Patent ID: 7324962

Claim:
A method for cross marketing products between a first company and a second company engaged in a bilateral cross-marketing relationship, the method performed over an interconnected plurality of point-of-sale terminals and a server, and comprising the steps of: establishing a parameter of the cross-marketing relationship by mutual consent of the first and second companies, the parameter including a discount on a second product offered by the second company, the discount contingent upon a condition at least partially satisfied by a purchase of a first product offered for sale by the first company; at the first company, identifying a straight sale that includes the purchase of the first product by a particular consumer at a first point-of-sale terminal, granting the discount and storing an indication of the purchase of the first product in a database on the server; at the second company, receiving a request from the particular consumer for the second product, querying the database to determine that the particular consumer has purchased the first product from the first company, providing the discount on the second product, and updating the database to reflect the providing; based on the first product being a cross-marketed product, calculating and recording an amount of cross-marketing revenue realized from a predetermined portion of the cost of the straight sale to a marketing fund account in the database; and based on the providing of the discount, allocating at least a portion of the cross-marketing revenue and a predetermined portion of the cost of the discount in the fund to reimburse the second company for the discount.