Determining feature importance and target population in the context of promotion recommendation

US10546320B2 · kind B2 · utility

Assignee

• International Business Machines Corporation · US

Inventors

• Adam N. Elmachtoub · New York, US
• Markus Ettl · Ossining, US
• Sechan Oh · Stanford, US
• Marek Petrik · Ossining, US
• Rajesh Kumar Ravi · Yorktown Heights, US

Key dates

• Filing date: Aug 14, 2015
• Grant date: Jan 28, 2020
• Expiry date: Apr 3, 2038

Classification

• Technology area (CPC G): Physics
• CPC primary: G06Q10/067
• WIPO field: IT methods for management
• WIPO sector: Electrical engineering

Abstract

A system, method and computer program product for determining a target population to be subject to a promotion or offer of goods/services. The target population is determined that strongly prefers a given promotion, while also making sure the target population represents a sizable number of consumers such that profits may be maximized. The system provides an output solution listing available promotion options and one or more corresponding target groups based on solving an optimization problem that incorporates, prior obtained most important customer features for each promotion using historical promotion data and statistics measures. The system may automatically initiate a promotion offering to each of said customers by communicating the promotion to the members of the targeted group of people, wherein a percentage of future transactions to which the promotion is offered is expected to exceed a threshold level.