Patent ID: 7330829

Claim:
An electronic commerce system that provides market feedback to sellers, comprising: one or more memory units storing program instructions for: recording query information associated with a search query of one or more seller databases containing product data, the search query involving a search by a buyer; recording presentation information associated with the manner in which a plurality of search results are presented to the buyer, each search result comprising data for a product matching one or more search criteria specified in the search query, the search results comprising one or more search results reflecting product data for a particular seller; recording selection information associated with selection by the buyer of a particular search result from among the plurality of search results, the particular search result comprising data for a particular product matching one or more search criteria specified in the search query, wherein the particular product is a product of a seller other than the particular seller; and providing the recorded query information and at least one of the presentation information and the selection information to the particular seller to allow the particular seller to assess one or more aspects of its product data relative to product data of other sellers; and one or more processing units that execute the stored program instructions to: record query information associated with a search query for a buyer of one or more seller databases containing product data; record presentation information associated with the manner in which a plurality of search results are presented to the buyer, each search result comprising data for a product matching one or more search criteria specified in the search query, the search results comprising one or more search results reflecting product data for a particular seller; record selection information associated with selection by the buyer of a particular search result from among the plurality of search results, the particular search result comprising data for a particular product matching one or more search criteria specified in the search query; and provide the recorded query information and at least one of the presentation information and the selection information to the particular seller to allow the particular seller to assess one or more aspects of its product data relative to product data of other sellers.