real-time bidding

An online marketing method which allows advertisers to place ads immediately based on what the user is currently viewing.

It used to be that advertisers booked slots in advance and could not make on-the-fly decisions about what ads to show based on what people were doing on the Web. Now, companies like Google, Yahoo! and Microsoft let advertisers buy ads in the milliseconds between the time someone enters a site’s Web address and the moment the page appears. The technology, called real-time bidding, allows advertisers to examine site visitors one by one and bid to serve them ads almost instantly.

For example, say a man just searched for golf clubs on eBay. EBay can essentially follow that person’s activities [[in real time]], deciding when and where to show him near-personalized ads for golf clubs throughout the Web. If eBay finds out that he bought a driver at another site, it can update the ad immediately to start showing him tees, golf balls or a package vacation to St. Andrew’s, Scotland, often called the home of golf. If a woman was shopping, eBay could change the ad’s color or presentation.