Automated allocation of media campaign assets to time and program in digital media delivery systems

• US 9,699,502 B1
• Filed: 01/19/2016
• Issued: 07/04/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 01/16/2015
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Optimized Markets, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Optimized Markets, Inc.
• Inventors: Sandholm, Tuomas Wilhelm, Peng, Fei, Dickerson, John Paul
• Primary Examiner(s): Pendleton, Brian T
• Assistant Examiner(s): Gee, Alexander
• Application Number:
  US15/000,742
• Time in Patent Office: 532 Days
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/252 Processing of multiple end-users' preferences to derive collaborative data
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/262 Content or additional data distribution scheduling, e.g. sending additional data at off-peak times, updating software modules, calculating the carousel transmission frequency, delaying a video stream transmission, generating play-lists scheduling strategies for dispatcher in multiprogramming arrangements G06F9/4881; arrangements for scheduling broadcast services or broadcast-related services H04H60/06; flow control in packet networks H04L47/10; establishing a time schedule or organising the servicing of application requests H04L67/62
• 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: H04N 21/442 Monitoring of processes or resources, e.g. detecting the failure of a recording device, monitoring the downstream bandwidth, the number of times a movie has been viewed, the storage space available from the internal hard disk arrangements for monitoring broadcast services or broadcast-related services H04H60/29; arrangements for identifying or recognising characteristics with a direct linkage to broadcast information H04H60/35; monitoring of user activities for profile generation for accessing a video database G06F16/739; monitoring in wireless networks H04W24/00
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/44226 on social networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4583 Automatically resolving scheduling conflicts, e.g. when a recording by reservation has been programmed for two programs in the same time slot
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4667 Processing of monitored end-user data, e.g. trend analysis based on the log file of viewer selections
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/47202 for requesting content on demand, e.g. video on demand
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/482 End-user interface for program selection broadcast systems using EPGs H04H60/72
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6582 Data stored in the client, e.g. viewing habits, hardware capabilities, credit card number arrangements where receivers interact with the broadcast H04H20/38
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/812 involving advertisement data advertising per se G06Q30/02

Abstract

A system for automatically managing the delivery of digital media assets allocates media assets to video programs so that audience members will receive the digital media assets when they view the video programs. An example is the automated allocation of sponsored videos to television programs. The system includes data stores, a digital media server, and a campaign manager system. The campaign manager system receives consumption data corresponding to a first campaign, along with an allocation value and other parameters, and uses that information to automatically allocate digital media assets to additional digital programming files and their corresponding video programs for a second campaign.

Claims

1. A system for automatically managing delivery of digital media assets via one or more digital video delivery services, comprising:

a first data store containing a plurality of digital video files, each of which corresponds to a digital media asset, and at least some of which include metadata indicating one or more campaigns with which the digital video file'"'"'s digital media asset is associated;

a second data store containing an inventory of digital programming files, each of which corresponds to one or more user-selectable video programs;

a digital media server configured to access the first data store and the second data store and transmit the digital video files and the digital programming files to a plurality of video presentation devices;

a campaign manager processor; and

a non-transitory computer-readable medium containing programming instructions that, when executed, will cause the campaign manager processor to;

receive consumption data corresponding to a plurality of user-selectable video programs and a plurality of digital media assets in a first campaign that a plurality of audience members viewed in a first campaign,

receive, from a digital video delivery service that corresponds to the digital media server, an inventory of digital programming files that are available for presentation to the video presentation devices at future times, along with metadata corresponding to the digital programming files in the inventory,

receive an allocation value, wherein the allocation value comprises an under-allocation value that represents an extent to which one or more of the user-selectable video programs have digital media assets allocated in a number that is less than an expected number, an over-allocation value that represents an extent to which one or more of the user-selectable video programs have digital media assets allocated in a number that exceeds an expected number, or both the under-allocation value and the over-allocation value,

receive, from a campaign requestor, a selection of one or more parameters for a second campaign,

identify a set of digital media assets for a second campaign,

analyze the consumption data and the metadata to identify one or more digital programming files in the inventory to which to allocate a plurality of the digital media assets for the second campaign, and

automatically allocate the plurality of digital media assets for the second campaign to the identified digital programming files in the inventory in accordance with one or more parameters and so that the allocating is consistent with the allocation value for presentation to audience members via video presentation devices in the second campaign.

2. The system of claim 1, further comprising additional programming instructions that, when executed, cause the campaign manager processor to:

analyze the consumption data and the metadata to identify one or more additional digital programming files and future times to which to allocate additional digital media assets corresponding to a remainder of the first campaign, and

automatically select a plurality of the additional digital media assets and allocate the selected additional digital media assets to the identified additional programming files at future times in accordance with the one or more parameters for presentation to audience members as the remainder of the first campaign.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein:

the instructions to receive the consumption data comprise instructions to receive the consumption data from a plurality of video presentation devices; and

the system further comprises additional programming instructions configured to cause the digital media server to present a first video program corresponding to a first one of the digital programming files in the inventory so that the digital media assets that are allocated to the first one of the digital programming files are output to an audience member with the first video program via a media presentation device.

4. The system of claim 1:

further comprising additional instructions configured to cause the campaign manager processor to analyze the consumption data and the metadata to identify a time at which to assign each of the digital media assets for the second campaign in accordance with the one or more parameters;

wherein the instructions to automatically allocate the digital media assets for the second campaign to the identified digital programming files in the inventory comprise instructions to perform the allocating so that each of the digital media assets for the second campaign will be presented to audience members at the digital media asset'"'"'s assigned time.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein:

the one or more digital video delivery services comprise one or more television networks;

the user-selectable video programs comprise television programs that an audience member may select by causing a video presentation device to select a channel or on-demand service corresponding to one or more of the television networks; and

the consumption data for each of the user-selectable video programs and the digital media assets comprises a number of impressions, as well as one or more parameters about audience members who consumed the user-selectable video programs and the digital media assets.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the instructions that cause the campaign manager processor to identify one or more digital programming files in the inventory to which to allocate the plurality of the digital media assets and automatically allocate the plurality of digital media assets for the second campaign to the identified digital programming files in the inventory comprise instructions to perform a batch optimization process by:

simultaneously allocating the inventory to multiple campaigns by;

identifying a number of expected impressions for the second campaign,

identifying a number of expected impressions for at least one additional campaign, and

using a greedy algorithm, genetic algorithm, tree search, integer programming, simulated annealing, local search or tabu search to automatically identify a set of digital programming files to which the digital media files in the second campaign will be allocated so that the number of digital media files allocated to each of the digital programming files in the set remains within the allocation value.

7. The system of claim 6, wherein the instructions to simultaneously allocate the inventory to multiple campaigns further comprise instructions to:

determine whether any candidate campaign will conflict with the selected one or more parameters, and if so reject that candidate campaign;

determine whether any candidate campaign will be less profitable than a different campaign with which the candidate campaign'"'"'s identified digital programming files in the inventory could instead be used and if so reject that candidate campaign; and

un-allocate the digital media assets from the identified digital programming files for any candidate campaign that the campaign manager processor has rejected.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein:

the one or more parameters for the second campaign include a smoothness constraint; and

the instructions that cause the campaign manager processor to identify one or more digital programming files in the inventory to which to allocate the plurality of the digital media assets and automatically allocate the plurality of digital media assets for the second campaign to the identified digital programming files in the inventory comprise instructions to;

identify a number of expected impressions for the second campaign in a scope, wherein the scope is a time interval or a combination of a time interval with one or more digital media services, and

allocate the digital media assets in the second campaign to the identified one or more digital programming files so that;

a number of impressions associated with each instance of the scope in the second campaign satisfy a threshold criterion, wherein the threshold criterion is that the instance of the scope be;

not larger than a first threshold,

not smaller than a second threshold, or

neither larger than the first threshold or smaller than the second threshold;

a number of impressions presented in any instance of the scope during the second campaign is not disproportionately larger than a number of impressions presented in any other instance of the scope during the second campaign;

a number of spots presented in any instance of the scope during the second campaign is;

not larger than the first threshold,

not smaller than the second threshold, or

neither larger than the first threshold or smaller than the second threshold;

or

a number of spots presented in any instance of the scope during the second campaign is not disproportionately larger than a number of spots presented in any other instance of the scope during the second campaign.

9. The system of claim 1, further comprising additional programming instructions that, when executed, will cause the campaign manager processor to:

receive, from one or more of the video presentation devices, consumption data for the digital media assets of the second campaign;

analyze the received consumption data to determine whether the received consumption data indicates that an expected number of impressions of the digital media assets of the second campaign was achieved; and

if the expected number of impressions of the digital media assets of the second campaign was not achieved, automatically allocate one or more of the digital media assets to one or more additional digital programming files in the inventory in accordance with the one or more parameters for presentation to audience members via video presentation devices.

10. The system of claim 1, further comprising:

a display device; and

additional programming instructions configured to cause the campaign manager processor to;

instruct the display device to output a heatmap comprising a plurality of sectors of the display device, in which each sector is represented as a cell, and each cell presents a value that is associated with inventory of a given scope;

select a color for each of the cells based on a measure of the value of the inventory associated with that cell; and

cause the display device to output each of the sectors so that each cell is presented in the cell'"'"'s selected color.

11. The system of claim 1, further comprising additional programming instructions configured to cause the campaign manager processor to:

cause a proposal comprising parameters of the second campaign to be presented to the campaign requestor for review;

identify a response time within which the campaign requestor must respond to the proposal;

if the campaign manager processor receives a positive response from the campaign requestor within the response time, cause the proposal to be presented to a second entity; and

if the campaign manager processor does not receive a response from the campaign requestor to the proposal in the response time, or if the campaign manager processor receives a rejection of the proposal, then;

un-allocate the plurality of digital media assets for the second campaign from the identified digital programming files, and

if the campaign requestor enters a prompt to do so, return the campaign request for an additional optimization process.

12. The system of claim 1, further comprising additional instructions programming configured to cause the campaign manager processor to:

receive, from the campaign requestor, a selection of one or more constraints on attributes of a target audience, wherein the attributes comprise demographic attributes, show attributes, digital media service attributes, time attributes, behavioral attributes, geographic attributes, or social network attributes;

use the received parameters and the received constraints on attributes to identify an audience segment; and

when performing the automatic allocation, do so such that the plurality of digital media assets in aggregate will be presented to at least a threshold number of impressions or unique impressions within the audience segment.

13. The system of claim 12, further comprising additional programming instructions configured to cause the campaign manager processor to:

receive, from the campaign requestor, an indication that an audience segment will be considered a premium target; and

use the indication as an additional parameter in the automatic allocation.

14. The system of claim 1, wherein:

at least a subset of the digital media assets comprise dynamic content that includes a variable component that can be selected at the time the second campaign is presented to audience members based on one or more dynamic constraints; and

the instructions to automatically allocate the digital media assets for the second campaign to the identified digital programming files comprise instructions to, for each of the digital media assets that has dynamic content;

determine whether the digital media asset'"'"'s dynamic content satisfies the selected one or more parameters,

identify a dynamic constraint of the identified digital programming files and determine whether the digital media asset'"'"'s dynamic content satisfies the identified dynamic constraint, and

only allocate that digital media asset to the identified digital programming file if the digital media asset'"'"'s dynamic content satisfies the selected one or more parameters and the identified dynamic constraint.

15. The system of claim 14, further comprising instructions that are configured to cause the campaign manager processor to, after allocating to the second campaign any of the digital media assets having dynamic content that satisfies the selected one or more parameters and the identified dynamic constraint, update the automatic allocation to ensure that the second campaign is still consistent with the allocation value and satisfies the one or more parameters.

31. The system of claim 8, wherein the instructions that cause the campaign manager processor to identify one or more digital programming files in the inventory to which to allocate the plurality of the digital media assets and automatically allocate the plurality of digital media assets for the second campaign to the identified digital programming files in the inventory comprise instructions to allocate the digital media files in the second campaign to the identified one or more digital programming files so that:

a number of impressions presented in any instance of the scope during the second campaign is not disproportionately larger than a number of impressions presented in any other instance of the scope during the second campaign;

or

a number of spots presented in any instance of the scope during the second campaign is not disproportionately larger than a number of spots presented in any other instance of the scope during the second campaign.

16. A method of automatically managing delivery of digital media assets via one or more digital video delivery services, the method comprising:

by a campaign manager processor, executing programming instructions that cause the campaign manager processor to;

receive consumption data corresponding to a plurality of user-selectable video programs and a plurality of digital media assets in a first campaign that a plurality of audience members viewed in a first campaign,

receive, from a video delivery service that corresponds to a digital media server, an inventory of digital programming files that are available for presentation by the digital media server to video presentation devices at future times, along with metadata corresponding to the digital programming files in the inventory,

receive an allocation value, wherein the allocation value comprises an under-allocation value that represents an extent to which one or more of the user-selectable video programs have digital media assets allocated in a number that is less than an expected number, an over-allocation value that represents an extent to which one or more of the user-selectable video programs have digital media assets allocated in a number that exceeds an expected number, or both the under-allocation value and the over-allocation value,

receive, from a campaign requestor, a selection of one or more parameters for a second campaign,

access a first data store containing a plurality of digital content files, each of which corresponds to a digital media asset, and identify a set of digital media assets for the second campaign,

analyze the consumption data and the metadata to identify one or more digital programming files in the inventory to which to allocate a plurality of the digital media assets for the second campaign, and

automatically allocate the plurality of digital media assets for the second campaign to a set of digital programming files in the inventory in accordance with the one or more parameters and so that the allocating is consistent with the allocation value; and

by a digital video server;

accessing the first data store to identify the digital content files associated with the digital media assets for the second campaign,

accessing a second data store to identify the set of digital programming files for the second campaign, and

causing the identified digital content files and the identified digital programming files for the second campaign to be transmitted to a plurality of video presentation devices for presentation to audience members.

17. The method of claim 16, further comprising, by campaign manager processor:

analyzing the consumption data and the metadata to identify one or more additional digital programming files and future times to which to allocate additional digital media assets corresponding to a remainder of the first campaign, and

automatically selecting a plurality of the additional digital media assets and allocate the selected additional digital media assets to the identified additional programming files at future times in accordance with the one or more parameters for presentation by the digital video server to audience members as the remainder of the first campaign.

18. The method of claim 16, wherein:

receiving the consumption data comprises receiving the consumption data from a plurality of video presentation devices; and

the method further comprises, by the digital media server, presenting a first media program corresponding to a first one of the digital programming files in the inventory so that the digital media assets that are allocated to the first one of the digital programming files are output to an audience member with the first media program via a video presentation device.

19. The method of claim 16, further comprising;

by the campaign manager processor, analyzing the consumption data and the metadata to identify a time at which to assign each of the digital media assets for the second campaign in accordance with the one or more parameters;

wherein automatically allocating the digital media assets for the second campaign to the identified digital programming files in the inventory comprises performing the allocating so that each of the digital media assets for the second campaign will be presented to audience members at the digital media asset'"'"'s assigned time.

20. The method of claim 16, wherein:

the one or more digital video delivery services comprise one or more television networks;

the user-selectable video programs comprise television programs that an audience member may select by causing a video presentation device to select a channel or on-demand service corresponding to one or more of the television networks; and

the consumption data for each of the user-selectable video programs and the digital media assets comprises a number of impressions, as well as one or more parameters about audience members who consumed the user-selectable video programs and the digital media assets.

21. The method of claim 16, wherein the identifying one or more digital programming files in the inventory to which to allocate the plurality of the digital media assets and automatically allocating the plurality of digital media assets for the second campaign to the identified digital programming files in the inventory comprise simultaneously allocating the inventory to multiple campaigns by:

identifying a number of expected impressions for the second campaign;

identifying a number of expected impressions for at least one additional campaign; and

using a greedy algorithm, genetic algorithm, tree search, integer programming, simulated annealing, local search or tabu search to automatically identify a set of digital programming files to which the digital media files in the second campaign will be allocated so that the number of digital media files allocated to each of the digital programming files in the set remains within the allocation value.

22. The method of claim 21, further comprising, by the campaign manager processor:

determining whether any candidate campaign of the multiple campaigns will conflict with the selected one or more parameters, and if so reject that candidate campaign;

determining whether any candidate campaign of the multiple campaigns will be less profitable than a different campaign with which the candidate campaign'"'"'s identified digital programming files in the inventory could instead be used and if so reject that candidate campaign; and

un-allocating the digital media assets from the identified digital programming files for any candidate campaign that the campaign manager processor has rejected.

23. The method of claim 16, wherein:

the one or more parameters for the second campaign include a smoothness constraint; and

identifying the one or more digital programming files in the inventory to which to allocate the plurality of the digital media assets and automatically allocating the plurality of digital media assets for the second campaign to the identified digital programming files in the inventory comprise;

identifying a number of expected impressions for the second campaign in a scope, wherein the scope is a time interval or a combination of a time interval with one or more digital media services, and

allocating the digital media assets in the second campaign to the identified one or more digital programming files so that;

a number of impressions associated with each instance of the scope in the second campaign satisfies a threshold criterion, wherein the threshold criterion is that the instance of the scope be;

not larger than a first threshold,

not smaller than a second threshold, or

neither larger than the first threshold or smaller than the second threshold;

a number of impressions presented in any instance of the scope during the second campaign is not disproportionately larger than a number of impressions presented in any other instance of the scope during the second campaign;

a number of spots presented in any instance of the scope during the second campaign is;

not larger than the first threshold,

not smaller than the second threshold, or

neither larger than the first threshold or smaller than the second threshold;

or

a number of spots presented in any instance of the scope during the second campaign is not disproportionately larger than a number of spots presented in any other instance of the scope during the second campaign.

24. The method of claim 16, further comprising, by the campaign manager processor:

receiving, from one or more of the video presentation devices, consumption data for the digital media assets of the second campaign;

analyzing the received consumption data to determine whether the received consumption data indicates that an expected number of impressions of the digital media assets of the second campaign was achieved; and

if the expected number of impressions of the digital media assets of the second campaign was not achieved, automatically allocating one or more of the digital media assets to one or more additional digital programming files in the inventory in accordance with the one or more parameters for presentation to audience members via video presentation devices.

25. The method of claim 16, further comprising, by the campaign manager processor:

causing a display device to output a heatmap comprising a plurality of sectors of the display device, in which each sector is represented as a cell, and each cell presents a value that is associated with inventory of a given scope;

selecting a color for each of the cells based on a measure of the value of the inventory associated with that cell; and

causing the display device to output each of the sectors so that each cell is presented in in the cell'"'"'s selected color.

26. The method of claim 16, further comprising, by the campaign manager processor:

causing a proposal comprising parameters of the second campaign to be presented to the campaign requestor for review;

identifying a response time within which the campaign requestor must respond to the proposal;

if the campaign manager processor receives a positive response from the campaign requestor to the proposal within the response time, causing the proposal to be presented to a second entity; and

if the campaign manager processor does not receive a response to the proposal in the response time, or if the campaign manager processor receives a rejection of the proposal, then;

un-allocating the plurality of digital media assets for the second campaign from the identified digital programming files, and

in response to receiving a prompt from the campaign requestor to do so, returning the campaign request for an additional optimization process.

27. The method of claim 16, further comprising, by the campaign manager processor:

receiving, from the campaign requestor, a selection of one or more constraints on attributes of a target audience, wherein the attributes comprise demographic attributes, show attributes, digital media service attributes, time attributes, behavioral attributes, geographic attributes, or social network attributes;

using the received parameters and the received constraints on attributes to identify an audience segment; and

when performing the automatic allocation, doing so such that the plurality of digital media assets in aggregate will be presented to at least a threshold number of impressions or unique impressions within the audience segment.

28. The method of claim 27, further comprising, by the campaign manager processor:

receiving, from the campaign requestor, an indication that an audience segment will be considered a premium target; and

using the indication as an additional parameter in the automatic allocation.

29. The method of claim 16, wherein:

at least a subset of the digital media assets comprise dynamic content that includes a variable component that can be selected at the time the second campaign is presented to audience members based on one or more dynamic constraints; and

automatically allocating the digital media assets for the second campaign to the identified digital programming files comprises, for each of the digital media assets that has dynamic content;

determining whether the digital media asset'"'"'s dynamic content satisfies the selected one or more parameters,

identifying a dynamic constraint of the identified digital programming files and determine whether the digital media asset'"'"'s dynamic content satisfies the identified dynamic constraint, and

only allocating that digital media asset to the identified digital programming file if the digital media asset'"'"'s dynamic content satisfies the selected one or more parameters and the identified dynamic constraint.

30. The method of claim 29, further comprising, after allocating to the second campaign any of the digital media assets having dynamic content that satisfies the selected one or more parameters and the identified dynamic constraint, updating the automatic allocation to ensure that the second campaign is still consistent with the allocation value and satisfies the one or more parameters.

32. The method of claim 23, wherein identifying the one or more digital programming files in the inventory to which to allocate the plurality of the digital media assets and automatically allocating the plurality of digital media assets for the second campaign to the identified digital programming files in the inventory comprise allocating the digital media files in the second campaign to the identified one or more digital programming files so that:

a number of impressions presented in any instance of the scope during the second campaign is not disproportionately larger than a number of impressions presented in any other instance of the scope during the second campaign;

or

a number of spots presented in any instance of the scope during the second campaign is not disproportionately larger than a number of spots presented in any other instance of the scope during the second campaign.