URL Shorteners – How to Shorten Links
In today’s digital age, sharing links has become a vital part of online communication. Whether you’re a casual user or a marketing professional, being able to share links efficiently and effectively is crucial for promoting your brand, engaging with your audience, and measuring the success of your online efforts.
A powerful tool that can help you achieve these goals is a URL shortener. In this article, we’ll delve into what URL shorteners are, their advantages and disadvantages, and how to use them effectively to boost your online presence.
What is a URL Shortener?
A URL, or Uniform Resource Locator, is a string of characters that follows a standard and serves to allocate a unique address to each resource on the Internet, including web pages, images, audios, and videos. This allows you to create hyperlinks in the World Wide Web, making internet navigation easier.
A URL shortener is a web tool that simplifies long and complex web addresses by replacing them with shorter, more manageable links. This tool is crucial for anyone looking to share links more effectively and efficiently. Whether you’re a casual user or a marketing professional, URL shorteners enhance user experience, promote brand visibility, and help accurately measure engagement and reach.
Benefits of Link Shorteners
Shortened URLs offer several advantages that enhance the user experience and improve the effectiveness of your links:
- Improved User Experience: Shortened URLs are visually appealing and less overwhelming for users, making them more inviting to interact with. They simplify the appearance of texts or posts, making them cleaner and more engaging.
- Enhanced Tracking and Analytics: URL shorteners often include built-in tracking features, allowing you to monitor the performance of your links. This includes metrics such as the number of clicks, geographic location of clickers, device used, and time of clicks.
- Increased Click-through Rates: Shortened URLs tend to achieve higher click-through rates due to their clean, concise appearance and the trust associated with recognizable URL shortening services.
- Branding Opportunities: Some URL shorteners offer customization options, allowing businesses to include their brand name or relevant keywords in the URL. This reinforces brand recognition and increases trust and relevance in the eyes of the user.
- Save Characters: Characters on social networks are valuable. URL shorteners help you avoid links that take up several lines, freeing up space on your posts where character limits apply, such as on X (Twitter).
Disadvantages of URL Shorteners
While URL shorteners offer several benefits, they also come with some drawbacks:
- Hampers Link-Worthiness: Shortened links can sometimes hide the website domain, making it appear random and potentially suspicious. This can lead users to disregard the link altogether.
- Increases Broken Link Possibility: Shortened links can become obsolete and unreachable if the service used to shorten the link is discontinued. This can result in broken links and lost traffic.
- Compromises User’s Security: URL shorteners are often used in phishing attacks, and hackers may use these link shorteners to disguise malicious links. This can put users at risk of falling victim to these attacks.
How to Shorten a URL
To shorten a URL, you can use various services on the internet. These services typically consist of two parts: the domain of the service and a unique key generated by algorithms based on numerical systems. When you use the new shortened address on the browser, it accesses the service that searches for an equivalence on its database and redirects you to the original URL.
Popular URL Shorteners:
- Bitly: One of the most popular URL shorteners, Bitly offers detailed analytics about the links it shortens, including click-through rates, geographic data, and referrer information. It also allows for custom branded links.
- TinyURL: This service offers a basic URL compressor and allows you to create short pronounceable links. It also provides the option to create QR codes with the shortened link.
- iS.gd: This tool is a basic URL compressor that allows you to create short pronounceable links and QR codes.
- Tr.im: This easy-to-use web service shortens URLs and provides the option to create QR codes.
Is it necessary to use an external tool?
While URL shorteners were once useful for shortening longer links to fit character limits on social media and messaging apps, many platforms now handle this automatically.
It is not always necessary to use an external app to shorten a link, especially on social media platforms, social media planners, or content management systems. Online platforms increasingly provide their own tools to compress URLs automatically.
Some examples include:
- WordPress: Use me to shorten links on your blog publications
- Twitter: Use co for all links used on a tweet.
- Facebook: Use me to reduce links on your profile or business pages.
- LinkedIn: Use in to compress links on this professional platform
- YouTube: Use be when you share a video
- Google: use gl to trim URLs
- Karmacrazy: Use me as a shortening tool
- Tumblr: Use co to shorten links used on its platform
Metricool URL Shortener
The Metricool URL shortener is a convenient feature that automatically shortens your URLs without needing any extra tools. By using Metricool’s shortener, you’ll gain valuable insights into the clicks your links receive.
As a premium Metricool user, which helps you schedule and manage your social media content. you’ll also have the option to automatically shorten links when you upload content to social media platforms. For free users, links will be shortened automatically when you include them in your posts.
