For those who read their emails in a browser (like Yahoo Mail, Gmail, etc.), they would still need to have HTML turned on for it to work, and even then, the email client may restrict whether any scripts embedded in the email can execute. These extensions are easily obtained and generic enough for almost any organization to use. Services that don’t do this can end up being blacklisted on major websites which won’t allow links from such services to be displayed. TweetDeck and Seesmic (TweetDeck’s direct competitor) both offer numerous URL-shortener options (bit.ly, is.gd, TinyURL, and twURL), but only bit.ly offers click tracking. The SEO issue isn’t an issue, according to Google’s Matt Cutts.
TinyURL tries to disable spam-related links from redirecting.[30] ZoneAlarm, however, has warned its users: "TinyURL may be unsafe. Our CTID can be passed through any affiliate network using SubID tracking. You can also pass the CTID to affiliate networks with pixel tracking or postback tracking if the network supports it. You need to make sure tag manager associates the event with this tag. Notes: Your custom URL can have 5-30 letters or numbers. It does not allow for a custom domain at this time.
AdFly: Another interesting shortener is AdFly, because it allows you to monetize on your URL shortener. For example, "4" can be used for the "for" sound in a name. In order to form the key, a hash function can be made, or a random number generated so that key sequence is not predictable.
Most URL shortening services offer basic analytic data that tracks the total number of clicks, the time of the click and the country or territory location of the person who clicked the link. A uniform resource locator (URL) is registered with a server. Every access requires more requests (at least one more DNS lookup, though it may be cached, and one more HTTP/HTTPS request), thereby increasing latency, the time taken to access the page, and also the risk of failure, since the shortening service may become unavailable. Before we go any further, you must upgrade to Universal Analytics. Apply the tracking pixel to “This Event” or “All Events”. If your account has multiple link domains, the link domain used to rewrite links is dynamically chosen per-link, based on the destination of the link.
See how that one event isn’t named correctly, so it shows as undefined? Tracking Out-going Links with Google Analytics With Google Analytics, you can also track outbound links on your website. UA code is the unique identifier for each Analytics account you create. The nice thing about it is that it’s a short link, about 70% smaller than the permalink for this post. However, if it's a direct link to a resource like a document or PDF or JPG, to track this link when using Google Analytics you may need some custom tracking methods setup on your server to track that particular link to your resource. Keyword This field should never be used in an email campaign.