Can you recommend a good hit counter/statistics program for our
100-page web site?  It doesn't need to be free, but must be invisible
to users and must have some reasonably comprehensive statistics
cababilities, preferably with charting.

---

Request for Question Clarification by gan-ga on 10 Nov 2002 17:56 PST

Hello Michael.

Thanks for what has transpired to be a very interesting question.

I did not realise the sheer number of counter / stats services
available on-line!

I am taking a fairly aggressive approach to 'whittling down' the
available services, to attempt to present you with a manageable list
of viable services for you to choose from.

This is proving to take a little time, however, so I am posting the
results so far using the 'request for answer clarification' feature,
with a view to concluding the research tomorrow.

Please let me know if you would like to suggest I modify the methods
I am using to select suitable services.

Methodology
=========== 

Initially: 
Assemble a list of likely candidate services. 48 listed initially.

Subsequently, apply the following criteria as far as possible:

1:
Remove those which do not offer multi-page support.

2:
Remove those which obviously act as link farms

3: 
Remove those for whom substantial negative feedback was found on
Usenet.

4:
Remove those services which do not offer a commercial / professional
option

5:
Remove duplicate sites using different domains

6:
Remove those services whose homepage navigational structure does not
operate correctly under the MSIE6 browser

7:
Remove those services which subjectively seem 'too good to be true'.

At all stages:
Remove a service if DNS / 404 error etcetera.

The Survivors
=============

Web-Stat : hit counters:
http://www.web-stat.com/
Invisible option         : Yes
Monthly cost             : $5
Supports 100 pages       : Yes
Charted stats            : 18
Trial available          : Yes
Guarantee                : Email to un-register at any time.


The-Counter.net Website Tracking Service:
http://www.the-counter.net/
Invisible option         : Yes
Monthly cost             : From $1.66
Supports 100 pages       : Yes
Charted stats            : Comprehensive
Trial available          : No
Guarantee                : 60 day full refund guarantee.
Notes                    : 3 packages, each payable yearly


Home - Fish Tracker - Web site statistics service:
http://www.fishhoo.com/stats-web/faqs.htm
Invisible option         : Yes
Monthly cost             : $1.98
Supports 100 pages       : Yes
Charted stats            : Unknown
Trial available          : Yes
Guarantee                : Not explicitly stated
Notes                    : Payment by PayPal only
                         : Appears to be attached to
                         : specialist fisherman's
                         : search engine ??


Free Hit Counter and Detailed Web Site Stats - FreeStats.com:
http://www.freestats.com/
Invisible option         : Unclear
Monthly cost             : $8.99 for top package
Supports 100 pages       : Yes
Charted stats            : Comprehensive, 28 reports
Trial available          : Yes but most features disabled
Guarantee                : Not explicitly stated



For subsequent processing:
==========================

Next Generation Stats:
http://www.nextgenstats.com/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

PageStat.com-your-site-for-free-web-counters-and-free-web-stats:
http://www.pagestat.com/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

Professional Stats, UK/USAs Premier Website Visitor Monitoring System:
http://www.prostats.co.uk/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

ServuStats.com - The easiest free page hit counter service on the
internet:
http://servustats.com/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

RealTracker Free:
http://www.showstat.com/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

Stat Smarts - Free Web Site Stats, Counter, statistics, tracker,
logger, Logs:
http://www.statsmarts.com/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

Stats4all.com Homepage:
http://www.stats4all.com/asp/index.asp
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

Stealth counter and visitorinformation:
http://www.stealthlite.biz/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

UltraStats: Counter and Statistics for your Website:
http://www.ultrastats.net/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

Free Hidden Counter Invisible Visitor Tracker:
http://www.urgentclick.com/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

Web Track:
http://trackit.danev.com/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

WhoWasThere.com:
http://www.whowasthere.com/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Notes                    :
Guarantee                :
Negative reports, usenet :

WunderCounter: Free Web Stats and Counters:
http://www.wundercounter.com/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

Dataplain - Hosted Web Stats:
http://www.dataplain.com/data.cgi/company/0/index
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

3DStats.com - Professional Website statistics in real time:
http://www.3dstats.com/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

WEB STATISTICS GLOBAL AUDIT:
http://www.globalaudit.com/en/index.html
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

HitBox - The Leader in Real-Time etc:
http://www.hitbox.com/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

Web stats & internet traffic statistics - Receptional:
http://www.hit-counter.net/hit-counter-features.html
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

Hitmatic ~ The Ultimate Statistical Tracker:
http://www.hitmatic.com/h4/visitors/faq.html
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

Ideal-Tracker.com:
http://www.ideal-tracker.com/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

IndexTools.com Web site statistics and analysis:
http://www.indextools.com/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

:: K15 zStats :: Advanced Website Statistics - Features and Benefits:
http://www.k15.ms/zstats/features.shtml
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

Web site traffic statistics. Real time reports:
http://www.pluslog.com/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

ProSTATS Invisible web site tracking stats and log file monitor:
http://www.pagetools.com/webstats/StatsV2/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

PROWEBCOUNTER.COM - A service that offers helpful stats:
http://www.prowebcounter.com/index.php4?redirect=about.php4
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

Link tracker track links on your site and in emails - The Red
Toolbox.com:
http://www.linktracker.theredtoolbox.com/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

Site Stats - The easy way to measure your web traffic:
http://www.sitestats.com/clients/careerkangaroo.php
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

Stat Trax - Web Stats NOW!:
http://www.stattrax.com/index.html
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

TheCounter.com:
http://www.thecounter.com/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

The-Counter.net Website Tracking Service:
http://www.the-counter.net/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

vioCLICKS:
http://www.vioclicks.com/webmaster.html
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

Counter and web statistics: WebHits:
http://www.webhits.de/english/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

WSTR - Powerful Web Site Traffic Analysis Reports Emailed Daily:
http://www.websitetrafficreport.com/faq.asp
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

WebsiteTracker.com (Website Tracking and Stats; Analyze your website
traffic):
http://www.websitetracker.com/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :

WebSTAT:
http://www.webstat.com/
Invisible option         :
Monthly cost             :
Supports 100 pages       :
Charted stats            :
Trial available          :
Guarantee                :
Notes                    :
Negative reports, usenet :



Search strategy:
Search phrases entered into Google search engine:
invisible web tracking
DMOZ open directory categories searched:
Computers:Internet:WebDesign and
Development:Authoring:WebCounters:Ad-Supported
Computers:Internet:WebDesign and
Development:Authoring:WebCounters:Premium
Search phrases entered into Google Usenet search:
[name of each service]
[name of each service] incompetent
[name of each service] fraud


Best regards,

gan

From your question, I'm assuming that you want a recommendation of a
service based on previous experience with these web counter/statistic
companies.
I have used 25+ companies that offer the kind of service you need and
the following are the "top picks" based on performance and support. 
No company is going to be modest about their own service and just
looking at their websites can be misleading; the following are
recommendations based on experience.

http://www.web-stat.com/
Invisible tracking, very nice support, almost no downtime, flat $5
dollars per month, detailed and accurate comprehensible data with
graphs.  Most highly recommended.  Web-stat has proven to be very
useful, friendly and reliable over the past years unlike other
come-and-go companies.  Also, the size of the code snippet is
considerably less than competitors which is helpful when you have over
100 pages.

http://sitetracker.com/
For invisible tracking, costs anywhere between 3 to 9 dollars monthly.
 Detailed statistics with charts.  Only flaw is popups on their
website and once in a while missing image file when looking for a
chart.


http://www.webtrendslive.com/wtl_marcom/default.htm
Professional; the analysis is very helpful in every way.  I would
recommend it to a large corporation but for small/mid businesses, it
is way too expensive (cheapest package is 35 dollars per month).

Overall, for general purposes, Web-stat has stood out far above its
competitors.

Hope this helps,
Tox-ga

A good answer, though I do wonder whether it was reasonable for you to
jump in when another researcher had obviously already done quite a bit
of work on the question.  Thanks to gan-ga: please see separate
posting.