Internet advertising system that provides ratings-based incentives to advertisers

• US 8,112,310 B1
• Filed: 12/06/2005
• Issued: 02/07/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 01/21/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: A9.com Incorporated (Amazon.com, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: A9.com Incorporated (Amazon.com, Inc.)
• Inventors: Yehoshua, Tamar, Leblang, Jonathan, Manber, Udi, Ortega, Ruben E., Natta, Owen Van
• Primary Examiner(s): Tarae, Michelle
• Application Number:
  US11/294,757
• Time in Patent Office: 2,254 Days
• Field of Search: 705/10, 705/14, 705/26
• US Class Current: 705/14.42
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/00 Commerce
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0243 Comparative campaigns

Abstract

An ad placement system provides functionality for users to rate advertisers associated with particular ads they view, and/or to rate particular ads. The ratings supplied by individual users in association with a given advertiser are used by the system to generate an average or other aggregate rating for the advertiser. This aggregate rating is exposed to users in association with the advertiser'"'"'s ad or ads, allowing users to efficiently take the advertiser'"'"'s reputation into consideration in deciding whether to click through or otherwise select such ads to access the advertiser'"'"'s web page or site. For example, in one embodiment, each ad is displayed with a corresponding visual indication of the aggregate rating of the advertiser.

Claims

1. An ad placement system, comprising:

a first user interface component operative to enable advertisers to specify ads, and to associate such ads with keywords;

a data repository operative to store the ads created via the first user interface component in association with corresponding advertisers and keywords;

an ad server system operative to select ads from the data repository for display on web pages based, at least in part, on the associations between ads and keywords, the ad server system comprising one or more physical servers;

a ratings system comprising computer hardware, the ratings system operative to;

collect and store ratings data for a plurality of ads provided by a selected advertiser, said ratings data collected by the ratings system via a second user interface component that enables users to supply ratings in association with the ads represented in the data repository,

calculate an aggregate rating for the selected advertiser based at least partly on the ratings data,

output a history user interface including a representation of a second plurality of ads previously selected by a selected one of the users, the history user interface configured to provide functionality for the selected user to choose one of the second plurality of ads to rate; and

an incentive determination component that is operative to;

determine whether to provide a discount to the selected advertiser based, at least in part, on the aggregate rating for the selected advertiser;

determine an amount of the discount to be provided to the selected advertiser based at least partly on the aggregate rating;

automatically apply said discount by reducing cost-per-click charges for a plurality of ads of the selected advertiser in connection with ad selection events, such that user ratings of a first ad of the advertiser are taken into consideration in determining a particular discount that is applied to at least a second ad of the advertiser; and

take ad click-through rates into consideration in calculating said discounts, such that advertisers whose ads produce higher click-through rates are provided greater discounts than at least some advertisers whose ads produce lower click-through rates.

2. The ad placement system of claim 1, wherein the ratings system is further operative to enable users to rate particular advertisers, and the incentive determination component is further operative to use the advertiser ratings to determine discounts to be given to corresponding advertisers.

3. The ad placement system of claim 1, wherein the incentive determination component is further operative to calculate, for the selected advertiser, a discount that is directly proportional to the aggregate rating of the advertiser.

4. The ad placement system of claim 1, wherein the discounts include free click-through transactions.

5. The ad placement system of claim 1, wherein the ad placement system is further operative to enable a user who is viewing a web page that comprises an ad, as selected for display by the ad server, to supply an associated rating.

6. The ad placement system of claim 1, wherein the ad server system is further operative to use the collected ratings data to supplement an ad, as served for display on a web page, with a visual indication of an aggregate rating of the corresponding advertiser.

10. The ad placement system of claim 1, wherein the incentive determination component is further operative to automatically apply said discount to one or more ads subsequently provided by the selected advertiser to the data repository.

14. The ad placement system of claim 1, further comprising a machine that executes the incentive determination component.

15. The ad placement system of claim 1, wherein the incentive determination component is further operative to determine whether to provide the discount based at least in part on whether a minimum quantity of ratings have been used to calculate the aggregate rating.

16. The ad placement system of claim 1, wherein the incentive determination component is further operative to automatically apply said discount to a second ad although the second ad has not yet been rated by the users.

7. An ad placement system, comprising:

a first user interface component operative to enable advertisers to specify ads, and to associate such ads with keywords;

a data repository operative to store the ads created via the first user interface component in association with corresponding advertisers and keywords;

an ad server system operative to select ads from the data repository for display on web pages based on the associations between ads and keywords, the ad server system comprising one or more physical servers;

a ratings system comprising computer hardware, the ratings system operative to;

collect and store ratings data in association with particular advertisers, said ratings data collected by the ratings system via a second user interface component that allows for users to supply ratings in association with particular ads represented in the data repository,

maintain ad selection histories of particular users, and

output a history user interface including a representation of a plurality of ads previously selected by a user that provides functionality for the user to choose one of the plurality of previously selected ads to rate; and

an incentive determination component operative to;

calculate an aggregate rating for a selected advertiser based, at least in part, on the ratings data associated with the selected advertiser,

determine discounts to provide to particular advertisers based, at least in part, on the aggregate rating, and

take ad click-through rates into consideration in determining said discounts, such that advertisers whose ads produce higher click-through rates are provided greater discounts than at least some advertisers whose ads produce lower click-through rates.

8. The ad placement system of claim 7, wherein the ad placement system is further operative to automatically apply said discounts by reducing cost-per-click charges for a plurality of ads of the particular advertisers in connection with ad selection events.

9. The ad placement system of claim 7, wherein the discounts include free click-through transactions.

11. The ad placement system of claim 7, wherein the ad placement system is further operative to automatically apply said discounts to one or more ads subsequently provided by the selected advertiser to the data repository.

12. The ad placement system of claim 7, wherein the ratings system is further operative to collect and store the ratings data for a plurality of ads provided by a selected advertiser.

13. The ad placement system of claim 7, wherein the incentive determination component is further operative to calculate, for the selected advertiser, a discount that is directly proportional to an aggregate rating of the selected advertiser.

17. The ad placement system of claim 7, wherein the incentive determination component is further operative to determine whether to provide the discounts to the particular advertisers based at least in part on whether a minimum quantity of ratings have been used to calculate the aggregate rating.

18. The ad placement system of claim 7, wherein the incentive determination component is further operative to apply said discounts to a new ad specified by the selected advertiser, although the new ad has not yet been rated by the users.