[DESCRIPTION]

[invention Title]

SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR PROVIDING ADVERTISEMENTS USING MOBILE COMMUNICATION TERMINAL

[Technical Field]

The present invention relates to a system and method for providing advertisements using a mobile communication terminal, in which, when a mobile user enters a cell area, an affiliated store located in the corresponding cell area provides advertising information, thus improving advertising effect.

[Background Art] Recently, mobile communication systems provide a variety of additional services for transmitting character messages and image information using a Short Message Service (SMS) , a Multimedia Message Service (MMS) and a wireless Internet, besides the voice communication service that enables users to communicate with others through mobile communication terminals.

Especially, the mobile communication systems cooperating with affiliated stores provide an advertisement delivery service that provides a variety of advertising information related to the affiliated stores, such as

commodity discount or event information, to the mobile communication terminals of the users so that the users can easily receive the corresponding information at any time and any place. However, the above advertisement delivery service has a problem in that, since the service delivers the advertising information of the affiliated stores to a plurality of unspecified mobile communication terminals, most of the users recognize such advertising information as spam.

Moreover, although the affiliated stores provide the advertisements using the SMS or MMS at high cost, the advertisements may have a reverse effect.

[Disclosure]

[Technical Problem]

The present invention is directed to a system and method for providing advertisements using a mobile communication terminal which reduces advertising cost and improves advertising effect by providing advertising information of an affiliated store located adjacent to a place where a user is located to a mobile communication terminal of the user using a Really Simple Syndication (RSS) feed at low cost.

[Technical Solution]

In a first aspect, the present invention provides a system for providing advertisements using a mobile communication terminal, the system comprising a service providing device connected to a plurality of affiliated store servers through Internet and to a plurality of mobile communication terminals through a mobile communication system, wherein the service providing device comprises a Really Simple Syndication (RSS) server receiving advertising information from the affiliated store servers in real time so as to provide the advertising information of the affiliated stores collected by the RSS server to a mobile communication terminal located adjacent to the corresponding affiliated store, and wherein the mobile communication terminal comprises a RSS reader connected to the RSS server so as to output the advertising information of the affiliated store provided from the service providing device.

The service providing device may provide the advertising information of the corresponding affiliated store to the mobile communication terminal registered in the affiliated store server as a member.

The advertising information may include at least one of commodity information and event information of the affiliated store. The mobile communication system may comprise a base

station controller controlling a plurality of base stations located in each cell and a home location register, wherein the base station wirelessly transmits the advertising information of the affiliated store located in a cell controlled by the base station to the mobile communication terminal located in the corresponding cell.

In a second aspect, the present invention provides a method for providing advertisements using a mobile communication terminal, the method using a system for providing advertisements using a mobile communication terminal, in which the system comprises a service providing device connected to a plurality of affiliated store servers through Internet and to a plurality of mobile communication terminals through a mobile communication system, the method comprising: a first step of receiving, at the service providing device, advertising information of an affiliated store from the affiliated store server through a Really Simple Syndication (RSS) server in real time and updating the advertising information; a second step of providing, at the service providing device, the advertising information of the affiliated s tores collected by the RSS server to a mobile communication terminal located adjacent to the corresponding affiliated store; and a third step of outputting, at the mobile communication terminal, the advertising information of the affiliated store provided

from the service providing device through an RSS reader.

In the second step, the service providing device may provide the advertising information of the corresponding affiliated store to the mobile communication terminal registered in the affiliated store server as a member.

In the second step, the service providing device may check whether there exists a member having a terminal number in the affiliated store server and, if so, provides the advertising information of the corresponding affiliated store to the corresponding terminal number through the mobile communication network.

[Description of Drawings]

FIG. 1 is a conceptual diagram of a system for providing advertisements using a mobile communication terminal in accordance with the present invention; FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing an internal configuration of a service providing device 100 of FIG. 1;

FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating a method for providing advertisements using a mobile communication terminal in accordance with the present invention.

[Mode for Invention]

Hereinafter, preferred embodiments in accordance with the present invention will be described with reference to

the accompanying drawings. The preferred embodiments are provided so that those skilled in the art can sufficiently understand the present invention, but can be modified in various forms and the scope of the present invention is not limited to the preferred embodiments.

FIG. 1 is a conceptual diagram of a system for providing advertisements using a mobile communication terminal in accordance with the present invention. As shown in FIG. 1, the system for providing advertisements using a mobile communication terminal in accordance with the present invention includes a service providing device 100 connected to a plurality of affiliated store servers 200 through Internet 1. Moreover, the service providing device 100 provides advertising information of an affiliated store located in a cell area to mobile communication terminals 400 located in the corresponding cell area through a mobile communication system 300 using a Really Simple Syndication (RSS) feed.

The affiliated store server 200 manages and operates the affiliated stores located in a cell on-line. The affiliated store server 200 stores member information including terminal numbers of the mobile communication terminals 400 in a database, not depicted. Moreover, the affiliated store server 200 provides various advertising information related to the affiliated stores registered by

affiliated store managers to the members on-line. The advertising information registered in the affiliated store server 200 includes commodity information and event information of the corresponding affiliated store. The affiliated store may be a shopping mall.

The mobile communication system 300 comprises a base station controller 320 for controlling a plurality of base stations 310 located in each cell, and a home location register (HLR) 330 of an exchange network. Each of the base stations 310 provides advertising information of affiliated stores located in a cell controlled by the base station 310 to the mobile communication terminals 400 located in the corresponding cell.

The service providing device LOO includes a Really Simple Syndication (RSS) server for receiving the advertising information of the corresponding affiliated store from the affiliated store server 200 through the Internet 1. The RSS server receives the advertising information updabed by the affiliated store server 200 in real time and updates the advertising information.

Moreover, the service providing device 100 provides the advertising information of the corresponding affiliated store to the mobile communication terminal of the user registered in the affiliated store server 200 as a member. Each of the mobile communication terminals 400

includes a Really Simple Syndication (RSS) reader 401 connected with the RSS server of the service providing device 100 to output the advertising information of the affiliated store,, FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing an internal configuration of the service providing device 100 of FIG. 1.

As shown in FIG. 2, the service providing device 100 comprises a web server 110, an RSS server 120, a service controller 130, a database 140 and a manager terminal 150. The above respective devices may be connected to one another through a local area network (LAN) 160. Moreover, the base station controller 320 and the HLR 330 of the mobile communication system 300 may be connected to the LAN 160 directly or through the web server 110. The web server 110 transmits and receives information related to various advertising information to and from the affiliated store servers 200 and performs service registration and log-in processes for the affiliated store servers 200. Moreover, the web server 110 receives membership information with respect to the mobile communication terminal numbers from the affiliated store servers 200.

The RSS server 120 connected to the affiliated store servers 200 receives advertising information of the affiliated stores, registered in the affiliated store

servers 200, in real time and updates the advertising information.

When a terminal number of the mobile communication terminal located in a cell is applied from the corresponding base station through the mobile communication system 300, the service controller 130 checks whether or not there is a member having the corresponding the mobile communication terminal number in the affiliated store server 200 of the affiliated store located in the corresponding base station 310 through the web server 120. If the mobile communication terminal number is determined as that of the member of the affiliated store, the service controller 130 controls to provide advertising information of the affiliated store located in the corresponding cell to the corresponding mobile communication terminal through the mobile communication system 300.

The database 140 stores information regarding the advertisement providing service including the affiliated store information located in the corresponding cell of the base station.

The manager terminal 150 performs an interface function with the manager in connection with the advertisement providing service according to the present invention. Next, an advertising method of the system for

providing advertisements using a mobile communication terminal in accordance with the present invention will be described with reference to FIG. 3.

First, the affiliated store server 200 performs a series of service registration processes for an affiliated store in the service providing device 100 (STl) . The service providing device 100 registers registration information provided from the affiliated store server 200 to the database 140, thus registering the corresponding affiliated store.

The service providing device 100 registers information regarding the affiliated store server in the RSS server 120. The RSS server 120 connected with the affiliated store server 120 receives advertising information updated by the affiliated store server 120 and updates the advertising information in real time (ST2).

In the above state, when a mobile communication terminal 400 approaches a cell, the base station 310 that controls the corresponding cell provides the terminal number of the mobile communication terminal 400 located in its cell to the base station controller 320. The base station controller 320 provides the corresponding terminal number to the HLR 330 of the exchange network to check the location of the mobile communication terminal 400 and provides the location information of the mobile communication terminal

400 including the terminal number and base station information to the service providing device 100 (ST3) .

Then, the service providing device 100 searches for information regarding the affiliated stores located in the cell controlled by the base station in the database 140 based on the base station information applied from the base station controller 320. The service providing device 100 provides the terminal number applied from the base station controller 320 to the corresponding affiliated store server 200 to request to check whether there exists a member having the corresponding terminal number (ST4).

The affiliated store server 200 checks whether there exists the corresponding member in its database, not depicted, and provides the result to the service providing device 100 (ST5) .

The RSS server 120 of the service providing device 100 provides advertising information of the affiliated store server 200 in which the member corresponding to the terminal number exists to the mobile communication system 300 (ST6) . That is, the service providing device 100 provides the advertising information to the base station 310 located in the corresponding cell through the base station controller 320.

The base station 310 provides the advertising information of the affiliated store located in the

corresponding cell to the mobile communication terminal 400 located in the cell controlled by the base station 310. At this time, the mobile communication terminal 400 receives and output the advertising information of the affiliated store provided from the base station 310 using the RSS reader 401.

According to the above embodiment, when the member of the affiliated store approaches a cell in which the affiliated store is located, advertising information is provided to the mobile communication terminal of the member using the RSS feed.

Accordingly, since the member located adjacent to the affiliated store is provided with the advertisement of the corresponding affiliated store, the possibility that the advertisement provided to the mobile communication terminal may promote sales of the affiliated store.

Moreover, the affiliated store can provide its advertising information by the RSS feed at a lower cost than the SMS and the MMS, thus reducing the cost for providing advertisements.

According to the above embodiment, although the advertising information of the corresponding affiliated store is provided to the mobile communication terminal of the user registered in the affiliated store as a member, the service providing device 100 may provide advertising

information of the affiliated store related to interesting information of the user to the mobile communication terminal 400 of the corresponding user. For example, in the event that the interesting information is registered as a computer, the service providing device 100 may provides advertising information regarding computer stores in the cell where the user is located at present.

Moreover, according to the present invention, in the case where the advertisements provided to the mobile communication terminal promote sales of the corresponding affiliated store, it is possible to provide a discount for the corresponding commodity. In this case, the affiliated store may store the purchase history information of the member and provides a merchandise coupon or a discount coupon to the corresponding member based on the purchase history information.

The invention has been described in detail with reference to preferred embodiments thereof. However, it will be appreciated by those skilled in the art that changes may be made in these embodiments without departing from the principles and spirit of the invention, the scope of which is defined in the appended claims and their equivalents.

[industrial Applicability] As described above, according to the present invention,

since a member located adjacent to an affiliated store is provided with an advertisement of the corresponding affiliated store, the possibility that the advertisement provided to the mobile communication terminal of the member may promote sales of the affiliated store.

Moreover, the affiliated store can provide its advertising information by a Really Simple Syndication (RSS) feed at a lower cost than a Short Message Service (SMS) and a Multimedia Message Service (MMS) , thus reducing the cost for providing advertisements.