This morning I decided to create and use my own personalized URL shortening service. I have been using bit.ly for a long time, and while I find bit.ly to be a great service I wanted to try throwing links around that had my signature in them.
There are several routes I could have taken to create my own URL shortener and I went with Pretty Link because of its simplicity and features. All I had to do to get it up and running was install the plugin and I was good to go.
I’ve only used it a few times this morning and so far it has worked great. I’ve shared a few of them on Twitter, some people have clicked them, and I have all the click info in my WordPress admin area. Pretty Link works just as it is supposed to.
Looking at my Twitter updates now though, I have to wonder if I’m coming across as too self-promotional. All the links I’m sharing on Twitter all start off with “http://robmcguire.net” and if people aren’t aware that I’m using my own URL shortener I can see how it would appear that I’m just blasting links to my website.
I think that this could become a problem for people who just start out using their own personalized URL shortener. Until people become aware that not all the links you share point to your site I think you take the chance of appearing a little spammy.
I know a few people who also use their own URL shrinkers and I haven’t asked their take on this yet. But I will go ahead and ask you: Have you ever found custom URL shorteners to be too pompous or self-promotional?
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The thing with URL shorteners is that they result in a really short link, and we recognize these for what they are. However, you’re using robmcguire.net for both the website and the short URLs, so people will be confused. I noticed a few people using very short versions of their names with .me for personalized short URLs, and I decided to go that way. So, if you had “robmcg.me” or something like that for your dedicated short URLs, the distinction between your short URLs and your website links would be clearer.