Method for measuring web visitors

• US 20090292803A1
• Filed: 05/21/2008
• Published: 11/26/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 05/21/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Red Hat, Inc. (International Business Machines Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Red Hat, Inc. (International Business Machines Corporation)
• Inventors: Schneider, James Paul
• Granted Patent: US 9,178,956 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/224
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/563 Data redirection of data network streams

Abstract

An apparatus and a method for tracking the number of hits to a web page is described. In one embodiment, a web browser of a client requests from a server a web page. The server redirects the web browser to a cookie counting web page, where the cookie counting web page provides a tracking cookie to the web browser. The server computes the number of unique hits to the web page without cookies based on the number of hits to the cookie counting web page without tracking cookies, the number of unique hits to the cookie counting web page with tracking cookies, the number of all hits to the cookie counting web page with tracking cookies.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method comprising:

receiving, at a server, a request for a web page from a web browser of a client;

redirecting with a redirector at the server, the web browser to a cookie counting web page, the cookie counting web page providing a tracking cookie to the web browser; and

computing the number of unique hits to the web page without cookies based on the number of all hits to the cookie counting web page without tracking cookies, the number of unique hits to the cookie counting web page with tracking cookies, the number of all hits to the cookie counting web page with tracking cookies.

2. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 wherein computing further comprises:

multiplying the number of all hits without tracking cookies to the cookie counting web page by the ratio of the number of unique hits with tracking cookies to the cookie counting web page to the number of all hits with tracking cookies to the cookie counting web page.

3. The computer-implemented method of claim 2 wherein the cookie counting web page is stored on the server.

4. The computer-implemented method of claim 2 wherein the web browser has cookies features enabled.

5. The computer-implemented method of claim 4 wherein the request for the web page includes a previously stored tracking cookie associated with the web page.

6. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 wherein the number of unique visitors includes the number of unique visits during a predetermined time period.

7. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 wherein the web page includes an advertisement banner.

8. An article of manufacture comprising:

a computer-accessible storage medium including data that, when accessed by a computer, cause the computer to perform a method comprising;

receiving, at a server, a request for a web page from a web browser of a client;

redirecting with a redirector at the server, the web browser to a cookie counting web page, the cookie counting web page providing a tracking cookie to the web browser; and

computing the number of unique hits to the web page without cookies based on the number of all hits to the cookie counting web page without tracking cookies, the number of unique hits to the cookie counting web page with tracking cookies, the number of all hits to the cookie counting web page with tracking cookies.

9. The article of manufacture of claim 8 wherein the method further comprises:

multiplying the number of all hits without tracking cookies to the cookie counting web page by the ratio of the number of unique hits with tracking cookies to the cookie counting web page to the number of all hits with tracking cookies to the cookie counting web page.

10. The article of manufacture of claim 9 wherein the cookie counting web page is stored on a second server.

11. The article of manufacture of claim 9 wherein the web browser has cookies features enabled.

12. The article of manufacture of claim 11 wherein the request for the web page includes a previously stored tracking cookie associated with the web page.

13. The article of manufacture of claim 8 wherein the number of unique visitors includes the number of unique visits during a predetermined time period.

14. The article of manufacture of claim 8 wherein the web page includes an advertisement banner.

15. A server comprising:

a redirector configured to receive and redirect a request for a web page from a web browser of a client to a cookie counting web page, the cookie counting web page providing a tracking cookie to the web browser;

a storage device coupled to the redirector, the storage device to store the web page and the tracking cookie; and

a computation engine coupled to the storage engine, the computation engine configured to compute the number of unique hits to the web page without cookies based on the number of all hits to the cookie counting web page without tracking cookies, the number of unique hits to the cookie counting web page with tracking cookies, the number of all hits to the cookie counting web page with tracking cookies.

16. The server of claim 15 wherein the computation engine configured to multiply the number of all hits without tracking cookies to the cookie counting web page by the ratio of the number of unique hits with tracking cookies to the cookie counting web page to the number of all hits with tracking cookies to the cookie counting web page.

17. The server of claim 15 wherein the cookie counting web page is stored on the server.

18. The server of claim 16 wherein the web browser has cookies features enabled.

19. The server of claim 18 wherein the request for the web page includes a previously stored tracking cookie associated with the web page.

20. The server of claim 15 wherein the number of unique visitors includes the number of unique visits during a predetermined time period.

21. The server of claim 15 wherein the web page includes an advertisement banner stored in the storage.

22. A system comprising:

a server configured to receive a request for a web page from a web browser of a client, the server configured to redirect the web browser to a cookie counting web page, the cookie counting web page providing a tracking cookie to the web browser, the server configured to compute the number of unique hits to the web page without cookies based on the number of hits to the cookie counting web page without tracking cookies, the number of unique hits to the cookie counting web page with tracking cookies, the number of all hits to the cookie counting web page with tracking cookies.

23. The system of claim 22 wherein the server is configured to multiply the number of hits without tracking cookies to the cookie counting web page by the ratio of the number of unique hits with tracking cookies to the cookie counting web page to the number of all hits with tracking cookies to the cookie counting web page.

24. The system of claim 23 wherein the cookie counting web page is stored on a second server.

25. The system of claim 22 wherein the web browser has cookies features enabled.

26. The system of claim 25 wherein the request for the web page includes a previously stored tracking cookie associated with the web page.

27. The system of claim 22 wherein the number of unique visitors includes the number of unique visits during a predetermined time period.

28. The system of claim 22 wherein the web page includes a banner ad.