Using Social Media To Share Links: Optimising URLs
Link sharing is one of the primary means by which marketers promote their products, services, and brands. Whether you're sharing your latest YouTube video on social media or sharing a link in a newsletter, links are often the first point of contact with customers.
However, savvy marketers should know that it's not as easy as posting a URL on social media and hoping for clicks.
Your company's posts, tweets, and emails should be polished and perfected so that they maintain consistency with your brand image and portray your company in a positive light. From creating on-brand graphics, images and videos, to writing in a consistent tone of voice, it all makes your brand more appealing and builds trust with your audience. Install easy-to-use social media share buttons on your site so that your audience can easily share content.
When it comes to maintaining consistency and encouraging users to act, branded URLs are one of the best ways to do that. In addition to increasing brand awareness and visibility, they give your audience the impression that your content is coming from a trusted source. It boosts CTR by 39% and cuts through newsfeed noise.
However, even with custom URLs, there are still some hurdles to overcome. There are many rules about how to share links on online platforms and tools. Some require HTTP text at the beginning - others do not. Some may even update your links so that they include your platform's name instead.
Tweets with URLs
In spite of the fact that most Twitter users do not realize it, all URLs are automatically shortened using Twitter's t.co service. Links are limited to 23 characters - even if they are actually much longer. This ensures that your tweets do not exceed the 280-character limit.
It's a good thing that Twitter displays the original URL, a safety check against known spamming sites that warns users before they take action that could be dangerous. In addition to its metrics, Twitter's shortening service allows it to judge engagement rates on tweets and links using the t.co shortening service.
Twitter will truncate links over 31 characters with ellipses (aka ...) once they go over 31 characters, so don't get too carried away with your links. You should keep this in mind if your URL shortener has a keyword in its slug and is another reason to keep its domain name short.
In Twitter's direct messages, the http:// part of the URL is assumed, so the http:// information is not required at the beginning.
Facebook link sharing
It is crucial to make sure your brand is reflected through every interaction you have with your audience, including links you share. Facebook should automatically pull in previews of any URL you post as long as it has been coded properly. If you want to encourage click-throughs and foster trust, make sure the link is included as well. Linking on Facebook does not require the http:// bit, so your brand name will stand out.
Using images, videos and external links, Facebook is a key tool for many advertisers for reaching key audiences. Your Facebook Ad Manager link can be shared with a URL other than the URL you're pointing to directly with the help of special tools built into the manager. An eye-catching branded link can also lead prospects to a specific page on your website or a product listing on a marketplace.
Visit LinkedIn for more information
You must strengthen your brand on LinkedIn, a social platform almost exclusively for career-oriented individuals. You should ensure your company name is in your URLs.
You can find all the details on LinkedIn URL best practices here. You can share your LinkedIn URL from your homepage, from a partner site, or from your company page update. Although LinkedIn posts have a text limit of 1,300 characters, keep your links short.
If your LinkedIn users see something like this - https://lnkd.in/eYKfXFe - instead of your own lovely brand name when you use LinkedIn's link shortener, it is not the same as it is on Twitter.
Using automation tools like Buffer, you can schedule posts that will automatically be shortened when they're published, but remember the change won't occur until after they're published.
LinkedIn may hide your link entirely if there is no text after it.
The Instagram links
You’re really hard to work with, Instagram! Your bio is the only place to hyperlink links within the Instagram platform.
The good news is, Instagram allows you to sneakily include links within your Instagram posts - or on your images. That’s a serious limitation, but the good news is that they shine on Instagram. The vanity URLs aren't incredibly user-friendly, but they're simple to remember, type or paste. One marketer we spoke to recently claims that vanity URLs get 10 to 20 times more traffic from Instagram posts.
It's also a good idea to use a bio link tool like LinkGallery to host unlimited links on a page specially designed to reflect your brand. Start for free here and start sharing links.
Although some businesses and users with more than 10,000 followers are now able to add links to their Instagram stories, this awkward link-sharing process is intended to keep the platform’s simplicity. Nevertheless, we marketers can maximize things by promoting our websites through branded links.
The YouTube URLs
While YouTube developers have cracked down on external links added to videos in recent years, there are still plenty of ways for marketers to add links to their videos. Nevertheless, some users remain wary of links in the platform since it has had spam problems in the past.
YouTube links your link right up for you if you paste it into your description. You can also use a branded link to establish your credibility and encourage clicks.
It is now necessary to be a member of the YouTube Partner Program if you want to use externally linked end cards in your videos.
As part of its efforts to make it clear when a link leads to YouTube, YouTube launched its own URL shortener in 2009, YouTu.be.
The Pinterest sharing of links is limited
There are many ways to pin a photo on Pinterest and as with Instagram, the focus is very much on the picture. You can add a URL to your picture, but you will not see it unless you choose to click through to the URL.
When you've gone through Pinterest's verification process, you can add a clickable link to your website to your profile bio as well as within the image or description you share on Pinterest, though it won't be hyperlinked.
You can drive click-throughs to Pinterest pin descriptions with branded links, even if they aren't highly visible. These metrics will also tell you how well your posts are performing. Pinterest's analytics are only available to people who have verified their websites, so this click data is useful for people selling their wares on marketplaces like Etsy and Amazon, where click data is important.
Google Mail
Besides hyperlinking URLs, Gmail also allows you to hyperlink phone numbers, email addresses, and street addresses automatically, as long as you include the HTTP protocol.
Generic short links can sometimes be blacklisted by email servers, landing your marketing newsletter in spam folders. Use a custom short link or a long URL whenever sending links via email.
Mail on the iPhone
You can add a URL to your Apple Mail by entering it in the body of the mail or in your signature. A URL is turned into a clickable link, whether or not the http:// is included. Apple Mail won't recognize links ending in certain TLDs without the http, though it's a good idea to include it.
Safari desktop users can drag and drop URLs directly into their email text.
Without using a branded URL shortener, it's difficult to get URLs to look exactly as you'd like. Your links may be truncated, foreshortened, or not hyperlinked if you don't take this into consideration. If in doubt, add HTTP or HTTPS at the beginning of your short links (32 characters on Twitter or 26 characters on LinkedIn).
You should keep this in mind if you plan to post across multiple social media channels with social media tools. You'll need to turn off automatic link shortening if you're using a scheduling tool that's built-in. This will prevent your post from displaying its brand name instead of yours.
Got questions? Visit us @ www.sirkle.com and we’re happy to help.
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