Output Bidding: A New Search Advertising Model Complementary to Keyword Bidding

Abstract

A search engine can be modeled as a mapping that takes in user keywords as input and produces search results as output. Currently, the most dominant form of search advertising is input bidding where advertisers bid to associate their advertisements with keywords. We propose output bidding where advertisers bid to associate their advertisements with search results without changing or replacing any search result. We argue how the two forms of bidding complement each other as well as how output bidding also ties in contextual advertising to search advertising. We propose three basic variations with examples: associating advertisements with output from the same site, using output to make more expressive input bidding, and associating advertisements with output in general. We experimentally show the potential of output bidding using real data.