Attribution of demographics to census data
View Patent ↗In general, systems, components, methods, and techniques for gathering, recording, and development of accurate user demographics attributed to accesses by client systems of webpage, web content, or other online resources is provided. For a given a subset of unique users having known demographics for a segment of traffic or general population, a demographic profile may be created for all users of the segment or population within a tolerable margin of error. Demographic data for unique machine identifications (IDs) may be assigned, aggregated, and derived from a single source, or multiple sources, such as panel data, beacon level surveys, cookie exchanges, and the overlay of profile cookies from other publishers.
1. An automated computer system configured to determine and assign demographics to electronic data based on access of an online resource by a client device, the system comprising:
a non-transitory storage device storing an application including instructions;
one or more processing devices operable to access the application and execute the instructions, the instructions causing the one or more processing devices to:
access a message automatically generated when web content associated with a beacon is accessed by the client device;
determine a unique client identifier accompanying the message;
determine a time indicating when the message was received, transmitted, or created;
request information from a cookie exchange associated with the unique client identifier;
receive, in response to the request, information from the cookie exchange including a time of an event indicating when a resource was accessed by the client device and demographic data associated with the access of the resource;
determine the potential likelihood that a user associated with generation of the message is a same user who accessed the resource based on the determined time of the message and the time of the event associated with access of the resource;
assign the received demographic information to the unique client identifier based on the potential likelihood, such that subsequent messages automatically generated when web content associated with the beacon is accessed comprise the demographic information; and
store a record of the unique client identifier and assigned demographic information in a database associated with the client device.
2. The system of claim 1 , wherein the one or more processing devices are operable to access the application and execute the instructions, the instructions further causing the one or more processing devices to determine the potential likelihood that the user associated with the message is the user associated with the information received from the cookie exchange by comparing the time indicating when the message was received, transmitted, or created and the time of the event associated with access of the resource by the client device.
3. The system of claim 1 wherein the one or more processing devices are operable to access the application and execute the instructions, the instructions further causing the one or more processing devices to assign the demographic information to the unique client identifier based on the potential likelihood by assigning the demographic information to the unique client identifier when the time of the event occurs within a determined period of time, the determined period of time starting from the time when the message was received, transmitted, or created.
4. The system of claim 1 wherein the unique client identifier is a client system IP address and user agent combination.
5. The system of claim 1 wherein the one or more processing devices are operable to access the application and execute the instructions, the instructions further causing the one or more processing devices to:
receive the message, wherein receiving the message includes receiving the unique client identifier and a uniform resource locator of the web content; and
associate a timestamp with receiving the message.
6. The system of claim 1 wherein the time of the event is a time of a user login associated with access of the resource.
7. The system of claim 1 wherein the one or more processing devices are operable to access the application and execute the instructions, the instructions further causing the one or more processing devices to:
determine a relative reliability for the assigned demographic information as compared to a standard reliability; and
assign the determined reliability to the demographic information.
8. The system of claim 7 , wherein the one or more processing devices are operable to access the application and execute the instructions, the instructions further causing the one or more processing devices to:
aggregate a plurality of the unique client identifiers;
assign demographic information to the identifiers; and
determine reliabilities associated with the demographic information based on the information received from the cookie exchange to derive a demographic distribution for a subset of a population.
9. The system of claim 8 wherein the one or more processing devices are operable to access the application and execute the instructions, the instructions further causing the one or more processing devices to:
apply the derived demographic distribution to a population to assign demographic information to data associated with the population; and
store in the database a record of the assigned demographic information for the population.
10. The system of claim 9 wherein the one or more processing devices are operable to access the application and execute the instructions, the instructions further causing the one or more processing devices to:
generate a report from the assigned demographic information showing one or more demographics of the population.
11. A computer implemented method of automatically determining and assigning demographics to electronic data based on access of an online resource by a client device, the method comprising:
accessing, by one or more processing devices, a message automatically generated when web content associated with a beacon is accessed by the client device;
determining, by the one or more processing devices, a unique client identifier accompanying the message;
determining, by the one or more processing devices, a time indicating when the message was received, transmitted, or created;
requesting, by the one or more processing devices, information from a cookie exchange associated with the unique client identifier;
receiving, by the one or more processing devices and in response to the request, information from the cookie exchange including a time of an event indicating when a resource was accessed by the client device and demographic data associated with the access of the resource;
determining, by the one or more processing devices, the potential likelihood that a user associated with generation of the message is a same user who accessed the resource based on the determined time of the message and the time of the event associated with access of the resource;
assigning, by the one or more processing devices, the received demographic information to the unique client identifier based on the potential likelihood, such that subsequent messages automatically generated when web content associated with the beacon is accessed comprise the demographic information; and
storing, by the one or more processing devices and in a database associated with the client device, a record of the unique client identifier and assigned demographic information.
12. The method of claim 11 , wherein determining the potential likelihood that the user associated with the message is the user associated with the information received from the cookie exchange by comparing the time indicating when the message was received, transmitted, or created and the time of the event associated with access of the resource by the client device.
13. The method of claim 11 wherein assigning the demographic information to the unique client identifier based on the potential likelihood, includes assigning the demographic information to the unique client identifier when the time of the event occurs within a determined period of time, the determined period of time starting from the time when the message was received, transmitted, or created.
14. The method of claim 11 wherein the unique client identifier is a client system IP address and user agent combination.
15. The method of claim 11 further comprising:
receiving the message, wherein receiving the message includes receiving the unique client identifier and uniform resource locator of the web content; and
associating a timestamp with receiving the message.
16. The method of claim 11 wherein the time of the event is a time of a user login associated with access of the resource.
17. The method of claim 11 further comprising:
determining, by the one or more processing devices, a relative reliability for the assigned demographic information as compared to a standard reliability; and
assigning the determined reliability to the demographic information.
18. The method of claim 17 , further comprising:
aggregating, by the one or more processing devices, a plurality of the unique client identifiers;
assigning demographic information to the identifiers; and
determining reliabilities associated with the demographic information based on the information received from the cookie exchange to derive a demographic distribution for a subset of a population.
19. The method of claim 18 , further comprising:
applying, by the one or more processing devices, the derived demographic distribution to a population to assign demographic information to data associated with the population; and
storing, in the database associated with the client device, a record of the assigned demographic information for the population.
20. The method of claim 19 further comprising:
generating, by the one or more processing devices, a report from the assigned demographic information showing one or more demographics of the population.
21. A system configured to assign demographics to a population of data, the system comprising:
a storage device storing data associated with a population of users or a segment of the population of users, the population data corresponding to a set of messages generated when web content associated with a beacon is accessed by client devices of the population of users;
a non-transitory storage device storing an application including instructions; and
one or more processing devices operable to access the application and execute the instructions, the instructions causing the one or more processing devices to:
access the database and the population data;
determine a subset of the population data corresponding to a subset of messages having associated demographic information provided from multiple sources of demographic information, at least one of the multiple sources of demographic information being a cookie exchange;
process the subset of the population data to determine a value associated with each demographic information;
determine a relative reliability of each of the multiple sources of demographic information;
apply the determined relative reliability to the determined values to normalize the demographic information provided from for each of the multiple sources of demographic information for the subset of population data;
aggregate the normalized demographic information for the subset of population data to derive a demographic distribution for the subset of population data; and
apply the derived demographic distribution to the population of users or the segment of the population of users to assign demographic information to the population data; and
store the assigned demographic data with the population data in a database.
22. The system of claim 21 wherein the one or more processing devices are operable to access the application and execute the instructions, the instructions further causing the one or more processing devices to:
generate a report from the assigned demographic information showing the demographic information of the population of users or the segment of the population of users.
23. The system of claim 21 wherein the database stores a report from the assigned demographic information showing the demographic information of the population of users or the segment of the population of users.
24. The system of claim 21 wherein the one or more processing devices are operable to access the application and execute the instructions, the instructions further causing the one or more processing devices to determine a relative reliability of the demographic information from each of the multiple sources of demographic information by comparing the reliability of the demographic information from each of the multiple sources to the reliability of panel centric demographic information.
25. A computer implemented method of assigning demographics to a population of data, the method comprising:
accessing, by one or more processing devices, data associated with a population of users or a segment of the population of users, the population data corresponding to a set of messages generated when web content associated with a beacon is accessed by client devices of the population of users;
determining, by the one or more processing devices, a subset of the population data corresponding to a subset of messages having associated demographic information provided from multiple sources of demographic information, at least one of the multiple sources of demographic information being a cookie exchange;
processing, by the one or more processing devices, the subset of the population data to determine a value associated with each demographic information;
determining, by the one or more processing devices, a relative reliability of each of the multiple sources of demographic information;
applying, by the one or more processing devices, the determined relative reliability to the determined values to normalize the demographic information provided from for each of the multiple sources of demographic information for the subset of population data;
aggregating, by the one or more processing devices, the normalized demographic information for the subset of population data to derive a demographic distribution for the subset of population data;
applying, by the one or more processing devices, the derived demographic distribution to the population of users or the segment of the population of users to assign demographic information to the population data; and
storing the assigned demographic data with the population data in a database.
26. The method of claim 25 further comprising:
generating, by the one or more processing devices, a report from the assigned demographic information showing the demographic information of the population of users or the segment of the population of users.
27. The method of claim 25 further comprising:
storing, in the database, population data having associated demographic information assigned from multiple sources of demographic information including two or more of exchange centric data, profile centric data, and panel centric data.
28. The method of claim 25 wherein determining a relative reliability of the demographic information from each of the multiple sources of demographic information includes comparing the reliability of the demographic information from each of the multiple sources to the reliability of panel centric demographic information.
29. The system of claim 1 wherein the cookie exchange comprises a database system storing unique identifiers and corresponding demographic information associated with the stored unique identifiers.
30. The method of claim 11 wherein the cookie exchange comprises a database system storing unique identifiers and corresponding demographic information associated with the stored unique identifiers.