Why Shorten Your Affiliate Links ?
As you have probably noticed most affiliate links are very long and ugly in appearance. Learning how to shorten your affiliate link is a vital part of being a successful affiliate. In this article I am going to show you exactly how easy it is to recreate your affiliate links. The purpose of any affiliate link is to get someone to click on it, so that you can earn a commission. If you can make it easier for this to happen by placing your links in more places and making it more attractive to click on them, then this can only be a good thing.
Having a shorter link is a major factor when posting on sites such as Twitter as you are limited by the number of characters that show up. If the link takes up most of the text that leaves very little left to create your call to action text.
Here is one of my affiliate links www.wealthyaffiliate.com?a_aid=4be6e41c as you can see the link has letters, symbols and numbers on the end and this is common to most affiliate links. Not very inviting hah ! Here is the same link which has been shortened and posted in Twitter using one of the most popular websites for doing this.
Shortening Your Links
So let’s show you just how easy it is to do.
Firstly you need to find a link shortening website. There are many of these on the internet and easily found by searching for link shortener. Even Google has its own link shortener. All of these sites offer this service for free.
Here are a few more of the most popular ones.
Lets take Bit.ly.com and show you how to create your links. First you need to sign up for an account this is easily done by creating a username, submitting an email address and creating a password.
Sign into your account and then click on the create button top left. Grab the link you need to shorten.
The drop down will open and you can paste your link into the box.
Where it says paste long link … its super easy!
Then click the create button at the bottom.
You then have your bitly shortened link created as an extra step you can customize the link by added some words or a code so that its easier to keep track of, and of course looks nicer to click on.
As you can see I have customized mine with WealthyAffiliate at the end so I can see straight away where the link will take people.
Then all you need to do now is copy or share your link.
I would place into an excel spreadsheet for ease that way you do have to head to bit.ly to grab it.
Advantages of these sites
- The links are very easy to create
- They provide you with the shortest link possible
- Most sites provide good stats so you can tell how you links are performing
- Some sites allow to you customize using keywords at the end of the link
Disadvantages of these sites
- The links can still look rather ugly
- People may look at the link and wonder where it leads to and not click it
What Stats Do You Get
Stats are super useful to test and check if your links are getting clicks, from where and by whom.
Even as a free member Bit.ly give you some great stats, such as how you are getting your clicks you can see below I have gotten most of the clicks on this link from my email list, followed by Facebook and then Twitter.
The most popular destination has been United States Of America and I have had 192 clicks so far.
If, I had to recommend any link shortener that is web based Bit.ly would be my first choice.
There is another way that you can create shorten links lets cover that now
Pretty Link Plugin
If you are using WordPress with your affiliate marketing business then the Pretty Link plugin will do the same as the link shorteners. From your WordPress dashboard click on plugins and then new. Then search pretty link, click install and then activate.
Advantages
- Very easy to create the links as its accessible directly from your WordPress dashboard.
- The links look very professional as it looks like a link from your website.
- You can place your links into groups which will make it quicker to find them at a later date.
- Simple stats show you your clicks and unique visitors on each link created.
Disadvantages
- The links can still be fairly long, and in some cases such as Twitter a shortener like Bit.ly would be better.
- The stats are not very in depth.
Recapping
Learning how to shorten your affiliate link is both essential and easy to do. As you have found out, there are loads of sites out there that you can use for free to shorten your links. Plus you have the pretty link plugin which can be used with WordPress. They all have their advantages and disadvantages. You will find which ones suit your needs and you may even combine online sites with the pretty link plugin.
In the comments below let me know what your most effective way of creating shortened links is, plus any other sites you would recommend too. Look forward to hearing from you.
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This was a really big deal for me personally because as you said the affiliate links always looks so long and ugly and makes it hard for the people to read it. The websites listed in this article really does a good job in shortening the affiliate links for me. Thank you so much for sharing those affiliate shortening websites with us.
I am glad you have found this a useful article, I wish you every success with your affiliate marketing business.