by dotted lines, but in practice, they are connected to the Internet via the respective web servers 22 and 62. . Similarly, the application 28 of the A shopping mall, the application 64 of the B shopping mall, the DCOM components 32 and 70, and the web servers 22 and 62 can be connected to the Internet, so as to settle a fee. Can be performed. On the other hand, although not shown in Figure 1, the electronic commerce system is linked to the pipeline for payment and payment, such as credit card companies and banks, and also linked to the delivery system. On the other hand, unless otherwise stated, data is transmitted between the system components connected to each other by the TCP / IP protocol.

The HTML document set 24 is files representing information to be transmitted to the purchaser computer and displayed on the screen, and each file is provided in units of screens. The HTML document for implementing the shopping mall 20 includes, for example, shopping mall introduction, product introduction, order, payment, and the like, and pages for various guide information. In the present embodiment, the HTML document set 24 is loaded on a separate server from the web server 22. However, in another embodiment of the present invention, the HTML document set 24 may be stored in the web server 22.

Active-X server 26 stores a number of Active Server Pages (ASPs), each of which is used to give various special effects on a web browser. Particularly, in the present invention, while the shopping mall 20 introduces a product through an HTML document, in order to simply introduce a list of products sold in its own mall or other shopping malls affiliated with itself as a product related to the product being introduced. Active server pages (ASPs) are used. In the preferred embodiment, the ActiveX server 26 is a server that is physically the same as the server that stores the HTML document set 24.

The application program 28 is a program executed in a separate server associated with the web server 22 by an extended application program interface (API). FIG. 2 shows the configuration of the application program 28 shown in FIG. The application program 28 accepts data from the web server 22 shown in FIG. 1 or reads data from the database 30 to perform necessary tasks. The application program 28 then transmits the data generated or acquired as a result of the operation to the web server 22 or stored in the database 30. In this embodiment, such application 28 is coded using programming languages such as Visual-BASIC and Visual-C. However, in other embodiments of the present invention, it may be coded using C ++ or other languages. The specific structure and function of the application program 28 are mentioned later.

The database 30 is a relational database (RDB), and is implemented using Oracle, Informix, or MS SQLserver. 3A to 3I show unit databases included in the database 30 shown in FIG. 1. As shown in FIGS. 3A to 3I, the database 30 includes a product DB, a product classification DB, a customer DB, an interworking DB, a transaction DB, an order DB, and a purchase item DB. And such a database 30 is linked to the application program 28 by ODBC. However, in other embodiments of the present invention, the database 30 may be linked to the application program 28 by other interworking means such as ASP or JDBC.

In FIG. 3, the product DB is a DB that stores information about products sold in a shopping mall, and stores ID, a product name, a price, a brief description of the product, and image information about each product. The product ID may be arbitrarily determined by each company, but may be determined by a contract between the companies or by standardization led by a government agency, etc., and may have a common format among the companies. The merchandise classification DB is a DB that stores the classification system of each merchandise. The merchandise classification DB stores information on an upper classification, a product ID belonging to the classification, or a lower classification ID for each major classification and intermediate classification ID. The customer DB is a database that stores information about each registered customer. The customer information includes information such as ID, registration date, name, password, age, gender, address, telephone number, and e-mail address for each customer. .

On the other hand, the mutual interworking DB stores information about the products linked to it is considered likely to be sold simultaneously with each product for all or part of the product in the shopping mall. For example, when the shopping mall A and B of FIG. 1 are contracted to cross-sell some or all of each sale product, the shopping mall B that can cross-sell to the mutual interworking DB of the shopping mall A shown in FIG. Information about other shopping mall products is stored. Meanwhile, some of the linked products may be products handled by the A shopping mall itself. Product linking information between shopping malls may be initially set by a contract, and then updated by data exchange between shopping malls.

The fields of the mutual interworking DB include a product name of the shopping mall A, a product name of another shopping mall (e.g., a shopping mall B) that is highly likely to be sold at the same time because it is highly related to the products of the shopping mall A, the ID of the cross-selling product, the other shopping mall The company ID, the ODBC address of the database in which the information on the cross-selling product is stored, and the commission rate according to the cross-selling. In a preferred embodiment, the interworking DB is one DB for all other shopping malls that are promised to cross-sell. However, in another embodiment of the present invention, an interworking DB may be generated in units of shopping malls that are agreed to cross-sell. On the other hand, there is not a product that can be cross-sold for all products of the shopping mall A, there may be a product that can be cross-sold only for some products.

A transaction DB is created the moment a buyer puts a product into a shopping cart as a pre-order of a product in a connection session, and stores information about all products in the shopping cart during that connection session. do. In detail, the transaction DB is generated for each buyer and stores information such as a buyer ID, a product ID, a product name, a consumer price, a sale price, and a quantity. The transaction DB is a temporary DB. When a purchaser confirms an order and an order DB record regarding the contents of the order is generated as described below, the transaction DB is destroyed when the purchaser stops the purchase process.

The order DB and the purchase item DB constitute a payment DB generated by taking over the contents of the transaction DB after confirming the order. In a preferred embodiment, the payment DB, that is, the order DB and the purchase item DB is generated in order units. First, the order DB of Figure 3f stores the information of the goods related to the order when the buyer confirms the order for the goods in the shopping basket. The order information stored in the order DB may be canceled or partially modified at the request of the buyer before the goods are shipped. Fields in the Order DB include Order ID, Buyer ID, Purchase Amount, Date Modified, Card Number or Account Number, Deposit Date, and Cross-Sale. Among the fields, a field relating to whether cross-selling products are included indicates whether cross-selling products handled by other shopping malls are included in the order. On the other hand, the purchase item DB is a DB that stores the information about each record of the order DB more specifically, records are generated for each ordered product. The fields of the purchase item DB include the order ID, the serial number of the item in the order, the product name (or product ID), the quantity, the consumer, the selling price, whether the product is another shopping mall product, and the cross-seller if the shopping mall product is another shopping mall. IDs, cross-sell fees, etc.

Meanwhile, other kinds of DBs may be added. For example, although not shown, a delivery DB for storing a list of goods for which payment has been completed and data about shipping destinations and delivery quantities of each product is required. In addition, a purchase management DB for each product and a purchase management DB for a supplier, or a customer DB for storing only data about a manufacturer or a supplier for each product may be added.

Although not shown in FIG. 3, a database (30a of FIG. 2) may be provided in the A shopping mall that stores all or a part of product information of other shopping malls linked thereto. That is, in order to reduce the traffic traffic between shopping malls due to cross-selling between shopping malls that are linked to each other, by providing the product information to the shopping mall on the other side, all information about the linked products by the buyer is provided. If you want to refer to it, you can make the information available on the original site. Even in this case, the application program 28 accesses the linked product database 30a provided from the linked site through ODBC.

Referring again to FIG. 2, the application program 28 includes a controller 80, which is the main program controlling the overall process, and a number of functions 82 to 98. In a preferred embodiment, the functions include search processing function 82, indexing function 84, order processing function 86, payment processing function 88, shipping processing function 90, analysis function 92, database call. Functions 94 and 96 and settlement processing function 98 and the like.

The search processing function 82, when the buyer searches for the desired product from the upper category to the lower category according to the product classification system or enters a search term in the search box on the screen to search for the desired product, the web server 22 After receiving the buyer's search command and driving the database call function 94 to call the information of the products belonging to the relevant product classification from the product DB and / or product classification DB of the database 30, the information of the retrieved products Transfer to the controller 80. Accordingly, the controller 80 causes the web server 22 to process the HTML document suitable for the current product classification level and transmit it to the buyer.

In addition, the search processing function 82 drives the indexing function 84 when the buyer requests specific information about a specific product. The indexing function 84 determines with reference to the interworking DB of the database 30 whether there is a linked product for the cross order for the specific product. If there is a linked product, the indexing function 82 transmits the information about the linked product to the controller 80 through the search processing function 82. The controller 80 causes the ActiveX server 26 to transmit the ASP about the linked product to the purchaser through the web server 22. Accordingly, the ASP of the linked product is displayed on the buyer's computer by overlapping the HTML showing specific information about the specific product.

The order processing function 86 drives the database call function 94 whenever the buyer puts a specific product in the shopping basket so that information about the product entered in the shopping basket is added to the transaction DB of the database 30. In addition, after the buyer has finished selecting the product, the order processing function 86 causes the buyer to confirm the order for all the products in the shopping cart.

The payment processing function 88 performs the payment processing for the order after the order is confirmed. The payment processing function 88 drives the web server 22 through the control unit 80 to cause the web server 22 to send an HTML document that allows the buyer to select a payment method to the web browser. In a preferred embodiment, payment methods include payment by credit card, bank online remittance, and the like. After the buyer selects the payment method and checks the credit card number in the case of credit card payment, the payment processing function 88 accesses the transaction DB, the order DB, and the purchase item DB of the database 30 to order the corresponding records of the transaction DB. It will be succeeded by DB and purchase item DB. At this time, the payment processing function 88 is to include the data about the payment method entered by the buyer in the order DB.

The delivery processing function 90 adds data about products for which payment is completed to a delivery DB, so that the delivery department of the shopping mall operating company can deliver the goods. The analysis function 92 calls the database 30 through the database call function 94 to perform statistical and analysis on all products handled by the shopping mall, and in particular, analysis on buyers' behavior and the behavior of buyers. Do this. The analyzed data may be used for setting and promoting the operation direction of the shopping mall.

On the other hand, the database call function 96 is driven when the buyer selects by clicking on the linked product part included in the displayed ASP superimposed on the HTML. The database call function 96 references the interworking DB to determine the ODBC address for the database that stores information about the linked product. If the ODBC address is of its own shopping mall, the database call function 96 calls the linked product information from the linked product database 30a. On the other hand, when the ODBC address is that of another shopping mall, the database call function 96 accesses a database of another shopping mall (e.g., shopping mall B) to call data about the linked product or an HTML document frame about such data. . The database call function 96 passes the data or HTML document frame for the called linked product to the web server 22 through the control unit 80, so that the web server 22 sends this information to the buyer's web browser. Do it. Accordingly, the description of the linked product is displayed in the product description frame portion on the buyer's web browser.

In a preferred embodiment, when a buyer puts a linked product into a shopping basket, the ordering and payment processing process thereof is the same as that of a product stored in the database 30, that is, a product mainly handled in an original shopping mall. That is, the process of ordering and payment for the linked product is first performed by the first shopping mall. However, the delivery process for linked products is treated differently from general products. That is, the settlement processing function 98 requests the delivery of the linked product to the other shopping mall (for example, the B shopping mall) when the linked product is included in the specific order after the payment for the specific order is completed. . For this purpose, the settlement processing function 98 communicates with the application program loaded on the host of the other shopping mall. In addition, the settlement processing function 98 transmits the settlement data for the amount of money excluding a predetermined fee from the selling price for the sold linked product to an application program loaded on the host of the other shopping mall. Meanwhile, in another embodiment of the present invention, the settlement processing function 98 may be called and executed by the settlement processing function 88 rather than the controller 80. In addition, the settlement processing function 98 may not be included in the application program 28 but may be included only in the DCOM component 32.

4 to 6 are flowcharts illustrating an online shopping process in the electronic commerce system according to the present invention.

Referring to FIG. 4, in general, when a user wants to shop online at an internet shopping mall, the user first attempts to access the shopping mall (step 100). In the state of being connected to the shopping mall, the user may search for a product according to a product classification system or by inputting a search word and select the searched product (step 102). When a specific product is selected, the information of the corresponding product is displayed on the web browser (step 104), and the user purchases and pays the product according to the user's selection (step 106).

FIG. 5 shows in detail the purchase and payment steps, that is, step 106 of FIG. 4, in the online shopping process. If product information is displayed on the browser for each selected product, the user may select whether to purchase the product after reviewing the product information (step 110). The selection of whether to purchase or not can be made, for example, by clicking the 'Add to Shopping Cart' button. If the user does not wish to purchase, the user may return to the previous screen or move to another screen (step 112). On the other hand, when the purchase of the corresponding product is selected, a message indicating that the corresponding product is included in the shopping basket may be displayed on the screen (step 114).

After putting the selected product in the shopping cart, the user may immediately perform a payment step or search for additional goods (step 116). If the user wants to search for the additionally desired product before payment, the user may return to the previous screen (step 118). On the other hand, when the user clicks, for example, the 'payment' button to proceed with the payment step for the product contained in the shopping cart, information about the payment is displayed on the screen (step 120). The payment information may include, for example, the type of goods currently in the shopping cart, the respective selling price, the total payment amount, and the payment method selection option. After the user confirms the purchase intention and selects a payment method, a certain approval process may be performed according to the payment method (step 122). After the approval is completed, a message about delivery and the like together with the purchase completion message may be displayed on the screen (step 124).

6 shows an online shopping process in the electronic commerce system according to the present invention. As in general online shopping, the user first attempts to access the shopping mall (step 130). In the state of being connected to the shopping mall, the user may search for a product by selecting a search word according to a product classification scheme or by inputting a search word (step 132). When a specific product is selected, the information of the corresponding product is displayed on the web browser (step 134).

At this time, in parallel with the information of the selected product is transmitted from the web server 22 to the web browser, the application program 28 refers to the interlocking DB data of the database 30 to determine whether there is a product linked to the selected product. It is determined (step 136). If there is no linked product for the selected product, the linked product data is not separately provided to the web browser of the user. Accordingly, the user may go through the normal purchase and payment steps according to the procedure shown in FIG. 5, or may go through an additional product selection procedure. On the other hand, if there is a linked product for the selected product, the ActiveX window is activated to display the linked product list (step 138).

If the user is not interested in the list of linked products displayed in the ActiveX window, the user can close the ActiveX window. On the other hand, if the user wants to obtain information on any of the linked product list displayed in the ActiveX window, the user can select the linked product by clicking the corresponding product name (step 140). At this time, the application program 28 will determine the ODBC address for the database that stores the information of the linked product with reference to the interlocking DB (step 142). If the information of the linked product is stored in its own site (eg, site A), the application program 28 activates the ODBC to call the information of the linked product from the database and provide it to the user. Accordingly, the information of the linked product is displayed on the web browser of the user (step 146). After reviewing the displayed linked product information, the user can go through the normal purchase and payment steps according to the procedure shown in FIG. 5.

On the other hand, if the ODBC address is not associated with its own site in step 144, the application program 28 accesses a database of another site (e.g., site B) related to the ODBC address via the web server 22 and the Internet. . If it is not normally accessible due to a network failure or a failure of the site B host (step 148), this is recorded in the database and notified to the user, and the user is allowed to perform the purchase and payment steps. The product selection step is continued (step 150). If the B site is normally connected, ODBC of the B site is activated, and the information of the linked product is searched in the B site database. The retrieved data is transmitted to Site A (step 152). In addition, the application 28 of the site A processes the ASP file and transmits the ASP file to the user, whereby an ActiveX window is activated on the user terminal to display the linked product information (step 154).

7 illustrates an example of data transmission when a transaction is made in the shopping mall of FIG. 1, and FIGS. 8A to 8D sequentially illustrate an example of a screen displayed on a computer monitor of a buyer in the transaction process of FIG. 7. Shows. The operation of the system of FIG. 1 will be described with reference to FIGS. 7 and 8A-8D.

When the buyer accesses the web server of the shopping mall A using a web browser (step 200), the web server transmits an HTML document about the homepage of the shopping mall to the buyer (step 202). 8A illustrates an example of the homepage 250 of a shopping mall. The purchaser searches for desired goods by selecting sub-classification systems sequentially according to the product classification system on the initial screen. On the other hand, the buyer may enter the desired product to purchase in the product search window 252 on the initial screen and then immediately search for the desired product by pressing the search button 254. An example of the screen 260 showing the sub-products selected by the buyer is illustrated in FIG. 8B, which is assuming that the buyer searches for “C ++ related books”. As illustrated in FIG. 8B, a screen displaying a search result displays a product name and a plurality of product lists belonging to the product. On the other hand, when the purchaser searches using the search button, only the product lists may be displayed without the product name.

When the buyer selects one of the products in the product list (step 204), an HTML document showing information about the selected product is sent from the web server to the buyer (step 206). An example of an HTML document for the selected product information is shown in FIG. 8C. Information about the selected product is displayed on any one of the plurality of frames on the screen 270. The product information includes a price and delivery date, and may include an image of a product depending on the product. When the purchaser wants to purchase the product, the buyer clicks the 'put in the shopping basket' button, and the application program stores the contents of the product in the transaction DB.

On the other hand, after the buyer selects any one of the products in the product list, the web server transmits product selection information such as, for example, the selected product ID to the application (step 208). The application program accesses the interworking DB of the database and inquires whether there is a linked product related to the selected product (step 210). If there is a linked product, the application program transmits the data of the linked product from the interoperable DB to the web server and the ActiveX server (step 212). The ActiveX server processes the active server page (ASP) file using the linked product data and transmits it to the web server (step 214), and the web server sends the accepted ASP file back to the buyer (step 216). Accordingly, a small size ActiveX screen 274 is displayed on the purchaser's computer monitor as shown in FIG. 8C. On the ActiveX screen, a list of products related to the product selected by the buyer is displayed. For example, when the buyer selects "C ++ related books" as illustrated above, products such as "C ++ compiler software" may be displayed on the ActiveX screen.

When the purchaser selects any one of the linked products displayed on the ActiveX screen and requests the web server for information about the linked product (step 218), the web server sends specific information of the linked product to the application. (Step 220). The application consults the interoperable DB to determine the ODBC address for the database that stores information about the linked product. If the ODBC address is that of the own shopping mall, that is, the corresponding product information is received from the counterpart shopping mall and stored in itself, the application program calls the linked product information from the linked product database. However, if the ODBC address is that of the other shopping mall, the application program accesses a database of the linked shopping mall (eg, shopping mall B) and requests the information of the linked product (step 222). In a preferred embodiment, the database of shopping mall B provides the information of products linked in the form of an HTML document frame to the application of shopping mall A (step 224). The application program transmits the information of the received linked item to the web server (step 226), and the web server transmits the HTML document to the buyer (step 228). At this time, the buyer's computer monitor displays a screen 270 showing the information of the A shopping mall product previously selected together with a separate screen 280 showing the linked product information as shown in FIG. 8D. Thus, in the preferred embodiment, since the linked product information is delivered to the buyer browser in the form of an HTML document frame, the linked product information is displayed in the browser in the same representation format as the product of the A shopping mall. If the user wishes to purchase the linked product displayed on the screen 280, the buyer clicks the 'put to the shopping basket' button, and the application program stores the contents of the linked product in the transaction DB.

After completing the selection of the product, the buyer confirms the order and selects a payment method (step 230). The confirmed order data is delivered to the application via the web server (step 232). The application moves data about the order contents from the transaction DB to the payment DB (step 234). In addition, the application program transmits the order data of the linked product among the data on the order contents to the database of the shopping mall B or the application of the shopping mall B (step 236). At this time, data on the cross-selling items of the purchase item DB are collectively transferred to the B shopping mall.

Accordingly, the shopping mall A and the shopping mall B can deliver the goods handled by their shopping malls (steps 238 and 240). In addition, the shopping mall A and the shopping mall B may settle the cross-selling product price for each product order or for a predetermined period of time (step 242). As described above, in the preferred embodiment, payment is made for all the products ordered including the linked products at once, and the settlement is performed between the shopping malls. However, in another embodiment of the present invention, each shopping mall may reserve a control over the program flow and receive a payment for its own product separately. In this case, each shopping mall will settle only the brokerage fee.

Although the description has been focused on the shopping mall so far, the above description may be equally applied to the interworking between the content providing site and the content providing site or the interworking between the content providing site and the shopping mall. However, in the content providing site, since the content that is a commodity is transmitted online, there is only a difference that a logistics process is unnecessary.

The above description merely illustrates preferred embodiments of the present invention, and the present invention is not limited thereto and can be variously modified. For example, in the preferred embodiment, whenever an HTML document for each retrieved product is sent to a web browser, the application determines whether there is a product linked to the product, and if there is a linked product, the ASP from the ActiveX server is executed. However, in another embodiment of the present invention, after the buyer puts in the shopping basket with the intention to buy the searched products, the application determines whether there are products linked to the products put in the shopping basket and linked products If present, the ASP from the ActiveX server can also be sent to the Web browser. In addition, an encryption program may be added to the application or the web server to increase the security of the transmitted data.

On the other hand, the application for implementing the electronic commerce system of the present invention can be variously modified depending on the environment used. For example, in the preferred embodiment of the present invention, since the linked commodity information is transmitted between sites in the form of an HTML document frame, the linked commodity information is displayed in the buyer's browser in the same representation format as that of a normal unlinked commodity. However, in another embodiment of the present invention, linked product information may be transmitted between sites in units of pages. In this case, the application program of the initially connected shopping mall should include a portion that blocks the connection with the linked shopping mall and allows the pipeline to link with itself when the buyer presses the 'add shopping cart' button of the linked shopping mall. However, as described above, in another embodiment of the present invention, once the user accesses the product information of the linked shopping mall, the order and payment management is performed in the linked shopping mall connected later instead of the initially connected shopping mall. You can do it proactively. In this case, the brokerage fees for guiding the buyer to the linked shopping mall may be settled between the shopping malls.

In addition, these applications can be supplied to merchant servers or RDB operators as components rather than as complete packages. In this case, the application must be properly ported to the merchant server or RDB. In addition, in the interworking between shopping malls, due to the different sizes of the two shopping malls or for other reasons, one shopping mall may provide all the product data to the linking and the other shopping mall may provide only a part thereof to the linking. In this case, an interface setting routine may be added to the application program to set the range of linking through a dialog or the like.

In addition, in the above-described preferred embodiment, the application program is divided into functions, but in another embodiment of the present invention, the application program communicates with the user through a control unit that controls the overall program flow and a web server. It may be divided into a user interface unit and a backend interface unit communicating with a database and another shopping mall. That is, the technical idea of the present invention relates to an electronic commerce system that can exchange data with another electronic commerce site so that a user can purchase a dynamically related product, and a specific configuration of an application constituting a part of the system. It is not limited to. And such an application can be easily implemented by those skilled in the art based on the above description, it can be variously modified within the scope of the technical idea of the present invention.

Fee settlement between linked shopping malls may be performed only when actual product sales are made, but a fee may be paid between shopping malls for providing linked product information. In this case, the fee for the product information in units of frames for each of the linked products is to be paid as a flat rate, and the selling fee for the actual sold product may be determined as a percentage of the product selling price.

In addition, in the above-described preferred embodiment, DCOM is mainly used as a tool for interworking distributed objects. However, in another embodiment of the present invention, CORBA, IIOP, Java, or CGI may be used instead of DCOM. .

As described above, according to the present invention, when the product information is displayed in the buyer's browser, the associated product list is displayed together with the assistant, and the buyer can easily select any one of the related product lists. Therefore, it is not necessary to surf the shopping mall site in order to purchase a plurality of correlated products, and it is possible to conveniently purchase a plurality of products at a site to which the user first connected. By ordering related products together, you can reduce your shopping time and usage time. On the other hand, as a shopping mall operator, it is possible to maximize sales by securing commission income through linkage with other sites.

In addition, as described above, the site interworking method according to the present invention may be applied to interworking between a shopping mall site and a content site or interworking between content sites. For example, a content site providing infant information and a shopping mall that handles infant supplies may be linked to each other by the present invention. Therefore, Internet users use the shopping mall site to purchase or search for a product, and separately use the content site to obtain related information, or conversely, obtain information of interest from the content site, and then separate the products related to the information. It is possible to simultaneously obtain information and order products at the first connected site without having to make a purchase at a shopping mall site. In addition, according to the present invention, when an electronic commerce system forms a trading relationship with a new system, The addition of index data completes the system change. In addition, even when the transaction relationship between electronic commerce systems such as a shopping mall is terminated due to the cancellation or termination or termination of the contract, the system change is completed only by deleting the index data. Therefore, there is an advantage that the maintenance of the system is easy.

Claims (11)

An electronic commerce system which is connected to a client computer of a buyer through a communication network, receives a product order from the buyer, processes the product order, and interworks with an external system server through a communication network. A merchandise database for storing information about a plurality of merchandise that the client computer can order through the communication network; An index database for storing a list of related products handled by the external system server for each of at least some of the plurality of products; A server for providing information of the first goods stored in the goods database and performing an order and payment process according to a request of the client computer; At any point in providing information on the first product or performing a payment process, the server checks whether there is a related product for the first product in the index database, and if the related product exists, a list of related products. Means for providing a list of related products for transmission to the client computer via And Associated product information providing means for obtaining information about the second product from the external system server and transmitting the information about the second product to the client computer via the server when the buyer selects the second product included in the related product list; By including the buyer to order the second product together with the first product. The client computer of claim 1, wherein the server provides the related product list to the client computer such that a first screen for displaying the first product information and a second screen for displaying the related product list are displayed as separate screens. E-commerce system. The method of claim 1, And the index database stores a list of related products handled by a plurality of external system servers. The method according to claim 1 or 3, Each of the product database and the external system server database are accessed via respective database interface means having a unique address, The index database has, for each associated product, a field indicating a unique address of a database interface means of an external system server associated therewith, And the associated product information providing means accesses a database of the external system server and obtains information about the second product based on the unique address of the second product selected by the purchaser. An electronic commerce system which is connected to a client computer of a buyer through a communication network, receives a product order from the buyer, processes the product order, and interworks with an external system server through a communication network. A merchandise database for storing information about a plurality of merchandise that the client computer can order through the communication network; An index database for storing a list of related products handled by the external system server for each of at least some of the plurality of products; A server for providing information of the first goods stored in the goods database and performing an order and payment process according to a request of the client computer; And At any point in providing information on the first product or performing a payment process, the server checks whether there is a related product for the first product in the index database, and if the related product exists, a list of related products. Means for providing a list of related products for transmission to the client computer via And providing information about the second product from the external system server to the client computer when the buyer selects the second product included in the related product list. In an electronic commerce system that is connected to a client computer of a buyer through a communication network to receive a product order from the buyer and to process the product order, can be linked to an external system server through a communication network, (a) providing a commodity database for storing information about a plurality of commodities that can be ordered through the communication network by the client computer; (b) providing an index database for storing a list of related products handled by the external system server for each of at least some of the plurality of products; (c) providing first client information requested by the client computer to the client computer; (d) confirming in the index database whether there is an associated product for the first product; (e) if the associated product exists in step (d), transmitting the related product list to the client computer; And (f) when the buyer selects a second product included in the related product list, the information about the second product is obtained from the external system server and transmitted to the client computer via the server, whereby the buyer Allowing the second product to be ordered together with the first product; Selling goods through a communication network comprising a. The method of claim 6, wherein step (e) (e1) sending the categories of related products to the client computer; And (e2) if the buyer selects any one of the categories of the related goods, transmitting the related goods list belonging to the category to the client computer; Product sales method comprising a. 8. The method of claim 6 or 7, wherein step (b) Recording in the index database a unique address of the database interface means of the associated external system server for each associated product; Product sales method comprising a. The method of claim 8, wherein step (f) (f1) when the buyer selects the second product, accessing a database of the external system server to obtain information about the second product; And (f2) transmitting information regarding the second product to the client computer; Product sales method comprising a. An electronic commerce system which is connected to a client computer of a buyer through a communication network, receives a product order from the buyer, processes the product order, and interworks with an external system server through a communication network. (a) providing a commodity database for storing information about a plurality of commodities that can be ordered through the communication network by the client computer; (b) providing an index database for storing a list of related products handled by the external system server for each of at least some of the plurality of products; (c) providing first client information requested by the client computer to the client computer; (d) confirming in the index database whether there is an associated product for the first product; And (e) if the related goods are present in step (d), transmitting the related goods list to the client computer, including transmitting external server system access information for each related goods; Including a, When the buyer selects a second product included in the list of related products Product information method for transmitting the information about the second product from an external system server to the client computer. The method of claim 6 or 7, wherein the first product sold by the electronic commerce system is any one selected from a group of products consisting of products or contents, And the second product sold by the external system server is any one selected from the product group.