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URL shorteners - Is one any better than the other?

by AnneE
6 replies
I'm about to post a YouTube video and want to link to a related product in Amazon in the description, so I plan to use a URL shortener for my affiliate link.

Is one URL shortener any better than the others?

Thanks in advance,
Anne
#shorteners #url
  • Profile picture of the author Alexa Smith
    Banned
    Yes ... any one that you own and control yourself is better than any one you don't.

    There's no need to rely on the continuity and security of unnecessary third-party services outside one's own control, when there are better alternatives available (such as "prettylink", redirected .info domain-names, and so on).

    That's even putting it mildly: even I'm old enough to remember a time that "tinyurl" itself did "just cease to exist the next day". It went under (but on that occasion was bought by another company from the liquidator, and was effectively resurrected, which may not happen next time).

    Anyone potentially interested in bit.ly might find this rather chilling reading: The .ly domain space to be considered unsafe | :Ben Metcalfe Blog
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    • Profile picture of the author ECS Dave
      Originally Posted by AnneE View Post

      I'm about to post a YouTube video and want to link to a related product in Amazon in the description, so I plan to use a URL shortener for my affiliate link.

      Is one URL shortener any better than the others?

      Thanks in advance,
      Anne
      Originally Posted by Alexa Smith View Post

      Yes ... any one that you own and control yourself is better than any one you don't.
      Excellent advice from Alexa!

      To add to that, with a "shortener" that you can "own" and control easily, and it is FREE...

      YOURLS: Your Own URL Shortener - I use it, along with another, on my EXCITIN' - Yes? xyt.in domain.

      HTH

      Be Well!
      ECS Dave

      P.S. One further thing to cogitate upon... If you do decide to use your
      own shortener, consider permanency - that is, invest in a domain that
      you will KEEP, so that your links won't die at some point in the future.
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  • Profile picture of the author Avish
    I totally agree with you. i think its better to post open urls rather than using shorteners except some best ones such as bitly, t.co,etc. I think it would be more better to use shortened urls in facebook and twitter, etc. Posting original urls builds an honest image in the minds of viewers.
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    Affrio is a B2B and B2C shopping affiliate platform which offers the best, latest and chosen products and services of your choice digitally all over the internet world. Find the best money making opportunites along with online shopping.
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  • Profile picture of the author AnneE
    Shucks.... you guys just gave me one more to-do. Actually 2 more to-do's, decide what domain name is both short and i'll have around forever and put a script out there.

    Sigh....
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    • Profile picture of the author Alan Petersen
      Originally Posted by AnneE View Post

      Shucks.... you guys just gave me one more to-do. Actually 2 more to-do's, decide what domain name is both short and i'll have around forever and put a script out there.

      Sigh....
      But you'll be better off in the end!

      Last week I was lazy and in a hurry, so I went against my own advice and used a third party URL shortner (Google's Goo.gl) and the result...



      Not only was link disabled, they displayed a scary warning page telling folks it was disabled for "spam, security, or legal reasons".

      Not good.

      I would like to add: never, ever, ever, ever, use URL shortners (especially for affiliate links).

      Control your links.
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  • Profile picture of the author Ord Allenbea
    You can use .htaccess to create your own short links. This way you control everything and do not rely upon any 3rd party that may go out of business or stop or links. Open or create a .htaccess file (you can create one as htaccess.txt and when you upload change it to .htaccess).

    In the file you will add:

    Code:
    RewriteEngine on 
RewriteRule art(.*) www * my-long-affiliate-url * com
    If you use mydomain * com/art then it will auto redirect to your affiliate url. (replace the * with .)

    A 2nd option, you could install a free open source code script that does the same thing - yourls DOT org (I have not tried this script and I do not know anything about it).

    I tried to post the code properly but I keep getting a message I can not post links. Just know the url should be a full url on the code example.
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