The best services for link shortening

In an effort to increase the effectiveness of marketing campaigns, companies are increasingly using URL shortening services. Short links facilitate communication across digital and offline channels, give control over analytics, and help protect the structure of campaigns without losing customer convenience.

In this article, we’ll look at how to choose a link shortening service based on business objectives: analytics, integrations, security, and costs.

Why businesses should use shortened links

At first glance, link shortening seems like a trifle – a technical nuance that has little impact on the results. But in fact, it plays a significant role in digital marketing.

Professional look and brand credibility

Long, technically complex URLs look unaesthetically pleasing and raise doubts – especially if they contain UTM tags or service parameters. A shortened link, on the other hand, is perceived as neat, controlled, and secure. For a brand, this means more trust from users in social media, email newsletters, and advertisements.

Convenience in working with marketing channels

Shortened links are easier to place in SMS, on banners, in printed materials, or in videos. This is especially important for offline communications, for example, when a company uses QR codes or short domain links for promotional campaigns.

Ability to track click-through rates

Most modern link shortening services have built-in analytics: number of clicks, geography, user devices, time of activity, etc. This allows you to evaluate which channels really bring traffic and optimize your budget without additional trackers.

Control over UTM tags and redirects

Instead of providing users with raw links with long labels, marketers can create a clean, short URL that automatically leads to the desired route. This not only simplifies the look of the link, but also helps to avoid mistakes when copying or pasting the link.

Protection against copying by competitors

In open source ads, short links make it harder for competitors to access your original UTM tags and campaign structure. This is a small but effective advantage in the fight for analytical transparency.

10 leading link shortening services

Let’s take a look at a selection of 10 leading link shortening services, selected based on business-oriented features: branding, analytics, APIs, bulk import capabilities, and QR/UTM support. Brief descriptions emphasize practical benefits and potential risks to make it easier to choose a platform for your company’s specific marketing and operational objectives.

1. Surli

Surli is a URL shortening service with a focus on ease of use, fast link generation, and basic analytics. It is focused on marketing and SMM tasks of small and medium-sized businesses.

2. Cuttly

Cuttly is a multifunctional link manager with branding tools, advanced analytics, A/B/C testing, and link-in-bio creation. It is aimed at those who need to control and test links.

3. Bitly.com

Bitly is one of the oldest and largest link shortening services in the world. It processes hundreds of millions of shortened URLs every month. Bitly is a commercial, scalable link shortening and management platform with a focus on enterprise analytics, security, and integrations; it is often used by global brands.

4. Is.gd

Is.gd is a simple, lightweight, and free link shortener suitable for quickly getting a short address without registration. It is more focused on one-time or small-scale tasks.

5. Tinyurl.com

TinyURL is a long-established and well-known link shortening service that is suitable for companies that need a stable and simple solution with the option of branded domains in paid plans.

6. Ow.ly

Ow.ly is a built-in link shortener in the Hootsuite platform. It is the best choice for businesses that centrally plan and publish content on social media through Hootsuite.

7. Rebrandly.com

Rebrandly is a platform focused on shortlink branding and scalable analytics. It is useful for agencies and teams that value domain consistency and metadata control.

8. Abbriv

Abbriv is a modern abbreviation service with a set of business tools (branded links, detailed analytics, QR generation, activation scheduler) and a user-friendly web interface for teams.

9. T.ly

T.ly is a service with a very short domain and a focus on simplicity, speed, and a set of business options: analytics, QR codes, support for custom domains, and APIs. It is positioned as a cost-effective solution for teams.

10. Short URL

ShortURL is a classic free shortener with a long history, suitable as a backup or simple solution for keeping short links forever. It is more focused on simplicity and permanence than on corporate features.

To quickly compare services by business task priorities and filter out some of the most suitable candidates for further testing, let’s look at the issue of choosing the right service for your business.

How to choose a URL shortening service for business

Choose a service that doesn’t just «shorten» links, but fits into your operational processes, meets your company’s risk profile, and allows you to scale. The following criteria will help you make an informed decision.

Identify business cases

Describe how you plan to use the links: mass email campaigns, SMS/messengers, QR in offline materials, referral programs, social media campaigns, or internal workflows. It depends on the case which features will be critical.

Analytics and tracking: check the level of detail

Evaluate whether you need only click counts or a breakdown by source, channel, country, device, and session at the campaign level. If you need reporting for C-level or BI integrations, prioritize solutions with data export and APIs (e.g., Bitly, Rebrandly).

Branding and trust control

The ability to connect your own domain significantly increases the level of user trust. For public branding campaigns, choose services that support custom domains and subdomains and CNAME settings.

Integrations and automation

Make sure that the service allows you to create links from CRM/CDP in bulk, has webhooks for real-time events, and is compatible with your automation tools. For a large volume of links, bulk tools and stable API quotas will be critical.

Scalability, SLAs, and support

For agencies and enterprise tasks, uptime guarantees, fast technical support, and SLAs in the contract are important. Check the terms of redundancy, RTO/RPO, and plans for DDoS or other incidents.

Security and content policy

Find out whether the service scans endpoint URLs for malicious content, how phishing and other malicious links are handled, and what the blocking policy is. For financial, healthcare, and other sensitive industries, compliance with security standards and the availability of IP filters and blockers are important.

Jurisdiction and regulatory compliance

Check where logs and metadata are stored, whether the provider complies with GDPR, local data storage laws, and whether cross-border transfers are possible. For some companies, this can be a decisive factor.

Marketing functionality

Pay attention to the availability of UTM templates, UTM generator, A/B (or A/B/C) link testing, dynamic redirects, mobile redirects, and integration with retargeting pixels. These tools save marketing time and increase test efficiency.

Link management options

Whether you can edit the target URL without creating a new short link, whether there is password protection, activation and deactivation schedule, link grouping, and roles for teams. For campaigns with many participants, granular access and audit trails are important.

Migration, export, and recovery

Check the ability to export the entire link history, save UTM parameters, and import/export CSV. Plan the exit scenario: how quickly you can transfer links to another service if necessary.

Pricing – read not only the price but also the terms and conditions

Pay attention to the real limitations: limits on the number of links, API quotas, history of statistics, tariff models by clicks or by number of domains. Calculate the total TCO for your volume.

Pilot and test before scaling

Launch a pilot on 2-3 services: check the ease of integration, accuracy of analytics, speed of support, and behavior under load. The pilot allows you to work out internal processes and avoid risks when scaling.

Monitoring and rollback plan

After the launch, set up regular monitoring of the availability and correctness of redirects, track KPIs (CTR, conversion rate, load time). Have a proactive rollback plan: templates for updating links, a contact person at the provider, a backup domain, and a mechanism for mass redirects in case of an incident.

Where to avoid shortened links

After choosing a platform, it’s important to know where shortened links may be inappropriate or risky. Below are situations in which you should avoid shorteners or proceed with extreme caution.

1. Critical legal or financial references. Links to legally binding documents, invoices, or confidential data should be left in plain text to maintain transparency and trust.
2. SEO-important pages. For indexing by search engines, it is better to use full canonical URLs. Short links are suitable for communication, but not as the main source of traffic.
3. Contexts with a high level of trust. In banking, government, or security communications, a hidden domain can cause users to be wary.
4. Long-term archived content. If the links are to remain relevant for years, think in advance about the export strategy and the possibility of recovery or redirection in case of service changes.

To summarize: in a business where speed and measurability determine profits, shortened links are a tool for operational analytics and branding. Use them as part of the system, not as a one-time solution.

Olha Tyshchenko

Editor

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