Patent ID: 8073732

Claim:
A method for an institution having a large number of customers to create a program through which the customers receive incentive to permit the institution to sell information that belongs to the customers, the method comprising: inviting the customers to participate in the program; receiving, via a computing device, a plurality of demographic information from the customers; receiving, via a computing device, a request from a third party to purchase a customer list, wherein the request includes a plurality of demographic criteria; accessing, via computing device memory, the demographic information obtained from the customers; identifying, via a computing device processor, a plurality of customers whose demographic information matches the demographic criteria requested by the third party; obtaining, via a computing device processor, authorization from one or more of the plurality of customers for inclusion in the customer list based on the plurality of customers being identified as having demographic information that matches the demographic criteria; and constructing, via a computing device processor, the customer list comprising customers whose demographic information matches the demographic criteria requested by the third party and who have authorized their inclusion in the customer list, wherein the constructed customer list is subsequently sold to the third party and customers who were included in the customer list are compensated.