You have probably noticed all the short and pretty links on different blogs and Twitter by now. Perhaps you’re unsure of which one you should use, or if it makes any difference.
But it does.
The main reasons people use URL shorteners are to make very long affiliate links shorter and prettier or to track clicks on the links, or both.
So here is a break down of the shorteners I am using and the reasoning behind it.
Clicky.me
This shortener is connected to Clicky Web Analytics and you must have an account with them to use it. You can register for it for free, and you can even use the Web Analytics feature for free for one site. It is a great service and I highly recommend it.
Clicky.me isn’t as busy as others so there is still chance you can get some really pretty links, for example I managed to get clicky.me/WPthesis for my affiliate link to the Thesis theme for WordPress, or clicky.me/wpstart for my affiliate link to Lisa’s WordPress Starter Guide.
This shortener has a tracking feature so you can see how many clicks each link received. Also, you can use it to shorten Clickbank links which is a big advantage over some other shorteners (more on that below).
Su.pr
This shortener is a part of StumbleUpon and you must have an account with them to use it. Registering an account is free.
There are some great features you can use with Su.pr:
- you can just shorten the URL
- you can write a tweet or a Facebook update with the shortened URL and send it out
- you can schedule the tweet or the update for a later time
The absolute winning feature of this shortener — when someone clicks on an URL shortened with Su.pr, at the top of the screen they will have a StumbleUpon toolbar which increases the chance of the page being “Liked” on Stumble and going viral.
This shortener has a tracking feature and you can use it to shorten Clickbank links.
Goo.gl
Goo.gl is Google’s URL shortener and you do not need to sign into your Google account to use it. However, if you want to build your URL history (which you should), then sign in before you shorten your URLs.
This shortener does have a tracking feature but don’t use it to shorten Clickbank links because the URL will be disabled:
Bit.ly
Bit.ly or Bitly.com is probably the most popular and used shortener out there. You can use it without registering or logging in, but if you want to have the history of clicks and links you should create an account.
You can customize your URLs but since it is so popular you will have to be very creative to get a name that hasn’t been taken yet.
This shortener does have a tracking feature but don’t use it to shorten Clickbank links because people who click on the shortened version of the URL will get a big warning (and you probably won’t make a sale):
Other Options to Consider
Ow.ly is a shortener from HootSuite. You can use Hootsuite for free and they have a tracking feature for Ow.ly links.
Tiny.url or Tinyurl.com is a free shortener that you don’t register for. It doesn’t have tracking feature but it will let you customize the short version of URL if the “custom alias” hasn’t been taken by someone else.
Two WordPress plugins that will do this for you are Simple URLs and PrettyLink. Note that Simple URLs stopped working for me with the WordPress 3.3 update so be selective about using plugins as a solution for shortening your links, because there is always a possibility for them to break.
Share-a-sale shortener is the best thing you can use for Shareasale affiliate links. Shareasale is a big network with products for any niche and most of the merchants over there will even have deep linking options (linking to specific product rather than the home or sales page) so you can really put their shortener to great use.
Conclusion
Like it or not, you are probably going to end up using shorteners even if you don’t want to, for example when you tweet using HootSuite or some other management tool. So you might as well pick one shortener and use it all the time to track clicks on your links.
Another benefit is they help you memorize some of your custom affiliate links, like I can do with my Clicky.me examples above.
If you haven’t paid much attention to this before, the start of the new year is the perfect time to give these shorteners a try and start making your links look pretty and track your marketing efforts.
Lisa,
Do you know any plugin which can I use to hide affiliate links . i.e MyBlog.com/go/Affiliate link ?
Try http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/pretty-link/
nice and very informative post , it will help me. i love these small trendy links. they are very useful when you share some pic with a link
nice info but Cafe so like use bitly.com, and posting to facebook account
I’ve been using bit.ly and I used it for url shorteners when I am posting a URL in my twitter account.
goo.gl is my fav, you might also untiny.me to reverse effect
I know it might make very little difference, but ‘http://bit.ly/’ is a very short prefix for a URL shortener. It is 14 characters, while the also popular ‘http://tinyurl.com/’ is 19 characters. 5 characters might not seem like much, but it is 3.5% of a tweet, and it may be the 5 characters that you need to make it easy for others to retweet your tweet.
That is a good point, of course. I am not too worried about shortening per se, since I am using tools like Hootsuite and other that automatically shorten the links and then report the clicks, but I did think a lot about making affiliate links pretty. That just makes the click through rate way higher, at least for me 🙂
I was using su.pr for most of the time. But thanks for other links! Useful!
I have been using MaxBlogPress Ninja Affiliate for a few years now and it has served me well.
I have not had any issues with WordPress update, and the plugin is self-updating when new versions of WP come out.
It does a very good job of tracking raw clicks and unique clicks, with a count of each. It displays the affiliate links cloaked for you and offers keyword insertion for words automatically into your articles or post, plus other added features.
It’s not a free one, right now it sells for $37, but I think it is worth the money.
Just my FYI,
Steve
I’ve heard great stuff about it. I personally stepped away from plugins just because I had so many problems with plugins, so a few bad ones ruined it for them all lol
I’ve been using the Stumbleupon shortener for awhile, for the reason you outlined. I also use bit.ly because it is easy to use and you can customized it too.
Thanks for share
Thanks for this list mate but I don’t really like using popular one’s because many think them as spam for example when you try to post goo.gl link on facebook it comes up with a captcha. Thats why I like to use less popular or my own url shortners 🙂
Great list Lisa.
I have been using tiny.cc/ free account recently. You can add your custom URL as well. But, for truly cloaking the link I like using Pretty Link Plugin.
The only problem with it when using it in Aweber broadcasts is that it appears as a error when you go to save your message but seems to work OK when I send myself a tezt email.
I have Covert Affiliate Links myself. I am not super technical, but my understaning is that this cloaker helps protect against malicious programs that a potential customer may have running on their computer.
I am not here trying to promote it, though, I am having problems with Covert Affiliate Links and Featured Content Gallery since updating to WP 3.3.1 and I’m trying to work through it. Figured I would add a little bit of info at least.. even if it isnt that helpful, I guess. The next person that finds your site for the same or sinilar reasons will at least know they are not alone.
Generally I only use adf.ly. I use it only to shorten URLs. Until now I do not know what specific URL Shortener usability.
But, thank you for sharing this information.
I like to use Pretty Link for all my wordpress sites. For tweets, I use bit.ly, since all twitter clients offer API integration for bit.ly.
I think if Twitter allowed URLs not to count toward the 140 character limit, these services would practically disappear.
I agree 🙂
I have tried lots of URL shortener from the one which give me money when I use it until the free one. Guess what, I believe the best is still goo.gl as it is so simple and people seems really like it. Another URL shortener only think about cash and not the people who is going to use it.
my opinion may be wrong but this is what i believe about URL shortener these day.
I like bit.ly too but the problem is that it ain’t good for SEO anymore. Google already have regulations on these URL shorteners
I like bit.ly because it is easy to use and you can customized it too.
Thanks for the list Lisa
I like Bitly myself, its annoying not being able to track my twitter hits without it
Don’t use Bit.ly service because it’s already blacklist by many email company.
Thanks for this, I am so grateful for Click.Me. I’ve been using TinyURL for which there is no tracking and I’ve found the Google one shuts links down after a certain time.
Bit.ly of course being the enemy of affiliate marketers due to their Clickbank policy, which I only figured out when a subscriber pointed it out to me 🙁
That is how I found out they made warnings about Clickbank links which wasn’t a nice thing to hear from a potential costumer that clicked on an affiliate link 🙂
I’ve been using Gocodes for a couple years now with good results. No analytics but, but it’s great for masking links.
Hey Brankica,
Can you be any more wonderful 😉
I haven’t needed URL shorteners, but like you mention, we will be needing it some day.
But this has been an awesome resource. Every time I read your posts, I am enlightened.
This is why you are one of my dearest blogging friends, you always make me feel special 🙂
Nice post. I’ve been using the Stumbleupon shortener for awhile, for the reason you outlined. I had no idea that Clickback was disabled my so many URL shorteners!
Great topic Brankica, I’ve had my own link tracker/short URL service for a few years so I just use mine.
There’s a bit of a trust issue when it comes to Short URLs. It seems to be less of an issue now but I really hesitate to click something like a shortened link on a Twitter profile. Unless it’s someone you already know, you just never know what trouble you’re going to find on the other end. I guess there’s just certain places that shortened links look suspicious.
I do the same with twitter links, unless it is someone I know, I don’t click much. But in the world of niche sites where not many people are as internet savvy as us that spend 24 hrs a day online, people don’t even think twice before clicking on a link.
PS I use my hubby for all my “normal people internet behavior” research 🙂
Nice list of resources Brankica. I’ve been using Pretty links and am comfortable with it. But i certainly did not know about the Share-a-sale shortener. Happy to have picked up something new from here.
Glad you found it useful 🙂 you can make Shareasale shortened links for custom landing pages too, so instead of sending people to a company’s home page for example, you send them directly to the product
I have been using Bit.ly in the past and have served me a lot in making my long blog post URLs a short one. I didn’t know that Google has a shortener too. I might check that one to see if i can make a customized short url.
I have used Bit.Ly most of the times, this is because I have the option to customize my links 🙂
Great post Brankica and thanks for the heads up on the other URL shortners
Hey Kharim! Thanks for sharing. Good to see ya! Long time no see. 🙂
Hello Lisa please which URL shorten service do you suggest to shorten my clickbank links? i am using tinyurl is it good ! do you suggest that i continue suing it???? please answer as soon as possible! thank you
I have been using bit.ly and tinyurl , for shorting url’s and these are really great toots,
bit.ly also integrate with Facebook page so this is the best for mew..
whats your favorite tool ??
I think at the moment it is Clicky.me because there are many available short links still so I can make my links look really pretty 🙂
So which do you think is better? I am currently using bit.ly. I always wanted to try su.pr, as my blog gets a decent traffic from StumbleUpon but didn’t know from where to access it.
If you get nice traffic with SU I would definitely try su.pr. Just type su.pr in your browser, log in with your SU account and start using it 🙂
I don’t do much affiliate linking, but I stopped using Ow.ly because I discovered that when you add a picture using it then it doesn’t get added to your Twitter profile gallery.
I’ve used Su.pr and bit.ly pretty much, though. At least for my Tweet Old Post and Buffering.
Man, I remember when TinyURL was king of the hill…
Lol, I remember those days too. Hey su.pr and bit.ly are great, you are obviously rocking it!
I’ve been using the GoCodes plugin for a number of years and I am very happy with it, would any of the services you mention in your post be better than this plugin?
I would not be able to answer it cause I haven’t tried that plugin so I don’t know how it works. Sorry. I do know that any plugin can break, there is always a possibility, so I try to avoid them.
Yes I have.. but I have a really weird issue.. My page ends with .ASPX and I want it to end with .HTML now what should I do to make it happen ? make another page and redirect it ? or give the same page a different URL ? wouldn’t that effect the indexing !!
Hi Brankica, great seeing you guest posting here. You just gave me a great lesson on url shorteners. Have you ever tried one called awe.sm – I found out about it from using Timely to schedule my Tweets. It has analytics. Let me know if you think it will work for the affiliates redirects. Thanks!
Haven’t used it, Ileane. I haven’t even seen it before, thanks for bringing it up. I do remember I once saw a list of shorteners somewhere and there are hundreds of them out there.
There’s simply tons of these URL shorteners these days, and you’ve just made me discover a few new ones now!
They are very handy though, especially for tracking your links, however I’m quite hesitant about clicking them on sites that I’m not familiar with as they can often be covering up dangerous and malicious links
That is a risk, I don’t click on them on sites I am not familiar with either, but people who know what shorteners are are a minority so I am sure a lot of them click without even looking at it, lol.
I’ve been using Su.pr for quite some time and find it very useful in terms of offering analytics.
I think it is a pretty good one too. My favorite thing about them is the StumbleUpon toolbar, you never know who will hit the “Thumbs up” on it 🙂
I use Bitly myself, mainly to track my twitter hits. could use a better wordpress plugin than post views. any suggestions?
Hey Brankica,
So glad to see you here. And thanks for such an amazing topic to discuss. I’m a fan of bit.ly, since its kinda universal – almost all services have an option to choose bit.ly from the drop down lol – may be that’s why.
I would hesitate a bit with using plugins to shorten, unless they are robust (but there’s no way you can say); may be premium ones like Pretty link pro may be robust but still who knows?
I just came to know that Shareasale has a shorterner. Great!
Jane.
Thanks, Lisa. I’m not experienced in using these shorteners, though it would clean up a lot of site. Thanks for passing this info on.
Great advice, as always! I use Bit.ly, but I was unaware of some the subtleties you point out. Thanks for the tips!
I used it for a long time until I shortened a Clickbank link and someone got a big red warning about it, lol. Who knows how many sales I missed before I figured that out 🙂
You could also use a plugin (for WordPress sites) like MaxBlogPress Ninja Affiliate to post shorter links using your domain name. So you url will look something like this instead:
mywebsite.com/thesis
And it will redirect to your affiliate offer. It’s not as short as the url shortener links but you get tracking in your admin panel and can convert keywords to links throughout your entire site with a couple of clicks.
There are a lot of plugins that do that, like the two I mentioned, the one you mention and several more, but there is always a risk of plugin breaking or colliding with another one. After mine broke, I just decided not to use plugins for this anymore.
Bad news about Simple URLs 🙁 I’m using that since some months now (actually because of your advice 🙂 ) , I see is still working on my blog, but now I’m thinking it would be good to change them, the bad thing is that some of my reports that people have, already have the aff links like that
It worked for some links but not for all on my blog, so my reasoning was “let me just remove while I have the time” cause you never know what might happen next 🙂 I also had some files that had shortened links and I guess it is the risk of running plugins 🙁
Thanks for a precise and effective list Bran. Although I do not use any right now, I am sure I will refer back when I go full fledge on social media.
Good to see you on 2CW
Thanks Sunil, I am following your footsteps 🙂
Great Article! Lisa
Thanks for Sharing!!!
This is great Brankica and I was not aware that “clciky” had their own shortener too. My favorite is su.pr and ow.ly (because of Hootsuite) and depending on whether I am tracking a campaign or not, bit.ly.
Now what really caught my attention was SimpleUrls. I use it on on my site and I have already heard some weird stuff about it. My links appear to be still working so this is where I am a bit confused. When you say “it stopped working” does that mean that the links where not redirecting properly or something else?
Hey Francisco, yes, the links were not redirecting properly. So some worked and majority didn’t and I didn’t see a “rule” why some worked and some didn’t. But the shortened URLs were going to 404 page (those that weren’t working). It had nothing to do with where the links were going, it was just a mess. So I removed it and redid all the links 🙁 I do plan to probably make a file with all the links and PHP them so I don’t get into all that work again.
That sounds like a great idea Brankica. I will have to do some research on how to do that via php… unless of course you want to teach me how to 🙂
Well i always prefer Goog.gl it’s fast and damn easy to use and previously used bit.ly it’s also good…but now i’m on google 😉
Hi Pit.
Congratulation with your first guest post here on Lisa’s great blog. As always you have been learning me something new 🙂 I have never really thought much about which service too use. As long as it was working and it was for free I was happy. I have mostly been using tinyurl and bit.ly but have never really been thinking much about tracking clicks or customizing my links.
Thank you for teaching me once again Brankica 🙂
Thomas, thanks so much for the support (BTW love that comment on Google+, means the world to me). I started with Tiny.url when I first got into this, then moved to bit.ly but now I like Clicky and Google more cause I just find them so easy to use. Let me know if you test them all, which one you plan to stick with 🙂
Hi Brankica (and Lisa),
The first service I heard about cloaking was bitly and I never quite got it, as I was trying to hide the affiliate URL (not that much tracking at the time) and the URL appeared in the open whenever I tweeted, so it was kind of useless for that matter.
I also remember that MANY times bitly wasn’t redirecting at all (as if the service was down) so I freaked out and stopped using them for affiliate links.
Whether is Facebook, Twitter, a PDF report, whatever it is, I’d like to be able to track and cloak from one single place.
My take on this is using something like LinkTrackr (don’t have free accounts anymore).
I’m not saying these guys are the safest bet, since we all know that companies disappear but there are some big names supporting this service.
I was wondering if any of you have any prior experience with them and what’s your take on this.
Thanks in advance,
Sergio
PS. I could ask my mentor or a few pro marketing friends but I already know they are going to tell me is the best thing since slice bread so that kind of advice is useless to me.
Sergio, I haven’t tried them before. The issue with Twitter is that it often does show the whole link when they are in fact shortened. Not sure how to explain this 🙂
Hi Brankica
Great to see you here with a guest post. And very informative too. Learnt something new and as I know you enjoy tracking everything on your site; not surprised at how much you know about this topic.
Thanks for sharing with us. Appreciated.
Patricia Perth Australia
Thanks, Patricia. Lisa taught me good, don’t you think 😉
This is a great post! Very useful information. I use all of these sites but love bit.ly the most I think.
malibu real estate
Now here was me under the impression that a link shortening service was just that and nothing else.
I tend to use Google Analytics to track the links people follow on my site going outgoing to somewhere else. By the same token if you’re the webmaster of a site you can track which link somebody followed to get to the page.
However with Clicky.me tracking how many ‘clicks’ a link gets, it would be helpful if you’re not the web master of the site you’re linking to and/or are putting this shortened link on other people’s sites.
I’m not a fan of having multiple analytics programs and Google’s interface suits me the most at the moment, however awareness of other services is certainly helpful.
Indeed tinyurl will no longer be the “No-brainer default”.
Glad you got something out of this 🙂 Clicky.me is pretty cool for tracking, I sometimes shorten the same link several times so I put one version in the sidebar, one in the post and third in some other place and then track how each of those is converting while they are all leading to the same place. Let me know how this worked for you if you give it a go!
this is my favourite use of link shortners, seeing how link positions on different sites, or different pages or even different spots on the same page affects click through and conversion. It’s amazing the varience we see. Thanks for this cool round up, some services there I haven’t used yet.
Informative post Brankica & Lisa!
I guess most of us must be using some of these, as I do use bit.ly and tiny.url, though the others I have seen quite a bit on Twitter- guess Hootsuites ones are rather common as well.
However, I haven’t really paid much attention to the Shareasale shortners. Guess all this does create more of an awareness about what to keep a look out for this New year!
Thanks for sharing 🙂
Harleena, I myself just recently realized Shareasale had a shortener 🙂 but it sure is useful when you want to get rid of those loooong links they have. Glad you liked the post!
hi lisa
Nice tips given in this article I really found them useful and helpful thanks for sharing
Very useful article previously i was only using goo.gl
But i came to know more shortning sites.
Thanks for sharing this with us
🙂
i am also using goo.gl its very short to the Google SE
You can easily shorten a URL using futz.me FROM your address bar…
Just type: “futz.me/short ” …in front of the page you’re viewing.
Example: futz.me/short http://www.yahoo.com
…will shorten yahoo.com to a goo.gl urI
It uses Google to shorten the link.
We use http://www.tinyurls.org, they have some good tools and tracking.