System and method for distributing advertisements to third-party SMS content providers

• US 20090011781A1
• Filed: 06/24/2008
• Published: 01/08/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 06/25/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: mCore International, Inc. (Voltari Operating Corp.), Voltari Operating Corp.
• Original Assignee: Voltari Operating Corp.
• Inventors: Andronikov, Alec S., Merrill, Derek D.
• Granted Patent: US 8,600,415 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 455/466
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1859 adapted to provide push services, e.g. data channels
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/063 Content adaptation, e.g. replacement of unsuitable content
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/58 Message adaptation for wireless communication

Abstract

Methods, apparatuses and systems enabling delivery of advertising to third-party short message service (SMS) content providers. An SMS content provider sends a request to an ad server for an advertisement to append to an outgoing mobile terminated message. The ad server retrieves an advertisement from the ad database that meets available character constraints as well as targeting parameters based on user area code, time, content-channel, and content of the message. If targeting parameters are satisfied, the ad server sends advertisement to SMS content provider to append to outgoing message. The ad server sends receipt of delivery to reporting database. The present invention provides methods, apparatuses and systems for third-party SMS content providers to retrieve advertisements for delivery to their mobile users, track retrieval of advertisements, and receive compensation in exchange for advertisement distribution. The present invention provides methods, apparatuses and systems for advertisers to create text-based advertisements, set targeting parameters, and view ad delivery reports across all third-party SMS content affiliates.

Claims

1. A short message service (SMS) adverting distribution system facilitating advertisement message and data exchange between an advertisement aggregator and an SMS content provider, comprising an ad database storing at least one text-based advertisement with associated targeting parameters;

an application ad server operative to receive an advertisement request, select at least one advertisement that satisfies targeting parameters, retrieve from ad database one or more selected advertisements;

a third-party SMS application operative to send request for advertisement to ad server, interact with an SMS gateway to format message protocol for each SMS Center, transmit at least one message to a remote wireless device;

a campaign management application to create and manage advertisements within ad database;

a reporting database to show advertisement delivery statistics.

2. The system of claim 1 wherein the third-party SMS application provides message content, user phone number and time stamp to application ad server.

3. The system of claim 1 wherein each third-party SMS application provides a unique identification number to application ad server for authentication, advertisement retrieval, advertisement reporting, and content-channel.

4. The system of claim 3 wherein a content-channel is defined by the type of SMS content or service a third-party message provider distributes. These types of content and services include:

news and information, mobile search, entertainment, sports, social communities (one to group messaging), and person to person messaging.

5. The system of claim 1 wherein the application ad server counts the characters available in SMS message transmitted from third-party SMS application and selects advertisements from ad database that have character counts less than or equal to available characters.

6. The system of claim 5 wherein a standard SMS message contains 160 alphanumeric characters including spaces.

7. The system of claim 1 wherein an advertisement has conditional targeting parameters established in the campaign management application that must be satisfied before being distributed for attachment to outgoing third-party SMS message:

a) area code

b) time

c) content-channel and/or

d) contextual keyword

8. The system of claim 7 wherein area code is a U.S. area code found in the phone number of the wireless device receiving the mobile terminated SMS message.

9. The system of claim 7 wherein time is the time stamp established when third-party SMS application requests an advertisement.

10. The system of claim 7 wherein each third-party SMS content provider is assigned a content-channel identification and will only be provided advertisements that match that content-channel designation.

11. The system of claim 7 wherein contextual keyword match is the analysis of words contained in the SMS message body and those tagged to the advertisement. The contextual keyword analysis looks for direct word matches, plurals, misspellings, synonyms, as well as popular text message grammar translations.

12. The system of claim 1 wherein an advertisement has conditional campaign parameters established in the campaign management application that must be satisfied before being distributed for attachment to outgoing third-party SMS message:

a) advertisement campaign must be set to “

active”

status

b) time of server request must be between campaign start and end dates

c) advertisement account must contain a positive balance

d) advertisement campaign must not exceed daily budget

13. The system of claim 1 wherein the application ad server further selects advertisements from ad database based on the following rules:

a) determining maximum character length

b) determining area code match

c) determining time match

d) determining content-channel match, and/or

e) determining contextual keyword match

14. The system of claim 13 wherein multiple ads meet campaign and targeting criteria, the advertisement with a higher price value will be selected.

15. The system of claim 1 wherein upon delivery of advertisement to third-party SMS application the application ad server sends receipt of delivery to reporting database.

16. The system of claim 15 wherein the reporting database records total advertisements delivered to third-party SMS message provider and reporting application provides total commissions earned by SMS message provider and total fees owed by advertiser.

17. The system of claim 1 wherein advertisements are created in the campaign management application. An advertisement is comprised of campaign parameters, targeting parameters, creative ad copy, conversion ad copy, and conversion types.

18. The system of claim 17 wherein the advertisement'"'"'s creative ad copy is in the form of text. Several ad copy formats are presented, differing by character size. A single campaign may contain several ad copy formats:

a) 55 character ad copy with spaces, 5 characters for formatting=60 total characters

b) 35 character ad copy with spaces, 5 characters for formatting=40 total characters

c) 20 character ad copy with spaces, 5 characters for formatting=25 total characters

19. The system of claim 1 wherein creative ad copy contains conversion types such as:

a) text a ‘

keyword’

to a shortcode, then receive a response message containing conversion ad copy

b) reply to message with ‘

keyword’

, then receive a response message containing conversion ad copy

c) URL hyperlink to website

d) Toll-free or local tracking number

20. The system of claim 19 wherein user response to conversion types are submitted to reporting database.

21. The system of claim 20 wherein conversion ad copy contains secondary conversion action to opt-in to future alerts from advertiser by replying with ‘

keyword’

to message.

22. The system of claim 19 wherein each ‘

keyword’

is unique to each creative ad copy and the advertiser is billed for each user who texts in ‘

keyword’

or reply'"'"'s to message with keyword.

23. The system of claim 19 wherein each URL hyperlink is unique to each creative ad copy and the advertiser is billed for each visit to URL.

24. The system of claim 19 wherein each toll-free or local tracking number is unique to each creative ad copy and calls through the tracking number can be billed on a per-call basis to the advertiser

25. The system of claim 19 wherein the conversion ad copy is sent by SMS to the user through the designated short code included in the creative ad copy.

26. The system of claim 1 wherein the campaign management application provides advertisement reporting summaries from the reporting database.

27. The system of claim 1 wherein the advertisement is composed of no more than 160 characters of text for delivery by SMS.

28. The system of claim 1 wherein the advertisement is composed of graphic images for delivery by MMS.

29. The system of claim 1 wherein the SMS content provider is any service that sends outgoing mobile terminated short message service (SMS) messages, whether that be content generated by the service provider, content aggregated from other sources, or content generated by users themselves through person-to-person messaging.