Patent ID: 7689590

Claim:
A computer-implemented yield management system for media advertising, comprising: a processor; memory coupled to the processor; demand curve data stored in the memory, the demand curve data associated with an availability of advertising time slots, wherein the demand curve data is defined by a function P N =P L *F N , wherein a sale N has a price and P N is the price for the sale N, P L is the sale N starting price when 0% of the advertising inventory associated with a particular advertising request has been sold, and F N is a multiplier that starts at 1.0 before a first sale and has a value which increases as a total amount of capacity available for the particular advertising request approaches zero, and P N =P H *F N , where P H is the sale N final price when 100% of the advertising inventory associated with the particular advertising request has been sold, wherein F is a demand curve function that determines an applicable price at inventory levels between the sale N starting and final prices, F H representing the function F value when 100% of the advertising inventory associated with the particular advertising request has been sold and F N representing the function F value at sale N; an inventory module executable by the processor to create advertising inventory for a plurality of media providers, the advertising inventory containing available advertising time slots; a yield management module executable by the processor, the yield management module to generate pricing information based on the demand curve data; a forecasting module to generate advertising time segments that meet specific criteria in the advertising inventory; and a pricing module to create a pricing strategy using the demand curve data where the price of advertising varies for one or more advertising time slots in the advertising inventory based on the available advertising inventory.