When to use a short link, and how to keep it working

A short link is a small address that sends people on to a longer one. Shortening started as a way to save characters, but that is the least useful thing about it now. Here is what short links are actually good for.

Four good reasons to use one

1. Someone will have to type it. A link on a slide, a sign, a van or a podcast needs to be short enough to remember and type without mistakes.

2. You want to know if it is working. A short link can count its clicks. Make one for the flyer and one for the newsletter, and you can see which brought more people.

3. The destination might change. A short link is a pointer. If the page moves, you change where the link goes and everything you have already shared keeps working.

4. The real link is ugly. Long addresses full of tracking tags look untrustworthy in a message and break when they wrap across lines in an email.

When not to use one

• When people need to see where they are going. A short link hides the destination. On your own website, in a legal notice, or anywhere trust matters more than tidiness, use the full address.
• For search engines. Links between pages on your own site should point straight at the page.
• When it adds nothing. If the real address is already short and will never change, a short link is one more thing that can go wrong.

Three things to check before you share one

A short link is only as reliable as the service behind it. Before you put one on anything permanent, check:

Does it expire? Some free shorteners deactivate links after a period or a number of clicks. A link printed on a thousand leaflets needs to outlast them.

Is there an ad in the way? Some free shorteners pay for themselves by showing a waiting page with adverts before sending people on. Your visitor sees someone else's advert before they see you.

Can you change the destination? If not, a moved page means a dead link.

On Utilica, short links go straight to your page with no ad and no waiting screen, they do not expire, and you can change where each one points at any time. The free plan includes three.

Short links and QR codes are the same idea

A dynamic QR code is a short link drawn as a pattern. Scanning the code and tapping the link both pass through the same redirect, so they share the same strengths: you can change the destination, and you can count how often they are used. That is also why the same checks apply. We cover the QR side in do QR codes expire?

One link per place

The simplest way to get more from short links: do not reuse one. Make a separate link for each place you share from, name it after that place, and compare the counts after a month. You will find out quickly which of your posters, profiles and emails are doing the work.