Sponsored Stories Unit Creation from Organic Activity Stream

Abstract

Methods, apparatuses and systems directed to sponsored story generation from an organic activity stream in a social networking site. A user wishing to promote an entry from an organic activity stream may, using a sponsor user interface, specify the types of stories to promote to a portion of the home page displayed to a member of a social network.

1 . A method comprising, by one or more computing systems:
 receiving sponsor specifications designating a set of story characteristics;   monitoring an organic activity stream for entries matching the story characteristics; and   upon finding a match, exporting the entry to a sponsored story system.   
     
     
         2 . The method of  claim 1 , the story characteristics comprising:
 an application ID; wherein a match is found any time an entry in the activity stream is published via an application with the same application ID.   
     
     
         3 . The method of  claim 2 , further comprising displaying the converted entry to all users connected to the user generating the entry via the application. 
     
     
         4 . The method of  claim 1 , the story characteristics comprising:
 an entity identifier, wherein a match is found any time an entry in the activity stream is generated by a user interacting with an entity corresponding to the entity identifier.   
     
     
         5 . The method of  claim 4 , further comprising displaying the entry to all users connected to the user interacting with the entity. 
     
     
         6 . The method of  4 , further comprising displaying the entry to all users connected to the entity. 
     
     
         7 . The method of  claim 4 , interacting with the entity comprising liking the entity. 
     
     
         8 . The method of  claim 4 , interacting with the entity comprising posting a link to the page of the entity. 
     
     
         9 . The method of  claim 4 , interacting with the entity comprising checking-in to a location associated with the entity. 
     
     
         10 . The method of  claim 4 , interacting with the entity comprising posting a review of the entity above a predetermined threshold value. 
     
     
         11 . The method of  claim 1 , the story characteristics comprising:
 an entity identifier and a specific tag requesting delivery to the sponsored story system.   
     
     
         12 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the sponsored story system displays the entry on a predetermined area of web page. 
     
     
         13 . The method of  claim 12 , wherein the sponsor specifications includes a visualization characteristic, and the sponsored story system converts the entry in accordance with the visualization characteristic prior to display. 
     
     
         14 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the activity stream is a news feed of the collective actions of all the users of a social network while on the social network 
     
     
         15 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the activity stream is a news feed of the collective actions of all the users of a social network while interacting with networked entities that are not a part of the social network. 
     
     
         16 . The method of  claim 4 , further comprising displaying the entry to all users interacting with the entity 
     
     
         17 . The method of  claim 16 , wherein interacting with the entity comprises liking the entity. 
     
     
         18 . The method of  claim 16 , wherein interacting with the entity comprises checking in to a location associated with the entity. 
     
     
         19 . The method of  claim 4 , further comprising:
 calculating a score for each user of the social network, the score comprising a numeric value representing each user's affinity for the entity based on each user's profile; and   displaying the entry to all users whose score exceeds a predetermined threshold value.   
     
     
         20 . The method of  claim 4 , further comprising:
 calculating a score for each user connected to the user interacting with the entity, the score comprising a numeric value representing the user's affinity for the entity based on the user's profile; and   displaying the entry to all users whose score exceeds a predetermined threshold value.