Patent Application
20060293957
The present invention relates generally to the field of market research, and in particular, it relates to the use of user behavior to define content offered to that user.
The technique of gathering information about consumer behavior on the internet was set out in commonly-owned U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/226,066, entitled “Method and Device for Publishing Cross-Network User Behavioral Data” filed on 14 Sep. 2005. (the “'066” application). That application is incorporated by reference herein for all purposes.
The technique of the '066 application teaches how information about user behavior on the internet can be gathered. In sum, that application teaches that a behavior module can reside on a user computer, which module can observe and record user behavior in terms of keystrokes, mouse clicks and so on. Also, the behavior module can also observe information about websites visited by the user. In conjunction with software incorporated into the behavior module, data about the web site or web page can be analyzed and the site categorized into one of a set of categories defined by the behavior module. Information identifying the category, as well as information about the user's navigation behavior, such as the when the site was visited, how much time was spent there, and what the user did, can also be gathered by the behavior module. Finally, the behavior module can summarize the information and compact it into a form suitable for transmission, such the form generally known as a “cookie.”
What is not taught by the '066 application, and not seen in the art, is an understanding of how to employ such information to provide content to a user based on what that user wants to see. It remains to the present invention to provide such functionality to the art.
An aspect of the invention is a method of tracking and publishing categorical user interest data, based on computer user behavior observed by a server coupled in communication with the user's computer. The method includes, as a first step, responsive to a user navigating with a browser to a first content site, receiving one or more categorical navigation history cookies. The next step constitutes categorizing the first content site into one or more subject categories (from a multiplicity of subject categories) and a sponsorship status (as hosting sponsored content or as navigation to sponsored content), which is followed by updating the categorical navigation history cookies to log by subject category and sponsorship status the user navigation to the first content site. The final step is sending to the user's browser the updated categorical navigation history cookies for persistent storage on the user's computer.
a and 3b illustrate an embodiment of a process for providing advertising content to a user based on prior user behavior.
The following detailed description is made with reference to the figures. Preferred embodiments are described to illustrate the present invention, not to limit its scope, which is defined by the claims. Those of ordinary skill in the art will recognize a variety of equivalent variations on the description that follows.
A user submits a search request because of the user's interest in a topic. To make good use of the information about a user's interest, a behavior watching and/or behavior summarizing program 120 resident in the client computer listens for requests, for instance made using a browser 110 or other hyperlink enabled programs such as word processors or presentation programs. It listens for requests for information such as a search request, a click-through on a banner ad, or entry into the browser or click through of a destination URL. When the behavior watching program 120 detects that an end-user is performing a search or otherwise indicating their interest in a web site or subject, the behavior watching program records the interest. The interest may be recorded to program memory or to a persistent memory 122. When a user clicks on an advertisement related to the end-user's search request, the probability that the end-user will be interested in one or more related advertisements increases. In the car example, just above, the behavior watching program may note that the search was followed by certain click-throughs.
The behavior watcher 120 is resident in the client computer 100 so that it can respond to an end-user's search request even when the end-user uses different search engines. That is, unlike other targeting techniques that only work when an end-user is on a particular web site, the behavior watching program observes user interest across different search engines, web sites and even browsers. An end-user may obtain the behavior watching program by itself or along with free or reduced-cost computer programs, services, and other products.
The behavior responsive server 132 presents a new approach to providing content responsive to recent user behavior. User behavior has in the past been observed using a cookie with a unique user ID that allows server-side tracking. Server aggregated user behavior data is compiled among an organization of cooperating server owners. Cooperation may relate to ad serving (e.g., Double-Click), portals (e.g., Yahoo), search engines (e.g., Google) or other organizational basis. Cooperation in this sense is contractual more than technical. Server aggregated user behavior data is used, for instance, by an ad server when a web beacon (a small, null image with a URL pointing to an ad server) contacts the ad server and causes a unique user ID cookie to be transmitted. The ad server accesses a database, to update user behavior data with the new contact. The ad server could also access data from the server aggregated database, based on the unique user ID. A serious limitation of server aggregated user behavior data is that it is limited to contacts detected by cooperating servers when the user accesses cooperating web sites and the user's unique user ID cookie is transmitted. Mismatches of unique user IDs or multiple unique user IDs for the same user diminish the effectiveness of server-side aggregation. The combination of client-side user behavior tracking 120 and a reported-behavior responsive server 132 presents a new approach.
A reported-behavior responsive server 132 accepts one or more messages (e.g., cookies) that report recent user behavior as a basis for deciding among potential messages (e.g., banner ads) which message to give the user. The reported-behavior responsive server 132 need not access a server-side user behavior database to decide which message to send. Those of skill in the art will recognize that the new paradigm of reported behavior could be combined with server-side aggregation and that that combination also would be novel.
The ability of the cookies employed here to identify categories, as discussed below, departs from traditional uses of such cookies. The structures shown here can be termed “categorical” cookies to note this capability.
A client computer 100 is typically, but not necessarily, a personal computer such as those running the Microsoft Windows™, Apple Macintosh™, Linux, or UNIX operating systems. An end-user may employ a suitably equipped client computer 100 to get on network 200 and access computers coupled thereto. For example, a client computer 100 may be used to access web pages from a web server computer 130. It is to be noted that as used in the present disclosure, the term “computer” includes any type of data processing device including personal digital assistants, digital telephones, wireless terminals, and the like.
A web server computer 130 may host a web site containing information designed to attract end-users surfing on the Internet. A web server computer 130 may host or cooperate with another server that hosts advertisements, downloadable computer programs, a search engine and products available for online purchase. A web server computer 130 may also host or cooperate with an ad server for that delivers advertisements to a client computer 100.
A reported-behavior responsive server computer 132 serves message units for delivery to a client computer 100. The message units may contain advertisements, for example. Message units are further described below. A reported-behavior responsive server computer 132 may also host downloadable computer programs and files for supporting, updating, or maintaining components on a client computer 100.
Web server computers 130 and reported-behavior responsive server computer 132 are typically, but not necessarily, server computers such as those available from Sun Microsystems, Hewlett-Packard, Dell or International Business Machines. A client computer 100 may communicate with a web server computer 130 or a reported-behavior responsive server computer 132 using client-server protocol. It is to be noted that client-server computing will not be further described here.
The components of a client computer 100 are not illustrated in a separate figure, but are well-understood. In one embodiment, the components of client computer 100 shown in
As shown in
The behavior watching program 120 may be downloadable from a message server computer 103. Behavior watching program 120 may be downloaded in conjunction with the downloading of another computer program. For example, behavior watching program 120 may be downloaded to a client computer 100 along with a utility program that is provided free of charge or at a reduced cost. The utility program may be provided to an end-user in exchange for the right to deliver messages to the end-user via behavior watching program 120. In essence, revenue (e.g., advertising fees) from messages delivered to the end-user helps defray the cost of creating and maintaining the utility program. Other components such as operating system components, utility programs, application programs, and the like are not shown for clarity of illustration.
An embodiment of a process by which the present invention can provide preference-based advertising content to a user is illustrated in
Initially, the host company conducts a survey of websites and assigns categories to as many commercially oriented websites as possible, step 202. This process is described in detail in commonly-owned U.S. Patent Application No. 11377,932 entitled “Method for Providing Content to an Internet User Based on the User's Demonstrated Content Preferences,” filed on Mar. 16, 2006. (the “'932” application). That application is incorporated herein for all purposes.
Results of that categorization, which can be in the form of a database containing both website identification information and associated categories, is provided to the behavior-responsive server in step 204. Similarly, the behavior-responsive server stores advertising content associated with categories, in step 206.
The user computer installs the software developed by the host (step 208) and begins tracking internet navigation behavior, step 210. As the user navigates to a website, step 212, a cookie is updated, step 214. The '066 application discusses such cookies in detail, and at this point it suffices to note that such cookies contain navigation information, including recency and usage data. As noted above, the relationship between these cookies and the categorization process allows these cookies to be termed “categorical” cookies, and that term will be employed henceforth. The user also transmits the categorical cookie to the behavior-responsive server.
The behavior-responsive server processes the received categorical cookie, step 216 which includes several distinct sub-steps. First, information about the current website location is unpacked. Then that site is categorized, employing the stored category information. Categorization of this sort is also set out in the '932 application.
Then, at step 218 (
At step 220, the categorical cookie is updated to include the current site category information (recency and usage) as historical data. In this manner, two advantages are achieved. First, the storage load for retaining masses of user information is shifted to the user computers. Small amounts of such data will have no impact individually, but if the behavior-responsive server were required to do so, a significant burden would result. Second, response speed is materially improved, as the requirement to look up user history data is removed. In the environment set out here, the behavior-responsive server must respond on the fly, in real time, and streamlining a time-consuming database access assists that situation.
With the appropriate content selected and the categorical cookie updated, the behavior-responsive server can transmit results to the user for display, step 222. In the embodiment shown here, that step is accomplished by transmitting the categorical cookie and a link to the content. If desired, the content could be transmitted as well, though the bandwidth requirement for that task probably renders that solution impractical in many scenarios.
The user responds to this message by first displaying the content, step 224, which most likely involves retrieving content from a designated URL. Then, the categorical cookie is stored on the user computer, step 226. Cookie memory 124, seen in
The behavior-responsive server continues with follow-up actions after the transmission to the user. First, it stores, and possibly aggregates user data, step 228. It then transmits data to the host, step 230, enabling the host to undertake update actions, step 232.
While the present invention is disclosed by reference to the preferred embodiments and examples detailed above, it is understood that these examples are intended in an illustrative rather than in a limiting sense. It is contemplated that modifications and combinations will readily occur to those skilled in the art, which modifications and combinations will be within the spirit of the invention and the scope of the following claims.
This application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 60/694,533 entitled “Publishing Behavioral Observations to Customers” filed on Jun. 28, 2005. That application is incorporated by reference for all purposes.
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 60694533 | Jun 2005 | US |
