Managing sponsored content based on geographic region

• US 8,688,671 B2
• Filed: 11/14/2005
• Issued: 04/01/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 09/14/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Blue Hills Series 95 of Allied Security Trust I (Allied Security Trust)
• Original Assignee: Millennial Media Incorporated (Apollo Global Management, Inc.)
• Inventors: Ramer, Jorey, Soroca, Adam, Doughty, Dennis
• Primary Examiner(s): Beausoliel, Jr., Robert
• Assistant Examiner(s): Arjomandi, Noosha
• Application Number:
  US11/274,905
• Publication Number:
  US 20070061363A1
• Time in Patent Office: 3,060 Days
• Field of Search: 707/706, 707/748
• US Class Current: 707/706
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/24578 using ranking
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/738 Presentation of query results
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/7867 using information manually generated, e.g. tags, keywords, comments, title and artist information, manually generated time, location and usage information, user ratings
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/306 User profiles
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/52 specially adapted for the location of the user terminal
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/53 using third party service providers
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/42348 Location-based services which utilize the location information of a target
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/4878 Advertisement messages
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2407 Monitoring of transmitted content, e.g. distribution time, number of downloads arrangements for monitoring programmes for broadcast or for distribution combined with broadcast H04H20/14
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2668 Creating a channel for a dedicated end-user group, e.g. insertion of targeted commercials based on end-user profiles information retrieval from the Internet by querying with filtering and personalisation G06F16/9535; arrangements for replacing or switching information during the broadcast H04H20/10; push services over packet-switching network H04L12/1859; adaptation of message content in packet-switching networks H04L51/063
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/02 Services making use of location information
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/029 Location-based management or tracking services

Abstract

Improved search capabilities are disclosed for mobile communications devices such as cell phones, as well as improved techniques for delivering sponsored content in a mobile communication environment.

Claims

1. A system for targeted distribution of advertising to one or more cellular phones of a first type or second type in one or more of a plurality of geographic regions by establishing a competitive bid auction process, the system comprising one or more computers having computer readable mediums having stored thereon instructions which, when executed by one or more processors of the one or more computers, causes the system to perform the steps of:

(a) presenting to a first sponsor and a second sponsor data corresponding to;

(1) the plurality of geographic regions; and

(2) the first type and the second type of cellular phone, wherein a rendering capability of the first type of cellular phone is different from a rendering capability of the second type of cellular phone;

(b) receiving a first advertising content and a second advertising content each from the first sponsor and the second sponsor, wherein the first advertising content requires the rendering capability of the first type of cellular phone to be rendered thereon and wherein the second advertising content requires the rendering capability of the second type of cellular phone to be rendered thereon, wherein the first advertising content is incompatible with the second type of cellular phone and the second advertising content is incompatible with the first type of cellular phone;

(c) receiving a bid from the first sponsor, wherein the bid includes;

(1) a selection of at least one geographic region from among the plurality of geographic regions; and

(2) a financial consideration offered for distribution of advertising associated with the first sponsor, to the one or more cellular phones of the first type or second type associated with the selected at least one geographic region;

(d) receiving a bid from the second sponsor, wherein the bid includes;

(1) a selection of at least one geographic region from among the plurality of geographic regions; and

(2) a financial consideration offered for distribution of advertising associated with the second sponsor, to the one or more cellular phones of the first type or second type associated with the selected at least one geographic region, wherein the selection of the at least one geographic region from the first sponsor is the same as the selection of the at least one geographic region from the second sponsor;

(e) receiving information associated with a webpage request of at least one cellular phone of the first type in the selected at least one geographic region, wherein the webpage request corresponds to a webpage and is received over a cellular telephony infrastructure provided by a carrier, wherein a user of the at least one cellular phone of the first type is paying for use of the at least one cellular phone of the first type with the carrier;

(f) receiving contextual information regarding the requested webpage, wherein the contextual information includes at least one or more keywords;

(g) attributing a priority to the distribution of the advertising of the first sponsor over the distribution of the advertising of the second sponsor based upon a determination that;

(i) a yield derived from the financial consideration of the first sponsor is greater than a yield derived from the financial consideration of the second sponsor; and

(ii) the advertising of the first sponsor is more relevant than the advertising of the second sponsor to the requested webpage based on a relevance of the at least one or more keywords to the respective advertising;

(h) associating the advertising of the first sponsor instead of the second sponsor with the webpage; and

(i) transmitting the first advertising content of the first sponsor to the at least one cellular phone of the first type within the selected at least one geographic region in accordance with the prioritization.

2. The system of claim 1, further comprising the step of presenting at least one mobile subscriber characteristic to the first and second sponsors.

3. The system of claim 2, wherein the mobile subscriber characteristic is a user characteristic.

4. The system of claim 2, wherein the mobile subscriber characteristic is a history transaction characteristic.

5. The system of claim 2, wherein the mobile subscriber characteristic is a transaction history characteristic.

6. The system of claim 2, wherein the advertisement comprises a sponsored link.

7. The system of claim 2, wherein the advertisement comprises a sponsored call.

8. The system of claim 2, wherein the plurality of geographic regions includes at least one aggregation of regions.

9. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more geographic regions correspond to one or more of:

a phone number associated with the one or more cellular phones;

a zip code of a billing address of the one or more cellular phones;

location coordinates corresponding to the one or more cellular phones;

a user-entered location corresponding to the location of a user of the one or more cellular phones; and

a distance of the one or more cellular phones from a specified location.

10. The system of claim 1, wherein the rendering capability is selected from the list consisting of:

(a) make of cellular phone;

(b) model of cellular phone;

(c) operating system of cellular phone;

(d) operating system version of cellular phone;

(e) MIDP support;

(f) polyphonic ringtone support;

(g) ringtone support;

(h) video download support;

(i) video streaming support;

(j) WAP push support;

(k) WML support;

(l) wallpaper support;

(m) XHTML support;

(n) touch screen support; and

(o) a display resolution.