HTTP Request Header is a collection of information that a website browser sends to a web server when you try to load a website. These information are being passed to the web server (most of the time being captured by tracking technologies – to be discussed on a separate post) and act as your identity for the assets being requested.
There are tons of information included in the HTTP header, but we will be focusing only on those that have direct impact in your digital analysis. I also decided to add some other information that can be captured to help you better understand the behavior of your website visitors.
• Date – The Timestamp of when the HTTP Request was made
• Host – the IP address or Website URL of the requested asset/website
• Referer – The referring website where the link going to a website was clicked or redirected.
• User Agent – A vast amount of information capturing data such as: Device Type, Browser Name, OS, and Device Name
• *ISP – The name of the Internet Service Provider used by a website visitor
• *Country – The country name of the website visitor when the request was made
• *Timezone – The timezone of the website visitor when the request was made
• URI – the actual page in your website that was requested
• Viewport – The size of the browser screen
• Screen Resolution – the screen resolution of the monitor
• URL – the full domain name of the website including the URI or the actual page requested/visited
• *lon – Longitude of the ISP termination
• *lat – latitude of the ISP termination
• *City – City location of the ISP termination
• DNT – Do Not Track preference of the user or website visitors
This is not an exhaustive list but the information above will already allow you to get a bunch of insights about how your website visitors or even mobile app users behave. This will help you in making better strategies to improve their digital experience and even retargeting offers.
Items with (*) requires some parser to capture.