How to use your short URL

I've noticed that some people use short URLs on their Active Rain posts, and others don't. If you don't know how to use your short URL feature, read on.

After you post your blog, even as a draft, look between the end of your post and the top of the comments for Generate Short URL. Click on it and the link turns into a short URL. 

A short URL limits the number of characters in the URL of your original post so you can fit a reference to your post into a Tweet or a Facebook post.

Short URLs are simple redirects. Someone who clicks on your short URL is redirected to the page to which the short URL refers. So you use your short URL on other webpages to link back to your original post.

For example, if you make a short URL for the page at http://www.facebook.com/duxburyhomes, it might look like this: http://on.fb.me/1abfS6B.

Okay, that one isn't all that much shorter. Or easier on the eyes. Nevertheless, either link will take you to the same page: Duxbury Homes on Facebook.

To use your short URL, copy and paste it into another web page, like your blog, or a social media site. People who click on the short URL will go to the original page.

Why bother? First, shorter URLs are more convenient in the limited space on a mobile phone face. Using them leaves you more space for the content of your post or tweet.  Many syndicated posts automatically generate a short URL for you. You can see that when you look at a tweet that's fed from your blog or some other social site automatically.

The second reason is better for you than it is for your readers: tracking. When someone uses a short URL to go to your webpage, the referring page entry in your weblog shows the short URL. So you could use that referral information to help you evaluate the success of your posts.

Here on Active Rain, check your stats to see how many short URL clicks you've had on any particular post. Every click is someone who's found your post from somewhere else on the internet, perhaps somewhere someone you've never met shared your link.

You can even get different short URLs for the same page and post them on different pages, or inside a differently worded call to action, and track their relative success rates.

Keep short URLs in mind. You'll find ways to use them in your social blogging and sharing.

There are a couple of places besides Active Rain where you can go to get a short URL. Here are the big three.

http://tiny.cc/

https://bitly.com/

http://goo.gl/

So who's your buddy now? Who? Who? Click it out.