Patent ID: 8401899
Filing Date: 2013-03-19
Classification: G06Q

Abstract:
1. A method comprising: accessing by one or more computer systems online advertising data for one or more online advertising spaces for placing one or more online advertisements, the online advertising data comprising a plurality of metric values for the online advertising spaces, each of the metric values representing particular online advertising performance of the online advertising spaces with respect to a particular one of a plurality of online advertising metrics and a particular one of a plurality of user variables, each of the online advertising metrics representing a particular type of online advertising performance, each of the user variables representing a particular characteristic of online users, the online advertising spaces having metric values with respect to all the online advertising metrics and user variables; identifying by the one or more computer systems a plurality of pairs of the user variables, the pairs of the user variables being unique with respect to each other, each of the pairs comprising a first one of the user variables and a second one of the user variables, there being a first metric value with respect to each of the online advertising metrics and the first user variable, there being a second metric value with respect to each of the online advertising metrics and the second user variable; by the one or more computer systems, for each of the pairs: selecting by the one or more computer systems one of the pairs based on its weighted score; performing by the one or more computer systems a merge test on the selected one of the pairs, the merge test comprising determining whether each of the statistical scores for the selected one of the pairs satisfies a predetermined threshold requirement for the statistical score, the selected one of the pairs passing the merge test if all the statistical scores for the selected one of the pairs satisfy their predetermined threshold requirements; and merging by the one or more computer systems the user variables in the selected one of the pairs with each other if the selected one of the pairs passes the merge test, the merging of the user variables in the selected one of the pairs comprising: