Systems and methods for placing advertisements

• US 20070192794A1
• Filed: 02/16/2007
• Published: 08/16/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 02/16/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: CEVA Technologies, Inc. (CEVA Incorporated)
• Original Assignee: Hillcrest Laboratories Incorporated (CEVA Incorporated)
• Inventors: Gritton, Charles, Curtis, Christian
• Granted Patent: US 8,180,672 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 725/42
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04817 using icons graphical or visual programming using iconic symbols G06F8/34
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0482 Interaction with lists of selectable items, e.g. menus
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0241 Advertisements
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0251 Targeted advertisements
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 20/38 Arrangements for distribution where lower stations, e.g. receivers, interact with the broadcast
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 60/31 Arrangements for monitoring the use made of the broadcast services
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 60/33 Arrangements for monitoring the users' behaviour or opinions
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 60/65 for using the result on users' side
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4312 involving specific graphical features, e.g. screen layout, special fonts or colors, blinking icons, highlights or animations
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4314 for fitting data in a restricted space on the screen, e.g. EPG data in a rectangular grid
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4316 for displaying supplemental content in a region of the screen, e.g. an advertisement in a separate window
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4438 Window management, e.g. event handling following interaction with the user interface
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/466 Learning process for intelligent management, e.g. learning user preferences for recommending movies services using the results of monitoring in broadcast systems H04H60/61
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/47 End-user applications
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/47214 for content reservation or setting reminders; for requesting event notification, e.g. of sport results or stock market stock exchange data over packet-switching network H04L12/1804; push services over packet-switching network H04L12/1859; notification of incoming messages in packet switching networks H04L51/224
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/478 Supplemental services, e.g. displaying phone caller identification, shopping application
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/812 involving advertisement data advertising per se G06Q30/02
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/163 by receiver means only

Abstract

Systems and methods provide techniques for associating advertisements with relevant content on a user interface. A method for placing advertisements on a user interface includes providing a user interface having a plurality of user interface screens, at least some of the plurality of user interface screens containing user-selectable control objects, and determining which of a plurality of advertisements to display on a user interface screen based on at least one of the following criteria: topical relevance, contextual relevance, path relevance and cognitive prominence

Claims

1. A method for placing advertisements on a user interface comprising the steps of:

providing a zoomable user interface having a plurality of user interface screens, at least some of said plurality of graphical user interface screens containing user-selectable objects associated with media selections;

linking said user interface screens together by predetermined paths, wherein each of said plurality of user interface screens can be reached via a predetermined set of said paths;

receiving user input resulting in zooming transitions from one of said plurality of graphical user interface screens to a currently displayed another of said graphical user interface screens;

wherein a semantic context associated with reaching one of said currently displayed another of said plurality of user interface screens is determined based upon a particular path within said set of predetermined paths taken to reach said currently displayed another of said plurality of user interface screens; and

placing at least one advertisement on said currently displayed another of said plurality of user interface screens based on said determined semantic context,

wherein said semantic context is further determined based upon contextual relevance, said contextual relevance being calculated as;

$\mathrm{HD}<br><br>\left(q,c\right)=\underset{x\in <br><br>\left\{P_q-P_c\right\}}{\sum <br><br>}<br><br>\frac{\mathrm{\alpha <br><br>}}{r_x}+\underset{y\in <br><br>\left\{P_c-P_q\right\}}{\sum <br><br>}<br><br>\frac{\mathrm{\beta <br><br>}}{r_y}+\underset{z\in <br><br>\left\{q,c\right\}}{\sum <br><br>}<br><br>\frac{\mathrm{\gamma <br><br>}}{r_z}$

where;

α

, β

, and γ

are weighting factors,

r_n is a hierarchical level of a given topic, and

P_n is a set of parent topics of an item.

2. A method for placing advertisements on a user interface comprising the steps of:

providing a user interface having a plurality of graphical user interface screens, at least some of said plurality of user interface screens containing user-selectable control objects; and

determining which of a plurality of advertisements to display on a user interface screen based on at least one of the following criteria;

topical relevance, contextual relevance, path relevance and cognitive prominence.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein said at least one criteria includes topical relevance and wherein said topical relevance is a measure of a relationship between one or more topics associated with each advertisement and one or more topics associated with said user-selectable control objects on said respective user interface screen.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein said topical relevance is calculated as:

${\mathrm{\mu <br><br>}}_T<br><br>\left(a,p\right)=\underset{i=0}{\overset{n}{\sum <br><br>}}<br><br>\frac{\mathrm{\delta <br><br>}<br><br>\left(a\bigcap <br><br>t_i\right)}{\mathrm{\delta <br><br>}<br><br>\left(a\right)+\mathrm{\delta <br><br>}<br><br>\left(t_i\right)}$

where δ

is the distance of a topic point from the root node.

5. The method of claim 2, wherein said at least one criteria includes contextual relevance and wherein said contextual relevance is a measure of a relationship between a theme of the respective user interface screen and a theme associated with each advertisement.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein said contextual relevance is calculated as:

$\mathrm{HD}<br><br>\left(q,c\right)=\underset{x\in <br><br>\left\{P_q-P_c\right\}}{\sum <br><br>}<br><br>\frac{\mathrm{\alpha <br><br>}}{r_x}+\underset{y\in <br><br>\left\{P_c-P_q\right\}}{\sum <br><br>}<br><br>\frac{\mathrm{\beta <br><br>}}{r_y}+\underset{z\in <br><br>\left\{q,c\right\}}{\sum <br><br>}<br><br>\frac{\mathrm{\gamma <br><br>}}{r_z}$

where;

α

, β

, and γ

are weighting factors

r_n is the hierarchical level of a given topic

P_n is the set of parent topics (superclasses) of an item.

7. The method of claim 2, wherein said at least one criteria includes path relevance and wherein said path relevance uses information associated with a user'"'"'s navigation path through the user interface to determine relevant ones of said plurality of advertisements.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein said path relevance is calculated as:

r=<

r₁,r₂, . . . ,r_n>

where each element of the vector r_i is the clickthrough rate for a given possible predecessor page i.

9. The method of claim 2, wherein said at least one criteria includes cognitive prominence and where said cognitive prominence criteria divides a screen into zones relating to frequency of being seen by a user.

10. The method of claim 9, where said cognitive prominence is calculated by the steps of:

dividing a screen on which said user interface is displayed gridwise into nine zones, and

assigning each zone a weighting factor between 0 and 1.

11. The method of claim 2, wherein said step of determining further comprises the steps of:

determining one or more advertisements that maximizes clickthrough rate, maximizes cognitive prominence, maximizes topical relevance (minimizes topical distance), maximizes contextual relevance (minimizes hierarchical distance), and maximizes the cost per click.

12. The method of claim 2, further comprising the step of:

displaying at least one advertisement on said user interface as a result of said determining step.

13. The method of claim 2, wherein said user interface has a plurality of different interface screens, each interface screen being individually displayable at a time;

and

further wherein each interface screen can be reached through at least one predetermined path through others of said plurality of different interface screens,

wherein said step of determining which of a plurality of advertisements to display on a user interface screen based on at least one of the following criteria;

topical relevance, contextual relevance, path relevance and cognitive prominence, involves using semantic context associated with a one of said at least one of said predetermined paths used to reach a currently displayed user interface screen.

14. A user interface comprising:

a zoomable user interface having a plurality of user interface screens, at least some of said plurality of user interface screens containing user-selectable objects associated with media selections;

wherein said user interface screens are linked together by predetermined paths, wherein each of said plurality of user interface screens can be reached via a predetermined set of said paths;

an interface for receiving user input resulting in zooming transitions from one of said plurality of user interface screens to a currently displayed another of said user interface screens;

wherein a semantic context associated with reaching one of said currently displayed another of said plurality of user interface screens is determined based upon a particular path within said set of predetermined paths taken to reach said currently displayed another of said plurality of user interface screens; and

at least one advertisement placed on said currently displayed another of said plurality of user interface screens, said at least one advertisement selected based on said determined semantic context,

wherein said semantic context is further determined based upon contextual relevance, said contextual relevance being calculated as;

$\mathrm{HD}<br><br>\left(q,c\right)=\underset{x\in <br><br>\left\{P_q-P_c\right\}}{\sum <br><br>}<br><br>\frac{\mathrm{\alpha <br><br>}}{r_x}+\underset{y\in <br><br>\left\{P_c-P_q\right\}}{\sum <br><br>}<br><br>\frac{\mathrm{\beta <br><br>}}{r_y}+\underset{z\in <br><br>\left\{q,c\right\}}{\sum <br><br>}<br><br>\frac{\mathrm{\gamma <br><br>}}{r_z}$

where;

α

, β

, and γ

are weighting factors,

r_n is a hierarchical level of a given topic, and

P_n is a set of parent topics of an item.

15. A user interface comprising:

a user interface having a plurality of user interface screens, at least some of said plurality of user interface screens containing user-selectable control objects; and

at least one advertisement displayed on a currently displayed one of said plurality of user interface screens,

wherein said at least one advertisement is selected from a plurality of advertisements to display on said currently displayed user interface screen based on at least one of the following criteria;

topical relevance, contextual relevance, path relevance and cognitive prominence.

16. The user interface of claim 15, wherein said at least one criteria includes topical relevance and wherein said topical relevance is a measure of a relationship between one or more topics associated with each advertisement and one or more topics associated with said user-selectable control objects on said respective user interface screen.

17. The user interface of claim 16, wherein said topical relevance is calculated as:

${\mathrm{\mu <br><br>}}_T<br><br>\left(a,p\right)=\underset{i=0}{\overset{n}{\sum <br><br>}}<br><br>\frac{\mathrm{\delta <br><br>}<br><br>\left(a\bigcap <br><br>t_i\right)}{\mathrm{\delta <br><br>}<br><br>\left(a\right)+\mathrm{\delta <br><br>}<br><br>\left(t_i\right)}$

where δ

is the distance of a topic point from the root node.

18. The user interface of claim 15, wherein said at least one criteria includes contextual relevance and wherein said contextual relevance is a measure of a relationship between a theme of the respective user interface screen and a theme associated with each advertisement.

19. The user interface of claim 15, wherein said contextual relevance is calculated as:

$\mathrm{HD}<br><br>\left(q,c\right)=\underset{x\in <br><br>\left\{P_q-P_c\right\}}{\sum <br><br>}<br><br>\frac{\mathrm{\alpha <br><br>}}{r_x}+\underset{y\in <br><br>\left\{P_c-P_q\right\}}{\sum <br><br>}<br><br>\frac{\mathrm{\beta <br><br>}}{r_y}+\underset{z\in <br><br>\left\{q,c\right\}}{\sum <br><br>}<br><br>\frac{\mathrm{\gamma <br><br>}}{r_z}$

where;

α

, β

, and γ

are weighting factors

r_n is the hierarchical level of a given topic

P_n is the set of parent topics (superclasses) of an item.

20. The user interface of claim 15, wherein said at least one criteria includes path relevance and wherein said path relevance uses information associated with a user'"'"'s navigation path through the user interface to determine relevant ones of said plurality of advertisements.

21. The user interface of claim 20, wherein said path relevance is calculated as:

r=<

r₁,r₂, . . . , r_n>

where each element of the vector r_i is the clickthrough rate for a given possible predecessor page i.

22. The user interface of claim 15, wherein said at least one criteria includes cognitive prominence and where said cognitive prominence criteria divides a screen into zones relating to frequency of being seen by a user.

23. The user interface of claim 22, where said cognitive prominence is calculated by the steps of:

dividing a screen on which said user interface is displayed gridwise into nine zones, and

assigning each zone a weighting factor between 0 and 1.

24. The user interface of claim 15, wherein user interface further selects said at least one advertisements that maximizes clickthrough rate, maximizes cognitive prominence, maximizes topical relevance (minimizes topical distance), maximizes contextual relevance (minimizes hierarchical distance), and maximizes the cost per click.

25. The user interface of claim 15, wherein said selection of said at least one advertisement is performed by executing a selection algorithm on a server-side processor.

26. The user interface of claim 15, wherein said selection of said at least one advertisement is performed by executing a selection algorithm on a client-side processor.

27. A computer-readable medium containing instructions which, when executed on a computer, perform the steps of:

providing a user interface having a plurality of graphical user interface screens, at least some of said plurality of user interface screens containing user-selectable control objects; and

determining which of a plurality of advertisements to display on a user interface screen based on at least one of the following criteria;

topical relevance, contextual relevance, path relevance and cognitive prominence.

28. An advertisement placement system comprising:

means for providing a user interface having a plurality of graphical user interface screens, at least some of said plurality of user interface screens containing user-selectable control objects; and

means for determining which of a plurality of advertisements to display on a user interface screen based on at least one of the following criteria;

topical relevance, contextual relevance, path relevance and cognitive prominence.

29. An advertisement selection method comprising:

providing a plurality of advertisements, each of which have at least one keyword associated therewith selected from among a plurality of keywords, wherein each of said plurality of keywords have a hierarchical level associated therewith;

providing a plurality of user interface screens, each of which have at least one of said plurality of keywords associated therewith;

selecting at least one of said plurality of advertisements for placement on one of said plurality of user interface screens based on a calculation involving each of said at least one keywords associated, respectively, with said plurality of advertisements and said at least one of said plurality of keywords associated with said one of said plurality of user interface screens, wherein said calculation further involves at least one of the following criteria;

topical relevance, contextual relevance, path relevance and cognitive prominence; and

displaying said selected at least one of said plurality of advertisements on said one of said plurality of user interface screens.