WO2001082565A1

WO2001082565A1 - Method for advertisement using background music while telephone conversation

Info

Publication number: WO2001082565A1
Application number: PCT/KR2000/000702
Authority: WO
Inventors: Ki Tae Kim
Original assignee: Ki Tae Kim
Priority date: 2000-04-24
Filing date: 2000-06-30
Publication date: 2001-11-01
Also published as: KR20010097558A

Abstract

Disclosed is a method for advertisement using background music while telephone conversation which is capable of sending an advertising music as the background music, for a predetermined time period, which does not interfere with the telephone conversation in order for a telephone user to listen to the advertising music, while the telephone user is talking over the wire telephone, the mobile telephone on the Internet phone, whereby consumption of a separate time of the telephone user for listening the corresponding advertisement can be prevented and the hanging up of the telephone receiver by the user's misunderstanding of the line mixing, which is caused when the advertisement is sent by force during the conversation, can be also prevented, such that more efficient advertisement than conventional advertisement can be achieved.

Description

METHOD FOR ADVERTISEMENT USING BACKGROUND MUSIC WHILE TELEPHONE CONVERSATION

TECHNICAL FIELD

The present invention relates to an advertisement method and more particularly, to

a method for advertisement using background music while telephone conversation which is

capable of sending an advertising music as the background music, for a predetermined time

period, which does not interfere with the telephone conversation in order for a telephone

user to listen to the advertising music, while the telephone user is talking over the wire

telephone, the mobile telephone or the Internet phone.

BACKGROUND ART

In order to be successful in business activities, generally, business enterprises

should extensively advertise their enterprise names or products to a great number of

peoples. To this end, they have strengthened various kinds of advertising activities using all

possible methods for the purpose of drawing the public's attention to their enterprise names

or products.

An example of the advertising activities is an advertisement method using a

telephone. In this way, if a telephone user listens to the corresponding advertisement during

the conversation over a public telephone or a wire telephone, he can enjoy free telephone

service without any payment of the fee for a telephone call. In other words, a separate

equipment is installed on a telephone terminal, and if the telephone user is connected to a counterpart, a predetermined advertisement for a few seconds is sent to the

telephone user. Thus, he can speak over the telephone for a few minutes at a charge of listening of the advertisement sent over the conversation. The above-mentioned

advertisement method using the telephone has to send the advertisement for a

predetermined time period before the beginning of the telephone conversation, such that

there occurs a problem that the telephone user should consume a separate time for listening

to the corresponding advertisement.

On the other hand, the above conventional advertisement method is very useful

when the telephone user listens to the advertisement and then speaks by telephone free of

charge, in case where he does not have any telephone card or coins upon using the public

telephone. In common cases, however, there is an inconvenience that the telephone user

should consume a separate time for listening to the corresponding advertisement.

Additionally, there is presented another conventional advertisement method similar

to the above conventional method. In this way. the conversation state during the telephone

conversation periodically stops in order to send the advertisement for a few seconds to the

telephone user and then, it restarts. As a consequence, the conversation state stops without

any notification, and the line is often off, since the counterpart who talks to the member of

the corresponding advertisement service side determines that the lines are mixed and thus,

hangs up the telephone receiver.

Accordingly, an object of the invention is to provide a method for advertisement

using background music while telephone conversation which is capable of sending an

advertising music as the background music, for a predetermined time period, which does

not interfere with the telephone conversation in order for a telephone user to listen to the advertising music, while the telephone user is talking over the wire telephone, the mobile

telephone or the Internet phone, whereby consumption of a separate time of the telephone user for listening to the corresponding advertisement can be prevented and the hanging up

of the telephone receiver by the user's misunderstanding of the line mixing, which is

caused when the advertisement is sent by force during the conversation, can be also

prevented.

DISCLOSURE OF THE INVENTION

To accomplish this and other objects of the present invention, there is provided a

method for advertisement using background music while telephone conversation, which

includes the steps of: detecting a telephone number of a subscriber, if a call of the

corresponding subscriber is connected; determining whether the detected telephone number

has been registered as an advertising music listening subscriber; sending an advertising

music to the corresponding subscriber as the background music which does not interfere

with the telephone conversation if it is determined that the telephone number has been registered as the advertising music listening subscriber; determining whether an advertising

music listening stopping signal is received from the subscriber during the sending of the

advertising music or whether the telephone conversation of the subscriber is finished;

stopping the sending of the advertising music and checking and storing the advertising

music listening time consumed by the subscriber, if it is determined that the advertising

music listening stopping signal has been received from the subscriber during the sending of

the advertising music or that the telephone conversation of the subscriber has been finished. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The invention will further be described by way of example and with reference to the

following drawings, in which,

Figure 1 is a block diagram illustrating an advertising system that is applied in a wire telephone according to the present invention;

Figure 2 is a block diagram illustrating an advertising system that is applied in a

mobile telephone according to the present invention; and

Figure 3 is a flowchart illustrating a method for advertisement using background

music while telephone conversation.

Hereinafter, an explanation of a method for advertisement using background music

while telephone conversation according to the present invention will be in detail discussed

with reference to the attached drawings.

BEST MODE FOR CARRYING OUT THE INVENTION

In a preferred embodiment of the present invention, advertising music is sent as

background music during conversation over a wire telephone or mobile telephone, thereby

carrying out advertising service. In case of the wire telephone, the advertising service is

provided with the system constructed as shown in Figure 1 and in case of the mobile

telephone, with the system constructed as shown in Figure 2.

In more detail, in case where the advertising service is provided over the wire

telephone, as shown in Figure 1 , a controller 20 is installed between a wire repeater 10 and

a plurality of telephone terminals TPl ~ TPn, in which the advertising music is sent to the telephone terminals TPl ~ TPn. In this way, the controller 20 mentioned checks whether a

subscriber who tries a call is registered as an advertising music listening subscriber from a

server 30 and if it is checked that the subscriber has been registered as the advertising music listening subscriber, receives the advertising music from the server 30 and sends it to the corresponding telephone terminal side. And. the controller 20 includes a matching part

for matching the telephone lines connected between the wire repeater 10 and the plurality

of telephone terminals TPl ~ TPn, a control part for controlling the sending of the

advertising music to the advertising music listening subscriber, a music sending part for

sending the advertising music to the advertising music listening subscriber, a telephone

number detecting part for detecting a telephone number of the scriber who tries the call, a

control signal receiving part for receiving an advertising music listening control signal

from the subscriber, and a communication part for communication between the control part

and the server 30, whereby the controller 20 controls the whole operation of the advertising

music sending to the advertising music listening subscriber. Also, the server 30 is

composed of a database 31 and a memory 32. First, the database 31 stores the information

on the advertising music listening subscriber and the information on the advertising music

listening time consumed by the advertising music listening subscriber. The memory 32 is

preferably a random access memory (RAM), in which the advertising music to be sent to

the advertising music listening subscriber is stored and if required, the advertising music

can be frequently changed and stored.

On the other hand, in case where the advertising service is provided over the mobile

telephone, as shown in Figure 2, a controller 20 is installed between a wireless repeater 40

and a wire repeater 50, in which the advertising music is sent via the wireless repeater 40 to a plurality of mobile telephone terminals MTP1 ~ MTPn. In this way, the

controller 20 mentioned checks whether a subscriber who tries a call is registered as an advertising music listening subscriber from a server 30 and if it is checked that the

subscriber has been registered as the advertising music listening subscriber, receives the

advertising music from the server 30 and sends it to the corresponding mobile telephone

terminal MTP1 ~ MTPn side. And, the controller 20 includes a matching part for matching

the telephone lines connected between the wireless repeater 40 and the wire repeater 50. a

control part for controlling the sending of the advertising music to the advertising music

listening subscriber, a music sending part for sending the advertising music to the

advertising music listening subscriber, a telephone number detecting part for detecting a

telephone number of the scriber who tries the call, a control signal receiving part for

receiving an advertising music listening control signal from the subscriber, and a

communication part for communication between the control part and the server 30,

whereby the controller 20 controls the whole operation of the advertising music sending to

the advertising music listening subscriber. As mentioned above, the server 30 is composed

of a database 31 and a memory 32. First, the database 31 stores the information on the

advertising music listening subscriber and the information on the advertising music

can be frequently changed and stored.

With the system according to the present invention comprised of the controller 20

and the server 30, the advertisement method for sending an advertising music to the wire telephone or the mobile telephone is carried out in the order as shown in Figure 3.

First, if the conversation is connected over the telephone terminals TPl ~ TPn or

the mobile telephone terminals MTP1 ~ MTPn at step Sl l , the controller 20 detects the

connected telephone number, based upon the information applied from the wire repeater 10

or the wire repeater 50 at step SI 2. And, at step SI 3 the controller 20 connects to the

database 31 of the server 30 and at step S14 detects and determines whether the detected

telephone number has been registered as the advertising music listening subscriber. If it is

at the step S14 determined that the detected telephone number has been registered as the

advertising music listening subscriber, the controller 20 receives the advertising music

from the memory 32 of the server 30 and sends it to the corresponding telephone terminal

or mobile terminal of the advertising music listening subscriber during the telephone

conversation at step SI 5. At this time, the advertising music is sent as background music

that does not interfere with the telephone conversation.

Moreover, at step SI 6, the controller 20 determines whether an advertising music

listening stopping signal (for example, a button '*' or '#' on the keypad of the telephone)

used for stopping the sending of the advertising music from the telephone terminal or the

mobile telephone during conversation, while the advertising music is being sent to the

corresponding telephone terminal or the mobile telephone. If it is determined that the

advertising music listening stopping signal has not been received, the controller 20

determines whether the conversation is finished at step SI 7. If it is determined that the

conversation has been finished, the controller 20 returns to the step S 15 and continuously

sends the advertising music.

However, if it is at the step S 16 that the advertising music listening stopping signal has been received, or if it is at the step SI 7 that the conversation has been finished,

the controller 20 stops the sending of the advertising music to the corresponding telephone

terminal or mobile telephone at step SI 8. Then, the controller 20 checks the advertising music listening time consumed by the corresponding advertising music listening subscriber

at step S19 and stores the corresponding advertising music listening time in the database 31

of the server 30 at step S20. And, if it is at the step S14 determined that the detected

telephone number has not been registered as the advertising music listening subscriber, it

does not send the advertising music. The advertising music listening time, which has been

stored in the database 31 of the server 30, is utilized for free call service for the

corresponding subscriber.

In the preferred embodiment of the present invention, as previously noted, while the

controller 20 is sending the background advertising music to the advertising music

listening subscriber during telephone conversation, if the advertising music listening

subscriber does not want to listen to the advertising music, he may press for example the

button '*' or '#' on the keypad of his telephone terminal or mobile telephone in order to

stop the listening to the advertising music. Therefore, if the controller 20 receives the

advertising music listening stopping signal from the advertising music listening subscriber,

it stops the sending of the advertising music and stores the advertising music listening time

consumed by the subscriber in the database 31 of the server 30.

In case where the telephone conversation is formed between the advertising music

listening subscriber and an non-subscribed user, the controller 20 in the repeater connected

to the telephone terminal or the mobile telephone thereof first detects whether he is

registered as the advertising music listening subscriber and then, in accordance with the checking result determines whether the advertising music is sent or not. Therefore, only the advertising music listening subscriber listens to the corresponding advertising music, but

the non-subscribed user does not listen to the advertising music.

While the embodiments described above of the present invention are applied over

the wire telephone and the mobile telephone, but they are not limited therein, which may be

applied over the Internet phone. In case where the preferred embodiment of the present

invention is applied in the Internet phone, in the same manner as above a controller 20 is

installed between a repeating apparatus for repeating conversation communication to an

Internet phone subscriber and the Internet phone subscriber. In this way, the controller 20

checks whether a subscriber who tries a call is registered as an advertising music listening

subscriber from a server 30 and if it is checked that the subscriber has been registered as

the advertising music listening subscriber, receives the advertising music from the server

30 and sends it to the corresponding Internet phone side. Therefore, the advertising music

is sent as the background music that does not interfere with the telephone conversation.

thereby providing the advertising service to the Internet phone subscriber.

As set forth in the above, there is provided a method for advertisement using

background music while telephone conversation which is capable of sending an advertising

music as the background music, for a predetermined time period, which does not interfere

with the telephone conversation in order for a telephone user to listen to the advertising

music, while the telephone user is talking over the wire telephone, the mobile telephone or the Internet phone, whereby consumption of a separate time of the telephone user for

listening the corresponding advertisement can be prevented and the hanging up of the

telephone receiver by the user's misunderstanding of the line mixing, which is caused when the advertisement is sent by force during the conversation, can be also prevented, such that more efficient advertisement than a conventional advertisement can be achieved.

Claims

WHAT IS CLAIMED IS:

1. A method for advertisement using background music while telephone conversation, said method comprising the steps of:

detecting a telephone number of a subscriber, if a call of the corresponding

subscriber is connected;

determining whether the detected telephone number has been registered as an

advertising music listening subscriber;

sending an advertising music to the corresponding subscriber as the background

music which does not interfere with the telephone conversation if it is determined that the

telephone number has been registered as the advertising music listening subscriber;

determining whether an advertising music listening stopping signal is received from

the subscriber during the sending of the advertising music or whether the telephone

conversation of the subscriber is finished;

stopping the sending of the advertising music and checking and storing the

advertising music listening time consumed by the subscriber, if it is determined that the

advertising music listening stopping signal has been received from the subscriber during

the sending of the advertising music or that the telephone conversation of the subscriber

has been finished.