SEO: Creating Your Own Basic Web Statistics Database

There are literally thousands of website statistics systems available on the Internet. Some provide complex analysis, whilst others provide very basic information.  Sometimes simply due to whom your web provider is you may not be able to install your own statistics applications.  I will set out in this article to provide a very basic web statistics database that will allow you to catch whom is visiting your web site and where they are coming from.

The first step in the process of building your own web statistics database is to identify where you will store the statistical information you have collected. In this example, I have decided to store all the data in a Microsoft Access database.  I basically created the database in Microsoft Access and called the database "dbStatistics".

The next step is to build a table in which you will store the data.  The table in the database will be called "tblStatistics".  The table needs five fields and the names are:

fldPageName              DataType - Text             255 Characters

fldIPNumber               DataType - Text             255 Characters

fldAll_Http                 DataType - Memo          

fldAll_Raw                 DataType - Memo          

fldTimestamp              DataType - DateTime    Default Value - Date() & " " & time()

The information above simply defines the type of fields each field should be set to and some specific field properties which will be important for this code to work.  You will note that there are no primary key fields. The reason this is undertaken is that the AutoNumber function in Microsoft Access is to limiting in the volume of data that you can hold.

You will also notice that there is a field called fldTimestamp. This field allows you to store the exact local Date and Time the person visited your website.  The local time is the time on your server that is hosting your webpages.

For this basic web statistic log to work, we now need to get the information into the database. The first thing you need is to ensure that your provider can in fact support ASP (Active Server Pages) pages. Most web hosting companies can support them, but it is worth checking.

We now need to add the code to each webpage that will log information on who is visiting your website and also which websites were referrers and the browsers they were using and what language they were searching in.  You will find out all this information in both the fldAll_Http and fldAll_Raw fields.

The following code needs to be copied into the top part of your webpage before the HTML tag.

<%@ Language=VBScript %>

<%

on error resume next

'<-----------------WEBLOGGING START------------------------> 

dim strpagename,strwho, stradvert

dim cn, strconnect

dim strip

dim strAll_http,strremote_addr,strall_raw

' The Field Below Tells you the page they visited

strPageName = request.servervariables("server_name") & request.servervariables("URL")

'The Field Below Tells you the visitors IP Numbers

strip = request.servervariables("Remote_Addr")

'The fields below contain all the information such as the website

' that referred them to your page etc.

strAll_http = request.servervariables("ALL_HTTP")

strall_raw = request.servervariables("all_raw")

set cn=server.createobject("adodb.connection")

'This code connects to your database

strConnect = "Provider=Microsoft.Jet.OLEDB.4.0;Data Source=" & Server.MapPath("/_private/dbstatistics.mdb")

cn.open(strConnect)

'This code inserts the collected information into your database

cn.execute "insert into tblstatistics(fldpagename,fldipnumber,fldAll_http,fldAll_raw)values('" & strPageName & "','" & strip & "','" & strall_http & "','" & strall_raw & "')"

cn.close

'<------------------WEBLOGGING END ------------------->

%>

The Microsoft Access Database must be stored into the _Private folder on your website. If you do not put the database in that position, anyone who visits your website could in fact download your statistics. Apart from that this code will not work. The danger of allowing someone access to your web statistics database is that your competitors could find out who is visiting your website and from where and as such this is really a serious business intelligence issue.

The code shown above has a number of pieces of information that is really useful in working out what is going on with your website. In the field fldPagename the actual page that a person is visiting is stored. In the field fldipnumber the IP number of the visitor is stored. Between these two pieces of information you can find out how a person has entered the site, what they have visited and also with the field fldTimestamp you can work out how long they looked at each page before they moved onto the next one.

The field fldipnumber contains powerful information. On the internet there are a number of lists of who owns what IP Numbers and also which countries they have been assigned to. By collecting the IP Numbers and in conjunction with the IP Database we can work out from what countries people are visiting our website. We can get detailed information to the point of which cities and even the ISP's who are providing the IP Numbers. With this information it allows us to setup our web pages to be in line with the characteristics and attributes that are standard for that country. 

Using a Microsoft Access Database as your datastore means that you can manipulate the data and filter it to find out how people are visiting your website and who is referring them.  This information is stored in the fldAll_Http and fldAll_Raw fields.  These fields will also contain important information such as what browsers and operating systems people are using to visit your website. For example not all browsers interpret HTML in exactly the same way. So if you found that 90% of your customers were in fact using the browser SAFARI which is the Apple Browser then you would be developing your website for this customer base and browser. If 90% of your customers were using Firefox then you would develop your web pages taking into account the idiosyncrasies of that browser. 

There is a lot of powerful information contained in these logs and I strongly encourage you to get some Microsoft Access Database Development Experience that will help you analyze the logs even further than what has been discussed in this article.

Remember one thing, when it comes to SEO or Search Engine Optimization it is the web logs that will tell you everything about your visitors and whether or not your SEO Strategies are in fact working.

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