Advertisement effectiveness measurement

Abstract

A dashboard to integrate gadgets and present data output from the gadgets in an integrated user interface. The gadgets dynamically collect information about an advertisement or an ad campaign associated with the advertisement as the information is collected from various sources during the ad campaign, each of some of the gadgets processing collected information and outputting the processed information in real time.

1 . An apparatus comprising:
 one or more server computers configured to perform operations comprising:
 providing a plurality of gadgets for processing data for display on a user device, each gadget being instructions for embedding in a web page, and each gadget being operable to perform operations comprising:
 collecting, from a reporting process that receives information from a plurality of sources, information about an advertisement as the information is updated by the reporting process during an ad campaign, the collecting comprising:
 accessing advertisement data logs from a first source for the advertisement, the advertisement data logs specifying timestamps of presentation events for the advertisement on web pages and Internet protocol (IP) addresses associated with the presentation events; 
 accessing browsing data logs from a second source for the web pages, the browsing data logs specifying timestamps of web page view events for the web pages, IP addresses associated with the web page view events, and a user ID that is not included in the advertisement data logs; 
 
 processing the collected information, including determining one or more performance metrics of the advertisement, the processing comprising:
 for pairs of an advertisement data log entry and a browsing data log entry that have matching IP addresses, determining a time interval for the pair based at least in part on a difference between the timestamp in the advertisement data log entry of the pair and the timestamp in the browsing data log entry of the pair; 
 for each of at least some of the pairs, determining that the advertisement was presented to a user corresponding to the user ID on a respective one of the web pages in response to determining that the respective time interval satisfies a predetermined threshold corresponding to a maximum time interval associated with presentation of the advertisement on the respective one of the web pages; 
 in response to determining that the advertisement was presented to the user on the respective one of the web pages, associating the user ID from the browsing data log entry with the presentation events for the advertisement; and 
 outputting a visual representation of the processed information as the information is updated by the reporting process; and 
 
 providing a dashboard for display on the user device, the dashboard operable to present the visual representations output from the gadgets in an integrated user interface. 
 
   
     
     
         2 . The apparatus of  claim 1  in which two or more of the gadgets are operable to output visual representations of information on effectiveness of corresponding two or more advertisements. 
     
     
         3 . The apparatus of  claim 2  in which the dashboard shows the two or more advertisements sorted according to the effectiveness of the advertisements. 
     
     
         4 . The apparatus of  claim 1  in which at least one of the gadgets is operable to process private data at a client site and implements a security procedure to prevent unauthorized access to the private data. 
     
     
         5 - 6 . (canceled) 
     
     
         7 . The apparatus of  claim 1  in which the information comprises at least one of data indicating a performance of the advertisement, statistical data associated with the advertisement, or data indicating recognition of a brand associated with the advertisement. 
     
     
         8 . The apparatus of  claim 1  in which the one or more performance metrics comprise at least one of brand health, campaign effectiveness, competitive brand tracking, market research, offline ad effectiveness, or mix media recommendation. 
     
     
         9 . The apparatus of  claim 1  in which at least two gadgets communicate with each other such that a gadget is updated automatically in response to a change in another gadget. 
     
     
         10 . The apparatus of  claim 1  in which the gadgets comprise a first gadget that processes data output from a second gadget and a third gadget to generate combined data for output. 
     
     
         11 . The apparatus of  claim 10  in which the first gadget correlates the output from the second gadget with the output from the third gadget to identify a correlation between the outputs from the second and third gadgets. 
     
     
         12 . The apparatus of  claim 1 , further comprising one or more application programming interfaces (APIs) for exchanging data among the gadgets. 
     
     
         13 . The apparatus of  claim 1 , further comprising one or more application programming interfaces (APIs) for exporting data from the gadgets or importing data to the gadgets. 
     
     
         14 . The apparatus of  claim 1  in which the dashboard presents the output from various gadgets in the web page. 
     
     
         15 . The apparatus of  claim 1  in which the integrated user interface displays at least one of text messages, charts, or graphs. 
     
     
         16 . A computer-implemented method for evaluating advertisements, comprising:
 providing, by at least one server computer, a plurality of gadgets processing data for display on a user device, each gadget being instructions for embedding in a web page, and each gadget being operable to perform operations comprising:
 collecting, from a reporting process that receives information from a plurality of sources, information about an advertisement as the information is updated by the reporting process during an ad campaign, the collecting comprising: 
 accessing advertisement data logs from a first source for the advertisement, the advertisement data log specifying timestamps of presentation events for the advertisement on web pages and Internet protocol (IP) addresses associated with the presentation events; 
 accessing browsing data logs from a second source for the web pages, the browsing data logs specifying timestamps of web page view events for the web pages, IP addresses associated with the web page view events, and a user ID that is not included in the advertisement data logs; 
   processing the collected information, including determining one or more performance metrics of the advertisement, the processing comprising:
 for pairs of an advertisement data log entry and a browsing data log entry that have IP addresses that match, determining a time interval for the pair based at least in part on a difference between the timestamp in the advertisement data log entry of the pair and the timestamp in the browsing data log entry of the pair; 
 for each of at least some of the pairs, determining that the advertisement was presented to a user corresponding to the user ID on a respective one of the web pages in response to determining the respective time interval satisfies a predetermined threshold corresponding to a maximum time interval associated with presentation of the advertisement on the respective one of the web pages; and 
 in response to determining that the advertisement was presented to the user on the respective one of the web pages, associating the user ID with the presentation events for the advertisement; and 
 outputting a visual representation of the processed information as the information is updated by the reporting process; and 
   providing a dashboard for display on the user device, the dashboard operable to present the visual representations output from the gadgets in an integrated user interface.   
     
     
         17 . A non-transitory storage device storing instructions operable to cause one or more processors to perform operations comprising:
 providing, from one or more server computers, a plurality of gadgets for processing data for display on a user device, each gadget being instructions for embedding in a web page, and each gadget being operable to perform operations comprising:
 collecting, from a reporting process that receives information from a plurality of sources, information about an advertisement as the information is updated by the reporting process during an ad campaign, the collecting comprising:
 accessing advertisement data logs from a first source for the advertisement, the advertisement data logs specifying timestamps of presentation events for the advertisement on web pages and Internet protocol (IP) addresses associated with the presentation events; 
 accessing browsing data logs from a second source for the web pages, the browsing data logs specifying timestamps of web page view events for the web pages, IP addresses associated with the web page view events, and a user ID that is not included in the advertisement data logs; 
 
 processing the collected information, including determining one or more performance metrics of the advertisement, the processing comprising:
 for pairs of an advertisement data log entry and a browsing data log entry that have IP addresses that match, determining a time interval for the pair based at least in part on a difference between the timestamp in the advertisement data log entry of the pair and the timestamp in the browsing data log entry of the pair; 
 for each of at least some of the pairs, determining that the advertisement was presented to a user corresponding to the user ID on a respective one of the web pages in response to determining the respective time interval satisfies a predetermined threshold corresponding to a maximum time interval associated with presentation of the advertisement on the respective one of the web pages; 
 in response to determining that the advertisement was presented to the user on the respective one of the web pages, associating the user ID with the presentation events for the advertisement; and 
 outputting a visual representation of the processed information as the information is updated by the reporting process; and 
 
 providing a dashboard for display on the user device, the dashboard operable to present the visual representations output from the gadgets in an integrated user interface. 
   
     
     
         18 . The device of  claim 17 , wherein the one or more performance metrics comprise at least one of brand health, campaign effectiveness, competitive brand tracking, market research, offline ad effectiveness, or mix media recommendation. 
     
     
         19 . The device of  claim 17 , wherein at least two gadgets communicate with each other such that a gadget is updated automatically in response to a change in another gadget. 
     
     
         20 - 40 . (canceled) 
     
     
         41 . The method of  claim 16 , comprising:
 providing supporting layers for the gadgets, the supporting layers comprising:
 a first layer configured to obtain, from at least two data sources, raw data indicating effectiveness of the advertisement; and 
 a second layer configured to analyze data output of the first layer, including determining trends of the data output from the first layer; and 
   an application programming interface (API) for the gadgets to access the analyzed data to generate the performance metrics, wherein the performance metrics include the trends of the data.   
     
     
         42 . The method of  claim 41 , wherein analyzing the data output of the first layer comprises:
 combining raw data from each of the at least two data sources; and   measuring effectiveness of the advertisement based on the combined raw data.   
     
     
         43 . (canceled) 
     
     
         44 . The method of  claim 16 , wherein processing the collected information comprises merging advertisement data log entries and browsing data log entries based on the respective IP addresses and the respective timestamps in advertisement data log entries and browsing data log entries to generate pairs of advertisement data log entries and browsing data log entries. 
     
     
         45 . The method of  claim 44 , wherein measuring effectiveness of the advertisement comprises determining a web browsing history of a user, the web browsing history indicating whether the advertisement is presented to the user. 
     
     
         46 . (canceled) 
     
     
         47 . The method of  claim 16 , wherein each gadget is a user-uploaded application program. 
     
     
         48 . The method of  claim 16 , further comprising:
 for each of the pairs, selecting the predetermined threshold based at least in part on a browser type and internet connection speed for a user device with the matching IP address of the pair; and   wherein determining that the advertisement is presented to the user comprises determining that the advertisement is presented to the user on the respective one of the web pages in response to determining the respective time interval satisfies the selected predetermined threshold.