Recently, the following happened with me, I wrote my regular daily newsletter and submitted it on my website. Because this was a normal WordPress Url I'd try using a URL shortener service as many other webmasters do.

Then I went on and posted this shortened website link to Twitter and also mentioned it in my weekly e-newsletter. In a couple of moments I started getting suggestions and email messages that there's a mistake because of the URL doesn't work.

Which may be easily done, however when I checked the hyperlink, I discovered that the URL shortener service was not functioning properly and giving the dreaded "Page Not Found" result. The funny thing is that I was utilizing Google's own system, Goo.gl, and because of that everyone thought I made the mistake, I mean Google is Google.

Before that I was using the ultra well-known bit.ly but after that I turned to Goo.gl simply because like everyone else, I trust Google a lot more! And almost everything functions much better together with Google; this was the very first time a thing I used with Google hadn't worked as prepared. Not just mine but every other Goo.gl link wasn't functioning neither. No biggie in case you weren't linking to Black Friday and/or Cyber Monday deals via the service.

But this brings up the entire issue of regardless of whether or not you should use a hyperlink shortener?

A URL website link shortener functions by redirecting your shorter hyperlink to the longer one you have inserted into their storage system. If it's a so-called 301 permanent redirecting then all the SEO benefits will get redirected also. No difficulty on that part. In this situation the redirection is simply a 302, or temporary redirection then search engines won't identify any link juice moving through your shortened URLs.

All the top Url shorteners for instance tinyurl, bit.ly and goo.gl uses 301 redirects so they are SEO friendly, if they are working!

Many people only start utilizing shorteners simply because of the popularity of Twitter, and they only permit anyone to post 140 characters, including links. These shorteners can be good for sharing and distributing your hyperlinks around the internet.

It is also a good and simple way to cover up your affiliate marketer hyperlinks if you're into affiliate marketing. Just imagine, you've 10's, even 100's of thousands of these shortened hyperlinks spread all over the net, bringing valuable SEO PR back to your site.

There are pros and cons when using an URL shortener assistance. The easiest way would be to take advantage of them but in a controllable way, for example by choosing services that have a good track record and are more well-known; but obviously you can (and maybe should) add less well-known ones to the mix also. Spreading your shortened URLs across a few of the major and less popular services is a wise strategy! For instance if you Tweet, blog, submit ebooks or short reviews regularly you can use a various provider for each of these.

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