track links with bitly

by rhythmofthecosmos

Posted: 13 years ago 8 replies

INTERNET MARKETING

Hi,

I'm trying to find out how to track my links. I'm going to set up cloud flood and use bitly. Will this give me a detailed account of how many people have shared my link?

#bitly #links #track

Alexa Smith Banned 13 years ago

The best link-tracker to use is any one that you own and control yourself.

To put it mildly, it's not sensible at all to rely on the continued availability, goodwill, reliability and changeable terms of service of any third-party URL-shortening/tracking service.

There were a few hundred Warriors here last year who would have told you the same (and in fact did) when all their Tinyurl links suddenly disappeared overnight.

And if anyone tells you that "bit.ly's not going anywhere", just invite them to read this recent post on Ben Metcalfe's blog: The .ly domain space to be considered unsafe | :Ben Metcalfe Blog.

It's good to be in control of your own business and not dependent on unnecessary third-party services (in countries like Libya!) and their reliability and longevity.
- Thanks
- 1 reply
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- rhythmofthecosmos 13 years ago
  
  I'm leaving the country to travel for 3 years though you see and won't have constant internet access. I need a way to track them over a period of time otherwise I would have done it myself
  
  Thanks
  
  3 replies
  
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  Alexa Smith Banned 13 years ago
  
  Originally Posted by rhythmofthecosmos
  
  I'm leaving the country to travel for 3 years
  
  Bon voyage ... and remember that "to travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive".
  
  Do you really think "bit.ly" will still exist in 3 years' time? Will you give me odds on it? :confused:
  
  Thanks
  
  1 reply
  
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  rhythmofthecosmos 13 years ago
  
  well I just need a way to keep a log of how many people have been sharing my stuff.. maybe GA could be useful?
  
  Thanks
  
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  abdin66 13 years ago
  
  Hey, have you tried out Pretty Links? That's quite a great free plugin for WordPress that works really well and has great flexibility.
  
  Thanks
  
  1 reply
  
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  rhythmofthecosmos 13 years ago
  
  Originally Posted by abdin66
  
  Hey, have you tried out Pretty Links? That's quite a great free plugin for WordPress that works really well and has great flexibility.
  
  Don't think it would work as cloud flood gives me an iframe to work with. I want to track how many people actually get my freebie
  
  Thanks
  
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  Alexa Smith Banned 13 years ago
  
  Also ...
  
  Originally Posted by rhythmofthecosmos
  
  I'm leaving the country to travel for 3 years though you see and won't have constant internet access.
  
  If you'll excuse the observation, for me that would be an additional reason for not wanting to be dependent on the reliability and longevity of an unnecessary third-party service: I'd want to have it set up on my own hosting under a domain-name pre-registered for the 3 years, to minimise the chances of "accidents" while I'm on my travels. Just saying ...
  
  Thanks
  
  1 reply
  
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  rhythmofthecosmos 13 years ago
  
  I've figured it out now I don't need to track links anymore. If I re-organised the way I set things up then I can re-direct the user to my tracking system already in place
  
  phew!
  
  thanks
  
  Thanks
  
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