COMPARISON SHOP AD UNITS

• US 20080046314A1
• Filed: 08/17/2006
• Published: 02/21/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 08/17/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Google LLC (Alphabet Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Google Inc. (Alphabet Inc.)
• Inventors: Moonka, Rajas, Chung, David, Rajaram, Gokul
• Granted Patent: US 8,700,470 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/14
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0253 During e-commerce, i.e. online transactions
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0275 Auctions
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0276 Advertisement creation
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0277 Online advertisement
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0623 Item investigation

Abstract

Merchants create ecommerce-enabled ad units advertising items offered by the merchants. The ad units contain functionality enabling customers to purchase the items by interacting with the ad units. The ad units have associated bid prices that the merchants agree to pay for sales through the ad units. The merchants provide the ad units to a broker. The broker publishes the ad units on web pages provided by publishers as comparison shop ad units that contain multiple ad units and functionality for navigating among them. A customer receiving a web page interacts with an ad unit to purchase the item. During the interactions, the broker dynamically updates the ad unit to conduct the transaction.

Claims

1. A method of conducting electronic commerce on a network, comprising:

accessing a collection of electronic commerce-enabled ad units advertising items offered by merchants;

generating a comparison shop ad unit including two or more ad units selected from the collection and having functionality for navigating among the two or more ad units; and

publishing the comparison shop ad unit to customers via the network.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the ad units have associated bids the merchants pay responsive to purchases of the advertised items through the ad units and further comprising:

interacting with a customer through an ad unit of the published comparison shop ad unit to enable the customer to purchase an item advertised by the ad unit; and

collecting a bid associated with the ad unit in response to the customer'"'"'s purchase of the item.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

interfacing with a plurality of publishers on the network to define an inventory of ad spaces on web pages published by the publishers in which the comparison shop ad unit can be displayed,

wherein the comparison shop ad unit occupies a single ad space of a published web page.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the ad units have associated targeting criteria and the comparison shop ad unit is published on a web page, and generating a comparison shop ad unit comprises:

selecting ad units for inclusion in the comparison shop ad unit responsive to the ad units'"'"' associated targeting criteria and characteristics of the web page.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein generating a comparison shop ad unit comprises:

identifying an item to offer responsive to item selection criteria, the item selection criteria comprising characteristics of a web page on which the comparison shop ad unit is published; and

selecting ad units for inclusion in the comparison shop ad unit responsive to the identified item.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein generating a comparison shop ad unit comprises:

selecting ad units for inclusion in the comparison shop ad unit responsive to comparison metrics describing relative merits of items offered by the merchants.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein generating a comparison shop ad unit comprises:

selecting ad units for inclusion in the comparison shop ad unit responsive to ad unit selection criteria.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the ad unit selection criteria comprise one or more criteria from the set consisting of:

a price of an item offered for sale by an ad unit;

a reputation of a merchant offering an item via an ad unit;

a bid price associated with an ad unit; and

historical ad unit performance.

9. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

displaying a description region associated with the comparison shop ad unit, the description region providing information about an ad unit being displayed by the comparison shop ad unit.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the comparison shop ad unit includes ad units from a plurality of merchants.

11. A system for conducting electronic commerce on a network, comprising:

a comparison shop ad generation module for generating a comparison shop ad unit including two or more ad units selected from a collection of electronic commerce-enabled ad units advertising items offered by merchants and having functionality for navigating among the two or more ad units; and

an ad unit serving module for serving the comparison shop ad unit to customers via web pages published by publishers on the network.

12. The system of claim 11, wherein the ad units have associated bids the merchants pay responsive to customer purchases of the advertised items through the ad units and further comprising:

a commerce module for interacting with a customer through an ad unit of the published comparison shop ad unit to enable the customer to purchase an item advertised by the ad unit and for collecting a bid associated with the ad unit in response to the customer'"'"'s purchase of the item.

13. The system of claim 11, wherein the ad units have associated targeting criteria and wherein the comparison shop ad generation module selects ad units for inclusion in the comparison shop ad unit responsive to the ad units'"'"' associated targeting criteria and characteristics of the web pages.

14. The system of claim 11, wherein the comparison shop ad generation module identifies an item to offer responsive to item selection criteria and selects ad units for inclusion in the comparison shop ad unit responsive to the identified item.

15. The system of claim 14, wherein the item selection criteria comprise characteristics of a web page on which the comparison shop ad unit is served.

16. The system of claim 11, wherein the comparison shop ad generation module selects ad units for inclusion in the comparison shop ad unit responsive to ad unit selection criteria.

17. The system of claim 16, wherein the ad unit selection criteria comprise one or more criteria from the set consisting of:

a price of an item offered for sale by an ad unit;

a reputation of a merchant offering an item via an ad unit;

a bid price associated with an ad unit; and

historical ad unit performance.

18. A computer program product having a computer-readable medium having computer program code tangibly embodied therein for conducting electronic commerce on a network, the computer program code comprising:

a comparison shop ad generation module for generating a comparison shop ad unit including two or more ad units selected from a collection of electronic commerce-enabled ad units advertising items offered by merchants and having functionality for navigating among the two or more ad units; and

an ad unit serving module for serving the comparison shop ad unit to customers via web pages published by publishers on the network.

19. The computer program product of claim 18, wherein the ad units have associated bids the merchants pay responsive to customer purchases of the advertised items through the ad units and further comprising:

a commerce module for interacting with a customer through an ad unit of the published comparison shop ad unit to enable the customer to purchase an item advertised by the ad unit and for collecting a bid associated with the ad unit in response to the customer'"'"'s purchase of the item.

20. The computer program product of claim 18, wherein the ad units have associated targeting criteria and wherein the comparison shop ad generation module selects ad units for inclusion in the comparison shop ad unit responsive to the ad units'"'"' associated targeting criteria and characteristics of the web pages.

21. The computer program product of claim 18, wherein the comparison shop ad generation module identifies an item to offer responsive to item selection criteria and selects ad units for inclusion in the comparison shop ad unit responsive to the identified item.

22. The computer program product of claim 21, wherein the item selection criteria comprise characteristics of a web page on which the comparison shop ad unit is served.

23. The computer program product of claim 18, wherein the comparison shop ad generation module selects ad units for inclusion in the comparison shop ad unit responsive to ad unit selection criteria.

24. The computer program product of claim 23, wherein the ad unit selection criteria comprise one or more criteria from the set consisting of:

a price of an item offered for sale by an ad unit;

a reputation of a merchant offering an item via an ad unit;

a bid price associated with an ad unit; and

historical ad unit performance.