Graphical certifications of online advertisements intended to impact click-through rates

• US 9,076,151 B2
• Filed: 02/12/2009
• Issued: 07/07/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 02/14/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Magnite, Inc.
• Original Assignee: The Rubicon Project Incorporated
• Inventors: Patton, John D., Lipschutz, Robert P., Clyman, John M. IV
• Primary Examiner(s): SIGMOND, BENNETT M
• Application Number:
  US12/370,343
• Publication Number:
  US 20090327084A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,336 Days
• Field of Search: 705/14.73, 705/76, 705/14.4, 705/14.41, 705/14.47, 705/14.52, 705/14.6
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/018 Certifying business or products
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0241 Advertisements
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0242 Determining effectiveness of advertisements
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0248 Avoiding fraud
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0254 based on statistics
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0263 based upon Internet or website rating
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0277 Online advertisement

Abstract

Embodiments are directed towards improving a user'"'"'s experience and confidence in advertisements shown within web pages or other online media, in part, by providing additional information for a given advertisement to be displayed along with the given advertisement to encourage, or discourage, a user to click on or interact with the advertisement. Such information to be displayed about a given advertisement may include, without limitation, information about the advertisement, such as its security status (e.g. it has been found to be free from malware), information about the advertiser, including if the advertiser is determined to be trusted based on some criteria, customer satisfaction information, information about the goods and/or services being advertised, including, for example, if how they compare to a competitor, and information about the destination Web page or Web site that the advertisement leads to when a user clicks it.

Claims

1. A network device, comprising:

a transceiver for sending and receiving information over a network; and

a processor that is configured to execute instructions that perform actions, including;

receiving a request for an audit associated with an advertisement containing a link to a destination web page that is part of a destination web site;

performing the audit to

determine a compliance to with at least one contractual criteria, standard, or rule;

determine whether any of the;

advertisement,

the destination web page, or

the destination web site

may result in malicious or undesired software being downloaded to a user computer;

based on a result of the audit, selectively performing a binding of a certificate to the advertisement, the binding being indicative that selection of the advertisement or downloading the destination web page or the destination web site will not result in malicious or undesired software being downloaded;

enabling the advertisement and the bound certificate to be displayed at a displayed web page, wherein the displayed web page includes the advertisement, the advertisement served by an advertisement server, content served by a content server, and the bound certificate, served by the network device, such that the certificate provides an indication that the advertisement, the destination web page, and the destination web site will not result in malicious or undesired software being downloaded;

if an unauthorized modification of the certificate or the advertisement is detected, sending an alert indicating that a modification is detected;

collecting statistical information, including click-through data associated with the advertisement, wherein the click-through data includes information indicative of interactions by user computers with the advertisement and the presence of the certificate indicating that the advertisement, the destination web page, and the destination web site will not result in malicious or undesired software being downloaded;

generating trend data using the collected statistical information, including the click-through data associated with the advertisement wherein the click-through data includes information indicative of interactions by user computers with the advertisement and the presence of the certificate indicating that the advertisement, the destination web page, and the destination web site will not result in malicious or undesired software being downloaded; and

generating a trend data report using the trend data for transmission to a recipient.

2. The network device of claim 1, wherein detecting a modification further comprises digitally signing the certificate and the advertisement, and monitoring for a change based on the digital signature.

3. The network device of claim 1, wherein sending an alert further comprises sending an alert to a reviewer, wherein the reviewer determines whether the modification results in non-compliance to the at least one contractual criteria.

4. The network device of claim 1, wherein content within the certificate is provided by an advertiser.

15. The network device of claim 1, wherein the processor is further configured to execute instructions that perform actions, including:

collecting statistics associated with users interacting with the advertisement;

generating a report that shows the statistics so as to indicate when information of the certificate displayed with the advertisement changes; and

presenting the report to an operator.

16. The network device of claim 1, wherein the processor is further configured to execute instructions that perform actions, including:

determining that the information associated with the certificate is no longer correct; and

automatically contacting an advertiser of the advertisement to notify the advertiser of a cause of a change in the information.

17. The network device of claim 16, wherein determining that the information associated with the certificate is no longer correct includes automatically determining whether the information associated with the certificate is no longer correct.

18. The network device of claim 16, wherein determining that the information associated with the certificate is no longer correct includes automatically determining whether a contract for displaying the information associated with the certificate has expired.

19. The network device of claim 1, wherein said processor is further configured to execute instructions that perform actions including:

accessing additional information about the advertisement; and

enabling the additional information about the advertisement to be displayed in association with the advertisement.

20. The network device of claim 19, wherein said processor is further configured to execute instructions that perform actions including:

communicating a request to a remote computing system via a communications network;

receiving the additional information; and

enabling the additional information to be displayed with the advertisement for continuous, full-time display in association with the advertisement.

21. The network device according to claim 20, wherein said processor is further configured to execute instructions that perform actions including:

enabling the additional information to be displayed in response to a user interaction.

22. The network device according to claim 20, wherein said processor, in enabling the additional information to be displayed with the advertisement, is further configured to execute instructions that perform actions including:

visibly displaying the additional information.

23. The network device according to claim 1, wherein said processor is further configured to execute instructions that perform actions including:

in furtherance of performing the audit, processing consumer reviews;

in response to processing the consumer reviews, determining a rating based on the consumer reviews; and

enabling the rating to be displayed in association with the advertisement.

24. The network device according to claim 23, wherein said processor is further configured to execute instructions that perform actions including:

computing a rating based on the consumer reviews.

5. A system that is operative to manage advertisements over a network, comprising:

a first network device configured to perform actions, including;

sending, for an advertiser, a request for an audit to be performed for a display of an online advertisement containing a link to a destination web page that is part of a destination web site;

enabling a determination as to whether any of the;

advertisement,

the destination web page, or

the destination web site

may result in malicious or undesired software being downloaded to a user computer;

based on determining that selection of the advertisement or downloading the destination web page or the destination web site will not result in malicious or undesired software being downloaded, receiving a certificate;

providing the certificate and advertisement on a displayed web page, wherein the certificate provides an indication that the advertisement, the destination web page, and the destination web site will not result in malicious or undesired software being downloaded; and

if an unauthorized modification to the certificate or the advertisement is detected, sending an alert indicating detection of the modification;

collecting statistical information, including click-through data associated with the advertisement, wherein the click-through data includes information indicative of interactions by user computers with the advertisement and the presence of the certificate indicating that the advertisement, the destination web page, and the destination web site will not result in malicious or undesired software being downloaded;

generating trend data using the collected statistical information, including the click-through data associated with the advertisement wherein the click-through data includes information indicative of interactions by user computers with the advertisement and the presence of the certificate indicating that the advertisement, the destination web page, and the destination web site will not result in malicious or undesired software being downloaded; and

generating a trend data report using the trend data for transmission to a recipient.

6. The system of claim 5, wherein the certificate employs one or more graphical markings to convey at least a rating of the advertiser, wherein the one or more markings includes at least one of a check mark, a star, text, an animated graphic, a thumbs-up/down graphic, a pop-up dialog box, an audio clip, video clip, or a multimedia file.

7. The system of claim 5, wherein detecting a modification further comprises digitally signing the certificate or digitally signing the advertisement, and monitoring for a change based on at least one of the digital signatures.

8. The system of claim 5, wherein the certificate is hidden on the displayed web page until a user action is detected including at least one of hovering a mouse over the advertisement for a defined time period, or right-clicking the advertisement.

9. The system of claim 5, further comprising a second network device is configured to perform actions, comprising:

monitoring for compliance to the at least one contractual criteria while the advertisement is made available for display on the displayed web page;

and if a result of the monitoring indicates non-compliance, revoking the certificate.

10. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium having computer-executable instructions, the computer-executable instructions when installed onto a computing device enable the computing device to perform actions, comprising:

receiving a request for an audit associated with an advertisement containing a link to a destination web page that is part of a destination web site;

performing the audit to determine whether any of the;

advertisement,

the destination web page, or

the destination web site

may result in malicious or undesired software being downloaded;

based on a result of the audit, selectively performing a binding of a certificate to the advertisement, the binding being indicative that selection of the advertisement or downloading the destination web page, or the destination web site will not result in malicious or undesired software being downloaded;

enabling the advertisement and the bound certificate to be displayed at a displayed web page, such that the certificate provides an indication that the advertisement, the destination web page, and the destination web site will not result in malicious or undesired software being downloaded;

if an unauthorized modification of the certificate or the advertisement is detected, sending an alert indicating that a modification is detected;

collecting statistical information, including click-through data associated with the advertisement, wherein the click-through data includes information indicative of interactions by user computers with the advertisement and the presence of the certificate indicating that the advertisement, the destination web page, and the destination web site will not result in malicious or undesired software being downloaded;

generating trend data using the collected statistical information, including the click-through data associated with the advertisement wherein the click-through data includes information indicative of interactions by user computers with the advertisement and the presence of the certificate indicating that the advertisement, the destination web page, and the destination web site will not result in malicious or undesired software being downloaded; and

generating a trend data report using the trend data for transmission to a recipient.

11. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 10, wherein the advertisement is configured with dynamic content.

12. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 10, wherein the instructions enable the computing device to perform actions, further comprising:

collecting click-through data associated with the advertisement to detect a change in click-through data based on a presence of the certificate.

13. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 10, wherein detecting a modification further comprises digitally signing the certificate or digitally signing the advertisement, and monitoring for a change based on at least one of the digital signatures.

14. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 10, wherein the certificate includes information about at least one of the advertisement, a security status for the advertisement, or a trust level for an advertiser of the advertisement.