Here is a report I received yesterday from Jonathan Gunson of TrafficCafe.tv on how he uses URL shortening services to encourage greater click-throughs to his website:
Now this is really cool: I've discovered by extensive split testing on Twitter that customized shortened links from the http://tinyurl.com service increase click-throughs by as much as three times.
Here's how:
I don't use the ordinary shortening, but use the custom alias panel immediately under the normal URL entry panel instead. (You'll see what I mean on the web page.)
For example, I shortened
http://www.trafficcafe.tv/stars/toptrafficsecrets.htm to http://tinyurl.com/ydcfa4b.
But I used the custom alias instead to make http://tinyurl.com/Jonathans-Secrets
This got 3 times the click throughs because of the personal branding, and it cost ... nothing.
Note from John Kremer: Other URL shortening services also allow you to create custom or branded links. Check out the URL shortening services at http://www.bookmarket.com/twitter-short.htm.
