How Short URLs Benefit Your Sites and Links

What are some of the benefits of using URL shorteners? Perhaps the main benefit is that a short URL is easier for copying into an email, a forum post, or a post on Twitter, where the poster is limited to 140 characters for the entire post. Especially if you want a Twitter post to be passed along by others, you want the address to be as brief as possible to make room for their introductory words.

Another benefit of using URL shortening services is to create URLs that will be read aloud, so that people can easily spell them out. The URL shortening sites create nice, human-readable URLs, however tend to create longer URLs for readable purposes than when they are strictly shortening an address to minimize the number of characters it contains.

The concept of shortening long URLs goes back to at least the year 2001. The first "breakout" shortening service was Tiny URL, which launched in 2002. Today, there are over 100 shortener sites.

Making a URL shorter requires using http redirection to use a short domain linked to the website with the longer address. Techniques for doing this include generating keys in the numerical base 36, which assumes 26 letters and 10 digits, or base 62, which includes 10 digits, upper case and lower case letters. Another technique uses what is known as a hash function, and some shorteners use random number generators to create key sequences.

You will also find that URL shortening services have evolved a lot over the years which add many additional features to make using url shorteners even better. One nice function is when you shorten a URL you will be able to keep track of that URL and check statistics on it such as how many clicks you have received.

Another benefit of these services is that you will start to find some of them offer you to earn extra money by using your short urls on other websites. When people click on your short URL on twitter or other social sites they will go to your URL but will also have an advertisement and you also can earn money through the URL shortening service.

Users of shortening services should be aware that some services and their products are blocked in some places. For example, Saudi Arabia blocks some link shortening services, as does the social site MySpace. Panera Bread locations block URL-shortening access in its free WiFi networks, and Craigslist does not accept some shortened links.

If you plan to use a short URL service, you would be wise to always preview the shortened address before posting it. There have been instances of services being hacked and redirecting users in unexpected ways.

For the casual poster on sites like Twitter and Facebook, short addresses are very handy for keeping your posts brief. But it is always a good idea to test out any short URLs you generate using a shortening site before posting them to make sure they go where you want them to.

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