Patent ID: 8671015

Claim:
A computer-implemented method in a computing device for augmenting keywords of advertisement sets, each advertisement set including at least one advertisement associated with a keyword, the method comprising: under the control of one or more computer systems configured with executable instructions, the one or more computer systems configured to perform the steps of: providing an internal search service associated with an advertiser's web site and configured to facilitate an internal search of an electronic catalog of items provided by an advertiser on the web site; identifying from currently submitted advertisement sets candidate keywords for augmentation by, for each advertisement set: determining a first value corresponding to a first financial benefit to the advertiser resulting from using the advertisement set in the internal search provided by the advertiser and facilitated by the internal search service associated with the advertiser, the first financial benefit being derived from purchases of an item by users who selected a link for the item in a first search result associated with the internal search of the electronic catalog facilitated by the internal search service, and wherein the first value includes an internal conversion rate associated with a keyword included in the advertisement set; determining a second value corresponding to a second financial benefit to the advertiser resulting from using the advertisement set in an external search that is external to the advertiser's web site, the second financial benefit being derived from purchases of the item by users who selected a link for the item in a second search result associated with the external search, and wherein the second value includes an external conversion rate associated with the keyword included in the advertisement set; determining that the first value exceeds the second value by a predetermined threshold; and identifying the keyword in the advertisement set as a candidate keyword for augmentation; and for each identified candidate keyword, identifying an augmentation term to be added to the candidate keyword of the advertisement set to provide an augmented keyword for an augmented advertisement set; and submitting the augmented advertisement set for placement with the advertisement placement service.