Serving advertisements based on content

• US 20040093327A1
• Filed: 02/26/2003
• Published: 05/13/2004
• Est. Priority Date: 09/24/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Google LLC (Alphabet Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Google Inc. (Alphabet Inc.)
• Inventors: Cui, Yingwei, Buchheit, Paul, Jindal, Deepak, Shivakumar, Narayanan, Dean, Jeffrey A., Carobus, Alexander Paul, Anderson, Darrell, Harik, Georges R.
• Granted Patent: US 7,136,875 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/24537 of operators
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9538 Presentation of query results
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0251 Targeted advertisements
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/944 Business related
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99945 Object-oriented database structure processing
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99948 Application of database or data structure, e.g. distributed, multimedia, or image

Abstract

Advertisers are permitted to put targeted ads on page on the web (or some other document of any media type). The present invention may do so by (i) obtaining content that includes available spots for ads, (ii) determining ads relevant to content, and/or (iii) combining content with ads determined to be relevant to the content.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

a) accepting a request for content-relevant advertisements, the request including a document identifier;

b) responsive to the request and using the document identifier, determining whether or not document information is available locally;

c) if it is determined that the document information is not available locally, performing one of;

(i) using a script to have a content rendering application provide document information,

(ii) retrieving the document information immediately, and

(iii) saving the document identifier for later retrieval.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the document is a Web page and the document identifier is a URL.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein the document information is textual content.

4. The method of claim 1 further comprising, if it is determined that the document information is available locally, performing at least one of (A) extracting document relevance information using the document information and (B) generating document relevance information using the document information.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein if the document information is not available locally and if the document identifier is saved for later retrieval, further

(d) serving at least one of (A) a house advertisement, (B) a blank advertisement,

(C) a random advertisement, and (D) a well performing advertisement without regard to its relevance.

26. A machine-readable medium including machine-executable instructions which, when executed perform the method of claim 1.

6. A method for retrieving document information comprising:

a) accepting a set of document identifiers corresponding to at least one of (A) document identifiers associated with prior unserved content-relevant ad requests and (B) document identifiers provided by content providers; and

b) retrieving document information from documents corresponding to the set of document identifiers.

7. The method of claim 6 wherein the documents are Web pages, the document identifiers are URLs, and the act of retrieving includes crawling the Web pages identified by the URLs.

27. A machine-readable medium including machine-executable instructions which, when executed perform the method of claim 6.

8. A method for obtaining document information for use in serving a content-relevant ad request, sourced by one of (A) a content provider serving content to a content rendering application and (B) a content rendering application, the method comprising:

a) returning executable instructions for reading document information to the content rendering application; and

b) setting, with the content rendering application, a document identifier, to address desired document information.

9. The method of claim 8 wherein the executable instructions are Javascript and wherein the content rendering application is a browser.

10. The method of claim 8 wherein a document identifier is set to address desired document information by determining whether or not the executable instructions were returned to a frame embedded in a main document, or a main document, wherein the main document includes the document information.

11. The method of claim 10 wherein whether or not the executable instruction is returned to a frame or a main document is determined by:

(i) attempting to compare a location to which the executable instructions were returned with a main document location,

(ii) if the comparison indicates that they are the same page, setting the document identifier to the location to which the executable instructions were sent, and

(iii) if the comparison indicates either a mismatch or a security violation, setting the document identifier to a document referrer to the location to which the executable instructions were sent.

28. A machine-readable medium including machine-executable instructions which, when executed perform the method of claim 8.

12. A method for obtaining document information for use in serving a content relevant ad request, sourced by one of (A) a content provider serving content to a content rendering application and (B) a content rendering application the method comprising:

a) returning a link to executable instructions for reading document information to the content rendering application; and

b) setting, with the content rendering application, a document identifier, to address desired document information.

13. The method of claim 12 wherein the executable instructions are Javascript and where in the content rendering application is a browser.

14. The method of claim 12 wherein a document identifier is set to address desired document information by determining whether or not the link to the executable instructions were returned to a frame embedded in a document or a main document including the document information.

15. The method of claim 14 wherein whether or not the executable instruction is returned to a frame or a main document is determined by:

(i) attempting to compare a location to which the link to the executable instructions was returned with a main document location,

(ii) if the comparison indicates that they are the same page, setting the document identifier to the location to which the link to the executable instructions was sent, and

(iii) if the comparison indicates either a mismatch or a security violation, setting the document identifier to a document referrer to the location to which the link to the executable instructions was sent.

29. A machine-readable medium including machine-executable instructions which, when executed perform the method of claim 12.

16. A machine-readable medium having stored thereon

a) a first set of document information extracted from a shallow crawl of Websites;

and

b) a second set of document information extracted from a deep crawl of targeted Websites.

17. The machine-readable medium of claim 16 wherein the targeted Websites include Websites provided by content providers having available ad spots.

18. The machine-readable medium of claim 16 wherein the targeted Websites include Web pages identified in earlier, unfilled, content-relevant ad requests.

19. Apparatus comprising:

a) an input for accepting a request for content-relevant advertisements, the request including a document identifier;

b) means responsive to the request and using the document identifier, for determining whether or not document information is available locally;

c) means, if it is determined that the document information is not available locally, for performing one of;

(i) using a script to have a content rendering application provide document information,

(ii) retrieving the document information immediately, and

(iii) saving the document identifier for later retrieval.

20. The apparatus of claim 19 wherein the document is a Web page and the document identifier is a URL.

21. The apparatus of claim 19 wherein the document information is textual content.

22. The apparatus of claim 19 further comprising, means, if it is determined that the document information is available locally, for performing at least one of (A) extracting document relevance information using the document information and (B) generating document relevance information using the document information.

23. The apparatus of claim 19 further comprising means, if the document information is not available locally and if the document identifier is saved for later retrieval, for serving at least one of (A) a house advertisement, (B) a blank advertisement, (C) a random advertisement, and (D) a well performing advertisement without regard to its relevance.

24. Apparatus for retrieving document information comprising:

a) an input for accepting a set of document identifiers corresponding to at least one of (A) document identifiers associated with prior unserved content-relevant ad requests and (B) document identifiers provided by content providers; and

b) means for retrieving document information from documents corresponding to the set of document identifiers.

25. The apparatus of claim 24 wherein the documents are Web pages, the document identifiers are URLs, and the act of retrieving includes crawling the Web pages identified by the URLs.