Method and apparatus for identifying related searches in a database search system

• US 7,657,555 B2
• Filed: 03/29/2005
• Issued: 02/02/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 05/22/2000
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: R2 Solutions LLC (Acacia Research Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Yahoo! Inc. (Apollo Global Management, Inc.)
• Inventors: Haugaard, Bradley R., Rorex, Phillip G., Soulanille, Thomas A.
• Primary Examiner(s): Pham; Khanh B
• Application Number:
  US11/092,182
• Publication Number:
  US 20050240557A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,771 Days
• Field of Search: 707/3, 707/10, 707100-102
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9538 Presentation of query results
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0275 Auctions
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0277 Online advertisement
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/04 Trading; Exchange, e.g. stocks, commodities, derivatives or currency exchange
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99933 Query processing, i.e. searching
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99942 Manipulating data structure, e.g. compression, compaction, compilation
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99943 Generating database or data structure, e.g. via user interface

Abstract

A method of generating a search result list also provides related searches for use by a searcher. Search listings which generate a match with a search request submitted by the searcher are identified in a pay-for-placement database which includes a plurality of search listings. Related search listings contained in a related search database generated from the pay-for-placement database are identified as relevant to the search request. A search result list is returned to the searcher including the identified search listings and one or more of the identified search listings.

Claims

1. A method using a related searches database in conjunction with a search database of an online marketplace system, the method comprising:

forming the related searches database, including

using the search database, forming a list of uniform resource locators (URLs) associated with internet web sites to be accessed;

removing duplicate URLs from the list;

if a URL on the list is similar to another URL on the list, crawling a predetermined number of potentially duplicate URLs;

comparing bodies of the URL on the list and the potentially duplicate URLs;

if the body of the URL on the list is similar to the body of a potentially duplicate URL,

suspending crawling of the potentially duplicate URLs,

storing the body of the URL on the list in the related searches database for subsequent search,

indexing at least the stored body of the URL to form related search listings in the related searches database;

subsequently, receiving at the online marketplace system a search request from a searcher;

in the search database, identifying search listings generating a match with the search request;

in the related searches database, identifying related search listings relevant to the search request; and

returning a search result list to the searcher including the identified search listings and one or more of the identified related search listings.

2. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

comparing a selected URL with other URLs on the list; and

determining the URL is similar to the other URL on the list when the URL has a predetermined text portion in common with the other URL on the list.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein comparing bodies of the URL on the list and the potentially duplicate URLs comprises:

comparing text from the URL on the list and text from one potentially duplicate URL; and

determining the URL on the list is similar to the one potentially duplicate URL when the text from the URL on the list and the text from the one potentially duplicate URL have a predetermined text portion in common.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein identifying related search listings comprises:

searching an inverted index of the bidded search listing database; and

searching an index of meta-information based on the bidded search listing database.

5. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

sorting the identified related search listings by relevancy to the search request;

selecting a predetermined number of the identified related search listings as most relevant related search listings; and

returning the most relevant related search listings in the search result list.

6. The method of claim 5 wherein sorting comprises:

selecting the identified related search listings according to frequency of occurrence of a queried term from the search request in the related search listings.

7. The method of claim 5 wherein sorting comprises:

selecting the identified related search listings according to proximity of one or more queried terms from the search request in the related search listings.

8. The method of claim 5 wherein sorting comprises:

weighting the related search listings according to predetermined weighting criteria; and

selecting the identified related search listings according to the weighting of the related search listings.

9. The method of claim 8 wherein weighting the related search listings comprises:

increasing relative weighting of a related search listing which includes one or more bidded search terms identified by an advertiser.

10. The method of claim 8 wherein weighting the related search listings comprises:

increasing relative weighting of a related search listing which is contained in a description or a title or metatag keywords of a search listing identified by an advertiser.

11. The method of claim 8 wherein weighting the related search listings comprises:

increasing relative weighting of a related search listing which is contained in text data of a search listing identified by an advertiser.

12. The method of claim 5 wherein sorting comprises:

ranking the related search listings according to spread of the related search listings; and

selecting the identified related search listings according to the ranking of the related search listings.

13. A method for a database search system, the method comprising:

maintaining a bidded search listing database of bidded search listings, each bidded search listing having an associated search term;

forming a related searches database using the bidded search listing database, including

using the bidded search database, forming a list of uniform resource locators (URLs) associated with internet web sites to be accessed;

removing duplicate URLs from the list;

if a URL on the list is similar to another URL on the list, crawling a predetermined number of potentially duplicate URLs;

comparing bodies of the URL on the list and the potentially duplicate URLs;

if the body of the URL on the list is similar to the body of the potentially duplicate URL,

suspending crawling of the potentially duplicate URLs,

storing the body of the URL on the list in the related searches database for subsequent search;

receiving at a search engine web server associated with the bidded search listing database a search query from a user over a data link;

returning a search results page to the user over the data link, including

positioning bidded search listings from the bidded search listing database having a search term matching the search query in a first portion of the search results page,

positioning related search listings from the related search database in a second portion of the search results page, and

communicating the search results page to the user.

14. The method of claim 13 wherein positioning related search listings comprises placing hypertext links in the second portion of the search results page, each hypertext link corresponding to a search term of a bidded search listing of the bidded search listings database.

15. The method of claim 13 wherein positioning related search listings comprises:

selecting a predetermined number of most relevant and most bidded-on search terms in the related searches database; and

placing hypertext links corresponding to the selected search terms in the second portion of the search results page.

16. The method of claim 13 wherein positioning related search listings comprises placing a hypertext link in the second portion of the search results page which, upon actuation of the hypertext link, allows the user to display additional related search entries.

17. The method of claim 13 wherein positioning related search listings from the related searches database comprises:

at a related searches web server in data communication with the related searches database, determining related search listings which generate a match with the search query; and

ordering the determined related search listings according to predetermined ordering rules; and

establishing hypertext links in the search results page corresponding to the ordered related search listings.