Do URL Shorteners like Bit.ly or TinyURL Reduce SEO Benefits?
With the increase usage of URL shorteners and their great benefit in tracking marketing campaigns, I wondered what impact they have on SEO.
Google counts backlinks in its measure of popularity for search engine ranking. So one can wonder – will NOT having your own domain in the backlink actually reduce your score for rankings with Google?
Url shorteners work by redirecting your new shortened url to your existing one entered in their database. Make sure that the service you use is a 301 redirect. A 301 redirect says that the shortened URL has permanently moved to the long address. Search engines currently give credit to the permanent redirects. This will count towards your SEO score.
Alternately a 302 redirect is temporary. In this case, the search engines assume that the shortened URL is the real url which is being temporarily pointed to an alternate page. In this case credit does not get passed on to the long URL.
So it’s important to choose a url shortening service that does 301 redirects for better SEO. Currently Bit.ly does. I also like Bit.ly because it is also has tracking and vanity urls.
The following chart by Search Engine Land provides more information on which service to choose and the facts on url shortening.
