Tracking user micro-interactions with web page advertising

• US 20020111865A1
• Filed: 03/14/2002
• Published: 08/15/2002
• Est. Priority Date: 09/11/1997
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Andreas Acquisitions, LLC
• Original Assignee: Enliven, Inc. (Extreme Reach, Inc.)
• Inventors: White, Gregory T., Middleton, Thomas M. III
• Granted Patent: US 7,310,609 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/14
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0242 Determining effectiveness of advertisements
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0277 Online advertisement

Abstract

In connection with display of advertising within Web pages, an applet is downloaded to the user'"'"'s Web browser to track the user'"'"'s interactions with the Web page. Tracked user interactions include mouse cursor position, time displayed on page, time of mouse cursor hovering over the advertisement, and so on. At an appropriate time, such as when the display of the Web page is terminated, the applet forwards logged interaction information from the client to a remote server, the remote server being typically controlled by an advertiser, rating service or the like. As a result, the advertiser may track consumer response to advertising impressions on a Web page without requiring the user to download other pages. This allows advertisers to track user response to specific elements of the Web page as well as to better infer information about the user'"'"'s interests in an effort to qualify the user prior to presenting subsequent advertising.

Claims

1. In a distributed computing system for displaying information, a method comprising the steps of:

displaying to a user a representation of an advertisement in electronic form;

tracking user interaction with the advertisement;

logging the user interactions while the advertisement is being displayed to the user; and

sending user interaction log data to a remote server.

2. A method as in claim 1 wherein the interaction log data is sent to the remote server when the display of the advertisement is terminated by the user.

3. A method as in claim 1 wherein the interaction log data is sent to the remote server upon the occurrence of a user interaction with the advertisement.

4. A method as in claim 1 wherein the interaction log data is sent to the remote server periodically.

5. A method as in claim 1 wherein the step of sending interaction log data additionally comprises the steps of:

opening a connection to the remote server; and

sending a message to the remote server over the connection, the message containing the interaction log data.

6. A method as in claim 5 wherein the message is an HTTP GET message.

7. A method as in claim 6 wherein the interaction log data is encoded as to appear as part of an extended address field in the HTTP GET message.

8. A method as in claim 1 wherein the interaction log data includes mouse position and time of mouse hovering over advertisement.

9. A method as in claim 1 additionally comprising the step of:

downloading the advertisement from a second server different from the remote server.

10. In a distributed computing system for displaying information, a method comprising the steps of:

displaying to a user a representation of a page in electronic form, the page containing at least one advertisement composed of two or more regions, each region containing a visual element of the advertisement;

tracking user micro-interactions with each of the elements in the advertisement through the steps of;

maintaining a list of elements displayed in the advertisement;

determining when a screen pointer hover occurs within a particular element of the advertisement, and the screen pointer hover occurring without requiring a user interaction on the element; and

creating a micro-interaction data record in response thereto;

logging the micro-interaction data records while the advertisement is being displayed to the user; and

sending the micro-interaction data records to a remote server.

11. A method as in claim 10 wherein the micro-interaction data records are sent to the remote server when the display of the advertisement is terminated by the user.

12. A method as in claim 10 wherein the micro-interaction data records are sent to the remote server upon the occurrence of a user interaction with the advertisement.

13. A method as in claim 10 wherein the micro-interaction data records are sent to the remote server periodically.

14. A method as in claim 10 wherein the step of sending micro-interaction data records additionally comprises the steps of:

opening a connection to the remote server; and

sending a message to the remote server over the connection, the message containing the micro-interaction data records.

15. A method as in claim 14 wherein the message is an HTTP GET message.

16. A method as in claim 10 wherein the micro-interaction data records include information with respect to screen pointer position within the element.

17. A method as in claim 16 wherein the micro-interaction data records include information indicating a time sequence of screen pointer positions within the element.

18. A method as in claim 10 additionally comprising the step of:

downloading the advertisement from a second server different from the remote server.

20. A method as in claim 19 wherein the periodicity of the tracking is variable.

21. A method as in claim 19 wherein the periodicity of the tracking is logarithmic.

19. In a distributed computing system for displaying information, a method comprising the steps of:

displaying to a user a representation of an advertisement in electronic form;

periodically tracking user interaction with the advertisement;

logging the user interactions while the advertisement is being displayed to the user; and

sending user interaction log data to a remote server.

22. In a distributed computing system for displaying information, a method comprising the steps of:

displaying to a user a representation of an advertisement in electronic form;

tracking user interaction with the advertisement;

logging the user interactions while the advertisement is being displayed to the user; and

periodically sending user interaction log data to a remote server.

23. A method as in claim 22 wherein the periodicity of the sending is variable.

24. A method as in claim 22 wherein the periodicity of the sending is logarithmic.

25. In a distributed system for displaying information, a method comprising the steps of:

displaying to a user a representation of an advertisement in electronic form;

tracking user interaction with the advertisement;

logging the user interactions while the advertisement is being displayed to the user; and

sending user interaction log data to a remote user interaction log aggregation device.

26. In a distributed system for displaying information content, a method comprising the steps of:

displaying to a user a representation of the information content in electronic form;

tracking user interaction with the information content;

logging the user interactions while the information content is being displayed to the user; and

sending user interaction log data to a remote user interaction log aggregation device.