Long or unreadable links look ugly and can confuse the reader. Before you post such a link on social media or in an email it is better to shorten it and make it nice for the user. As a result this can raise your Click-Through-Rates.
What are modern URL shortening services? How do they work and how can they help you specifically? Why are they so much in demand today? You will find the answers to these questions in our article.
Link shorteners are services that automatically shorten inbound links and make them attractive for users.
Since the launch of the World Wide Web in 1991 the digital world has grown fast. People started using the Internet more and more, feeling comfortable in this virtual space. And as digital technologies developed, the URL evolved over time as well.
One day in 2002 a 24-year-old American web developer decided to «simplify» his work a little. His name was Kevin Gilbertson, and his creation was called TinyURL - the first official URL «shortener». All this user wanted was to be able to convert messages in news groups into web pages without having to deal with long and cumbersome URLs. He ran into this problem and simply wanted to make his life easier with shorter links. Gilby did not have any particularly big plans for TinyURL either. He just wanted to solve the problem of long URLs and improve his own user experience. And the developer himself had no idea that he had started the rapid growth of the URL shortening industry. The popularity of TinyURL influenced the creation of at least 100 similar sites. Among the best known are Bitly, Lnnkin and Short.io.
When you may need link shortening
Modern link shorteners offer more than just a shorter link. They are focused on analytics and link tracking. So why use URL shortening?
- Tracking posts on social media. You will be able to see whether some social networks need more attention, or check the statistics to find out whether people liked your new posts. You will be able to track every click to improve your analytics, which will help you understand where most referrals come from, or track affiliate commissions. Messages that are convenient for users. If you post long links they can confuse people. Adding tracking parameters to them can make them look like spam, so URL shortening will make them short and clear. It will also give you the ability to insert UTM parameters without making the links look suspicious or ugly.
- Managing all your links in one place. When you publish your new product on all the social networks, it is easier to track and change the link in one place than to go through all the versions across all your marketing channels to edit something.
- Greater awareness of your brand. Your links will not only be easier to remember thanks to a short domain and a quick permalink. Branded links will help people recognise you and get an idea of what the content is about. Working on the recognisability of your brand will matter a great deal if you have a younger audience. According to recent research, brand recognition is an important factor of loyalty for millennials.
- More clicks on your links. When people «identify» links as familiar to them, they click on them more often.
The basic functionality of a standard URL shortener
What should any link shortener be able to do? Above all, shorten URLs, which is obvious. You paste in the old long link and it becomes shorter, cleaner and more convenient. A short address is easier to remember and easier to type on a keyboard. Link tracking is important functionality that lets you find out how well your marketing campaign is working. Analytics will give you a better idea of the people who visit your site and of your click-through rate. Some URL shorteners track clicks themselves, some services attach Google Analytics tracking data. If you decide to add new tracking parameters or launch a new marketing campaign (or even if you have already shared the link but realised you forgot to add a UTM tag), you change your link. And instead of going through every social network, you change it only once, in your admin panel. So which services are popular online today?
back to contents ↑Popular link shortening services
Bitly
Companies that use branded links report a 34% increase in the number of clicks to their website. With Bitly you can create your own branded links that will be consistently recognisable on any channel. Bitly integrates with almost every social network and digital marketing tool and offers analytics tracking tools in a single interface. You can start for free or from 39 dollars per month with the basic plan.
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T1p.de
The t1p.de short link service provides a high level of privacy and checks all links for possible malware and phishing attacks. The "t1p.de" URL shortener complies with data protection requirements. The service does not store personal or other user data. It also offers extra options, for example setting an expiry date and a dereferencing feature when the link is followed. How does it work? Just enter the URL you want and press «Check availability». Leave the input field empty to create a random short link. Important: the service is in German.
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Is.gd
Is.gd is one of the safest and most convenient tools. The slogan of the developer company «Compress That Address» certainly attracts attention. Among the pluses is that there is no fee for using it. You also do not need to register. The service lets you customise addresses and presents statistics as a chart. To track statistics you need to press «Additional options», then «Custom URL» while shortening the link, and tick «Log statistics for this link». Is.gd lets you work with the tool via an API, creates QR codes and has detailed instructions for the user. Among the downsides are a somewhat simplified and outdated interface, inconvenient statistics functionality and the inability to create a link on your own domain. This is an excellent service for those looking for a free URL shortener for users, but only if there is no need to create links on your own domain. Is.gd is not the best choice if you want to shorten many links at once and track the performance of each of them.
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TinyURL
TinyURL.com is a free site that offers both URL shortening and customisation. What is good about this tool apart from being free? One of the advantages is easy integration into your browser's toolbar. Clicking the button on the toolbar creates a tiny URL for the current page you are on. The downsides of Tiny URL include the inability to track links. If that is not critical for your business, this service can be an excellent option for shortening addresses. If you need more functionality, it may be worth looking at the paid versions of the apps.
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Rebrandly
Rebrandly is a link management platform for branding, tracking and sharing short URLs using your own domain name. Rebrandly offers a free service but limits the number of tracked clicks to 5 000 per month. The plans range from 29 to 499 dollars per month, or you can contact the Rebrandly team to find out a custom price.
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AdLinkFly
One of the oldest and most trusted tools for shortening URLs. A completely free service with support for many languages. With it you can simply cut a link or create an account and get paid for the people who follow your links. It has a friendly, simple and clear interface. The downsides - no support for QR code generation and no way to create branded links.
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Ow.ly
A platform that provides a lot of extra functionality for content marketing. Ow.ly will help you shorten links, measure traffic and demonstrate the return on investment in social media right in the Hootsuite dashboard. The price ranges from 29 to 599 dollars per month.
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Bit.do
Bit.do is a product of a Brazilian software company. It launched in 2012, so it is one of the «youngest» services in our review. Its advantages include:
- a free personalised URL shortener;
- has a simple interface;
- no need to register;
- it lets you use automatically generated addresses by default or create your own URL: meaningful addresses based on a set of letters. However, for those who shorten a large number of links this feature will not be needed;
- shortening urls with a qr code;
- it generates addresses on a unique second-level domain. That means all shortened links will look like «mydomain. *** / ***».
The last option is paid, the prices start from 85 $ / month.
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Shorturl.at
A safe and free link shortening service. ShortURL lets you shorten long links from social media and popular sites on the Internet; just paste the long URL into the shortening field and press the «Shorten URL» button. There is an extended, paid version.
T9y.me
T9y.me is another tool that can help shorten links. Very simple and completely free. It is not suitable for managing links because there is no admin panel. However, if you need to shorten one link and share it on social media, this service will suit you perfectly.
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Lnnkin
This is not just a link shortening service but a whole platform for working with links. There is a free and a paid version, which starts at 5 dollars per month. Shortening one link or several at once, click analytics and so on.
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Bl.ink
For many it has become the perfect service with the right combination of metrics and social media. Unlike Bit.ly with its custom keywords or TinyUrl with its customisable URL feature, BudURL gives you a way to track where your link was clicked. In other words - Bl.ink is an effective enterprise link management system. Users can create their own domains and personalised URLs and manage links with intelligent routing by device, location, language, time of day and date. The Bl.ink dashboard includes advanced and customisable click analytics, multi-level user roles and so on.
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Short.io
Probably the nicest-looking site for shortening links, with a Russian-language version. As in many other services, the shortened link is immediately copied to the clipboard. Of course it does not have as much statistics tracking as the others, but it looks quite «cool» and clearly stands out among similar tools.
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Cutt.ly
cutt.ly has both free and paid versions. With it, shortening URLs is done in one click for several links at once. The shortened part can be generated automatically or created by hand. A huge plus is that the portal has a Russian-language version.
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Summary
URL shortening services have gone beyond making your links look «pretty», short and clean. You can use them to analyse how your marketing campaign is going, raise brand awareness and even build trust. They can be useful whether you use them for business or for sharing funny videos on social media. One thing is certain: if you work with several social networks, URL shortening is a must-have tool.
