System and Method for Targeting Advertisements

Abstract

An advertisement selection system is presented in which vectors describing an actual or hypothetical market for a product or desired viewing audience can be determined. An ad characterization vector is transmitted along with a consumer ID. The consumer ID is used to retrieve a consumer characterization vector which is correlated with the ad characterization vector to determine the suitability of the advertisement to the consumer. The consumer characterization vector describes statistical information regarding the demographics and product purchase preferences of a consumer, and is developed from previous purchases or viewing habits. A price for displaying the advertisement can be determined based on the results of the correlation of the ad characterization vector with the consumer characterization vector.

1 . A computer-implemented method of targeting advertisements to a consumer, the method comprising: 
 (a) accessing a computer-stored purchase record associated with the consumer, the purchase record including information related to a set of initial purchases made by the consumer;    (b) determining one or more behavioral characteristics of the consumer from the purchase record, wherein the behavioral characteristics are not directly observable from the set of initial purchases; and    (c) selecting one or more advertisements to present to the consumer, the advertisements corresponding to a set of potential purchases, wherein the selection of advertisements is based on the one or more behavioral characteristics of the consumer.    
   
   
       2 . The method of  claim 1 , further comprising: 
 (d) profiling the consumer using the behavioral characteristics and selecting the advertisements based on the profiling.    
   
   
       3 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the selected advertisements are unrelated to the set of initial purchases.  
   
   
       4 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the potential purchases are unrelated to the set of initial purchases.  
   
   
       5 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the behavioral characteristics are determined by applying heuristic rules to the purchase record.  
   
   
       6 . The method of  claim 5 , wherein the heuristic rules have been predefined independently of the initial purchases and at least one of the heuristic rules remains unchanged during steps (b) and (a).  
   
   
       7 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the determination of the behavior characteristics is based in part on an external study.  
   
   
       8 . A computer-implemented method of targeting advertisements to a consumer, the method comprising: 
 (a) accessing a computer-stored purchase record associated with a consumer, the purchase record containing initial purchase data representing a set of initial purchases made by the consumer;    (b) relating the purchase record to at least one consumer characteristic by applying at least one computer-stored heuristic rule;    (c) accessing a set of advertisements corresponding to a set of potential purchases, wherein the set of potential purchases is substantially unrelated to the set of initial purchases; and    (d) matching one or more of the advertisements to the consumer based on the at least one consumer characteristic.    
   
   
       9 . The method of  claim 8  wherein the at least one consumer characteristic is a demographic characteristic.  
   
   
       10 . The method of  claim 8  wherein the at least one consumer characteristic is a behavioral characteristic.  
   
   
       11 . The method of  claim 8  wherein step (b) includes profiling the consumer based on the at least one consumer characteristic, and wherein the matching in step (d) is based on the profiling.  
   
   
       12 . The method of  claim 8  further comprising: 
 (e) updating the at least one consumer characteristic based on a new purchase record.    
   
   
       13 . The method of  claim 8 , wherein at least one computer-stored heuristic rule relates the purchase record to at least one consumer characteristic using a relationship which is not directly observable through collaborative filtering techniques.  
   
   
       14 . The method of  claim 8 , wherein relationship between the purchase record and the at least one consumer characteristic is accomplished by incorporating at least two types of analysis selected from the group consisting of exploratory problem-solving, self-learning, discovery, experiments, trial and error, inferences, educated guesses, market studies, human knowledge and experience.