Though the Petersiks in the past have made revenue through paid writing jobs and private design consulting, the majority of their income now comes from advertising on the site - either through automatically generated Google ads, or through direct site sponsors, which often include design and home supply companies such as the Tile Shop.

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Just as crucial, he says, are elements such as increasing video access from mobile devices and targeting users with ads based on demographic details that they reveal through social networking or other personalized mediums.

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Individuals or companies claim to own patents to ubiquitous features of the Internet-enabled economy such as using a virtual shopping cart online, updating smartphone apps, scrolling through pages, or serving ads in an online video.

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The vast majority of medium and large organizations which advertise their jobs on job boards or through their recruitment tools such as targeted email campaigns and cell phone text messaging campaigns set up their ads so that the candidates who click apply go to the employer career site to apply.

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"Many people think of Internet advertising as an intrusive, interruptive experience, with dancing aliens jumping across the screen and perpetual pop-up windows, " Moloney says, adding that Scottrade favors ads that provide information that is meaningful to customers, such as a real-time stock chart it offers through an ad on Yahoo.

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