System for modifying queries before presentation to a sponsored search generator or other matching system where modifications improve coverage without a corresponding reduction in relevance

• US 20060206474A1
• Filed: 03/10/2005
• Published: 09/14/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 03/10/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: R2 Solutions LLC (Acacia Research Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Yahoo! Inc. (Apollo Global Management, Inc.)
• Inventors: Sharma, Nitin, Kapur, Shyam
• Granted Patent: US 7,668,808 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9532 Query formulation
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99933 Query processing, i.e. searching

Abstract

Techniques are provided for modifying queries to increase the number of sponsored links that are returned in response to the queries. A query modification system uses a predefined set of rules that are designated to modify a query to increase the chance that the modified query will match more sponsored links. The modified query is then matched against a listing of search query strings that have been pre-selected by sponsors. Each pre-selected search query strings corresponds to one or more sponsored web links. If the modified query matches one of the pre-selected search query strings, the corresponding sponsored web links are returned and displayed to the user.

Claims

1. A method for increasing coverage of a search query for sponsored links, the method comprising:

receiving a query to perform an Internet search;

modifying the query to produce a modified query using rules designed to increase a chance that the modified query matches more predefined query strings, wherein the predefined query strings have been selected by sponsors to correspond to sponsored links;

identifying at least one of the predefined query strings that matches the modified query; and

returning at least one of the sponsored links that one of the sponsors has corresponded to said at least one predefined query string.

2. The method according to claim 1 wherein modifying the query to produce the modified query further comprises:

determining how frequently units in the query appear in previously submitted queries, wherein each of the units corresponds to one concept in the query; and

modifying the query by eliminating the units in the query that appear more frequently in the previously submitted queries.

3. The method according to claim 1 wherein modifying the query to produce the modified query further comprises:

determining how frequently associated units in the query appear in previously submitted queries, wherein each of the units corresponds to one concept in the query; and

modifying the query by eliminating the associated units in the query that appear less frequently in the previously submitted queries.

4. The method according to claim 1 wherein modifying the query to produce the modified query further comprises:

determining how frequently groups of units in the query appear in previously submitted queries, wherein each of the units corresponds to one concept in the query; and

modifying the query by eliminating the groups of units in the query that appear less frequently in the previously submitted queries to produce a preliminary modified query.

5. The method according to claim 4 wherein modifying the query to produce the modified query further comprises:

modifying the preliminary modified query to produce the modified query by eliminating the groups of units in the preliminary modified query that have less units.

6. The method according to claim 1 further comprising:

before the query is modified to produce the modified query, attempting to identify which of the predefined query strings match the query; and

returning a result that includes a subset of the sponsored links, wherein the modified query is generated only if the result includes less sponsored links than a predetermined number.

7. The method according to claim 6 wherein modifying the query to produce the modified query using the rules further comprises:

determining how frequently units, groups of units or associated units in the query appear in previously submitted queries, wherein each of the units corresponds to one concept in the query.

8. The method according to claim 1 wherein the query is modified to produce the modified query before an attempt is made to match the query to the predefined query strings.

9. The method according to claim 1 further comprising:

performing the Internet search based on the query using a search engine to generate search results; and

displaying said at least one of the sponsored links on a display screen along with the search results.

10. The method according to claim 1 wherein modifying the query to produce the modified query further comprises:

substituting the query with a synonym or a preferred form that corresponds to one of the predefined query strings.

11. A computer system designed to improve coverage of a search query, the computer system comprising:

code for receiving a query to perform an Internet search;

code for modifying the query to produce a modified query using rules designed to increase a chance that the modified query matches more predefined query strings;

code for identifying at least one of the predefined query strings that matches the modified query; and

a computer readable medium for storing the codes.

12. The computer system defined in claim 11 wherein the predefined query strings have been selected by sponsors to correspond to sponsored links.

13. The computer system defined in claim 12 further comprising:

code for returning at least one of the sponsored links that corresponds to said at least one predefined query string.

14. The computer system defined in claim 11 wherein the code for modifying the query to produce the modified query further comprises:

code for calculating how frequently units in the query appear in previously submitted queries, wherein each of the units corresponds to one concept in the query; and

code for eliminating the units in the query that appear more frequently in the previously submitted queries.

15. The computer system defined in claim 11 wherein the code for modifying the query to produce the modified query further comprises:

code for calculating how frequently associated units in the query appear in previously submitted queries, wherein each of the units corresponds to one concept in the query; and

code for eliminating the associated units in the query that appear less frequently in the previously submitted queries.

16. The computer system defined in claim 11 wherein the code for modifying the query to produce the modified query further comprises:

code for calculating how frequently groups of units in the query appear in previously submitted queries, wherein each of the units corresponds to one concept in the query; and

code for eliminating the groups of units in the query that appear less frequently in the previously submitted queries to produce a preliminary modified query.

17. The computer system defined in claim 16 wherein the code for modifying the query to produce the modified query further comprises:

code for eliminating the groups of units in the preliminary modified query that have less units to produce the modified query.

18. The computer system defined in claim 12 further comprising:

code for attempting to identify which of the predefined query strings match the query, before the query is modified to produce the modified query; and

code for returning a result that includes sponsored links, wherein the code for modifying the query produces the modified query only if the result includes less sponsored links than a predetermined number.

19. The computer system defined in claim 11 wherein the query is modified to produce the modified query before an attempt is made to match the query to the predefined query strings.

20. The computer system defined in claim 13 further comprising:

code for performing the Internet search based on the query using a search engine to generate search results; and

code for displaying said at least one of the sponsored links on a display screen along with the search results.

21. The computer system defined in claim 11 wherein the code for modifying the query to produce the modified query further comprises:

code for determining how frequently units, groups of units or associated units in the query appear in previously submitted queries, wherein each of the units corresponds to one concept in the query.

22. The computer system defined in claim 11 wherein the code for modifying the query to produce the modified query further comprises:

code for substituting the query with a synonym or a preferred form that corresponds to one of the predefined query strings.