Determining conversion rates for on-line purchases

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9324095-B2
Application number	US-201113702888-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jun 8, 2011
Priority date	Jun 8, 2010
Publication date	Apr 26, 2016
Grant date	Apr 26, 2016

Abstract

Identifying on-line advertising conversions includes identifying, at a computer server system, a plurality of reports from one or more computing devices, wherein each of the reports indicates a clock skew between one of the computing devices and a clock server system; using the clock skews to determine that two or more of the reports are likely from a common computing device; determining that the two or more of the reports are common, in that they correspond to display of an advertisement on the common computing device and to purchase of on-line content with the common computing device; and indicating that a purchase conversion occurred based on determining that the two or more of the reports are common.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A computer-implemented method for identifying an on-line advertising conversion, the method comprising:
receiving, by one or more computers, a first set of data specifying that a user interacted with an online advertisement and specifying a first clock skew between a clock of a client device at which the user interaction occurred and a clock server that differs from the one or more computers, wherein the first clock skew is determined based on a difference between (i) a midpoint between a current time on the client device when the client device sent a time request to the clock server in response to detecting the user interaction occurred and a current time on the client device when the client device received a response to the time request from the clock server and (ii) a time specified in a response to the time request by the clock server, wherein the specified time corresponds to a time when the clock server received the time request from the client device;
receiving, by the one or more computers, a second set of data specifying that an application was installed and specifying a second clock skew between a clock of a client device at which the application was installed and the clock server, wherein the second clock skew is determined based on a difference between (i) a midpoint between a current time on the client device when the client device sent a time request to the clock server in response to detecting the application was installed and a current time on the client device when the client device received a response to the time request from the clock server and (ii) a time specified in a response to the time request by the clock server, wherein the specified time corresponds to a time when the clock server received the time request from the client device;
determining, by the one or more computers and based on a difference between the first clock skew and the second clock skew being less than a specified amount, that the application installation is attributable to presentation of the online advertisement; and
outputting, by the one or more computers and based on the determination that the application installation is attributable to presentation of the online advertisement, an indication that the online advertisement led to a conversion.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising serving, by the one or more computers, code for the online advertisement to a computing device, wherein the code causes a clock skew for the computing device to be determined in response to user interaction with the online advertisement.

3. The method of claim 2 , further comprising storing information identifying the online advertisement and at least one of the first clock skew or the second clock for the computing device in a reporting log.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein determining that the application installation is attributable to presentation of the online advertisement comprises determining that the first clock skew and the second clock skew were both received within a threshold amount of time or less.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein determining that the application installation is attributable to presentation of the online advertisement comprises determining whether additional information received in each of the first set of data and the second set of data match within a threshold variance.

6. The method of claim 5 , wherein the additional information comprises one or more environmental indicators that indicate a physical environment within which a client device was located when the first set of data or the second set of data was provided.

7. The method of claim 6 , wherein the environmental indicators include one or more of: sound, temperature, and location information that indicates a geographic location.

8. The method of claim 5 , wherein the additional information comprises one or more pieces of information selected from the group consisting of an IP address, information identifying a model of a computing device, information identifying an operating system, and a version of an operating system of a computing device.

9. A computer-implemented system for identifying on-line advertising conversion, the system comprising:
an advertising sub-system arranged to serve interactive advertisements to users of computing devices;
one or more transaction logs that store transaction instance data representing interactions by computer users with the advertisements and with products that are subjects of the advertisements; and
a conversion correlator programmed to correlate connections between interactions with advertisements with interactions with products that are subjects of the advertisements by matching clock skew data for the computing devices, wherein the conversion correlator includes one or more processors that execute instructions that cause the conversion correlator to perform operations comprising:
receiving a first set of data specifying that a user interacted with an online advertisement and specifying a first clock skew between a clock of a client device at which the user interaction occurred and a clock server that differs from the one or more computers, wherein the first clock skew is determined based on a difference between (i) a midpoint between a current time on the client device when the client device sent a time request to the clock server in response to detecting the user interaction occurred and a current time on the client device when the client device received a response to the time request from the clock server and (ii) a time specified in a response to the time request by the clock server, wherein the specified time corresponds to a time when the clock server received the time request from the client device;
receiving a second set of data specifying that an application was installed and specifying a second clock skew between a clock of a client device at which the application was installed and the clock server, wherein the second clock skew is determined based on a difference between (i) a midpoint between a current time on the client device when the client device sent a time request to the clock server in response to detecting the application was installed and a current time on the client device when the client device received a response to the time request from the clock server and (ii) a time specified in a response to the time request by the clock server, wherein the specified time corresponds to a time when the clock server received the time request from the client device;
determining, by the one or more computers and based on a difference between the first clock skew and the second clock skew being less than a specified amount, that the application installation is attributable to presentation of the online advertisement; and
outputting, by the one or more computers and based on the determination that the application installation is attributable to presentation of the online advertisement, an indication that the online advertisement led to a conversion.

10. The system of claim 9 , wherein the interactive advertisements are served with code that cause a clock skew to be determined by a device on which an advertisement has been displayed in response to user interaction with the online advertisement.

11. The system of claim 9 , further comprising an application marketplace offering one or more applications for sale that, when installed on a computing device, cause a clock skew for the computing device on which the application is installed to be determined and reported to the one or more transaction logs.

12. The system of claim 9 , further comprising a transaction log manager programmed to remove entries from the logs after the conversion correlator

Assignees

• Singleton David P
• Barr Miles E
• Google Inc

Inventors

• Singleton David P
• Barr Miles E

Classifications

• G06Q30/02

  Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising · CPC title

• G06Q30/0246 Primary

  Traffic · CPC title

• H04L63/0876

  based on the identity of the terminal or configuration, e.g. MAC address, hardware or software configuration or device fingerprint · CPC title