Advertising methods for advertising time slots and embedded objects

• US 20050137958A1
• Filed: 12/23/2003
• Published: 06/23/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 12/23/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Roku, Inc.
• Original Assignee: OpenTV, Inc. (Kudelski SA)
• Inventors: Zenoni, Ian, Huber, Thomas, Lemmons, Thomas
• Granted Patent: US 7,979,877 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/37
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0275 Auctions
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/08 Auctions
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/04 Trading; Exchange, e.g. stocks, commodities, derivatives or currency exchange
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/812 involving advertisement data advertising per se G06Q30/02

Abstract

Disclosed is a process for an advertising bidding system in which advertisers can bid on advertising time slots or enhanced ads that can be inserted in either prerecorded or live television programming. A high degree of flexibility is provided by allowing embedded ads to be purchased and displayed in a very short time period. This allows TV broadcasters to increase revenues and allows advertisers to have more flexibility in advertising. Objects can be inserted in the display video broadcast using enhancements such as by using mark-up language overlay pages or by video combination techniques. The effect of these ads can be evaluated for advertising campaigns.

Claims

1. A process for auctioning advertising time slots in a TV broadcast comprising:

selecting a predetermined number of advertising time slots in said TV broadcast for auctioning;

providing a description of said predetermined advertising time slots to interested advertisers;

auctioning said selected advertising time slots to said interested advertisers in an auction;

generating a TV advertisement for said selected advertising time slot for a TV advertiser that wins said auction;

transmitting said TV advertisement in said selected advertising time slot.

2. The process of claim 1 further comprising:

determining said interested advertiser from attribute data provided by advertisers.

3. An embedded advertising process for TV broadcasts comprising:

identifying embedded advertising opportunities in a TV program;

providing said embedded advertising opportunities to interested advertisers;

auctioning said embedded advertising opportunities to said interested advertisers in an auction sale;

inserting an embedded advertisement in a TV program from a TV advertiser that has won said auction sale;

transmitting said TV program with said embedded advertisement to viewers.

4. The process of claim 3 further comprising selecting said interested advertisers from attribute data provided by advertisers.

5. The process of claim 3 wherein said step of inserting an embedded advertisement in a TV program comprises:

inserting an embedded advertisement in a TV program using video combination techniques.

6. The process of claim 3 wherein said step of inserting an embedded advertisement in a TV program comprises:

inserting an embedded advertisement in a TV program using markup language overlay pages.

7. The process of claim 3 wherein said step of identifying embedded advertising opportunities comprises:

using pattern recognition techniques to identify, objects and blank spaces in said TV program.

8. An embedded TV advertisement generated by the process of:

identifying embedded advertising opportunities in a TV program;

providing said embedded advertising opportunities to interested advertisers;

auctioning said embedded advertising opportunities to said interested advertisers in an auction sale;

inserting an embedded advertisement in a TV program from a TV advertiser that has won said auction sale;

transmitting said TV program with said embedded advertisement to viewers.