Bitly is a great tool for shortening links and watching the clicks come in, but there are some great additional features as well.

When you hear someone mention Bitly, your immediate thought is something along the lines of, “Link shortening!” While Bitly is a great tool for shortening links and monitoring clicks, there are some additional Bitly features that are extremely valuable to the optimization of your activity on social media.

These four Bitly features are not universally known, but are definitely worth remembering.

Bitly Analytics

You account shows you how many clicks a particular link (or a version of a link) has garnered, and a lot of people think that the counting stops there. But for serious marketers who are looking to optimize their activity, there are Bitly insights a click away.

When you copy a link and paste it into a new tab or window with a small ‘+’ next to it, you are introduced to a world of insights about the activity that has taken place on that link. Similarly, if you have access to the link in your account, you can simply click on the ‘View stats’ link (shown above) and see the same insights.

See what Bitly analytics look like when you dive in!

Competitive Insights

What a lot of people don’t seem to realize is that these Bitly insights can be viewed by anyone. So next time you see a competitor using a Bitly link, copy it, add the ‘+’ mentioned above and take a look at the activity on their link.

These insights can provide you with some idea of how to position your product on social media, what demographics to target and how to optimize your content schedule for optimal exposure and click-through rate.

Custom Links

Data shows that social media users are generally more comfortable clicking on a link when they know where it is going. From a content marketing point-of-view, this means that your posts shouldn’t have cryptic, ambiguous calls-to-action like, “Want to Make Money?” or “Start Your Journey Here!” Instead, they should be clear and straightforward. The same goes for your links.

One of the best features when it comes to Bitly is that you do not have to be a webmaster to customize your links. Sure, there are options to fully-customize (go to the Advanced section in your Bitly account’s Settings) but you can also simply customize the ending of your link.

Instead of a messy bit.ly/abc123-style link, you can click on the pencil next to your link (see it in the image above?) and customize it! Of course, if someone else has already taken your customized link, you’ll have to think of something else, but the more specific you are the better. For example, in the link above you’ll see that we changed it to t2SocialBlog so that people know they are clicking through to our blog and not some spam-filled webpage.

Networking

Wether you are sharing links with your public community (hence the ability to make links public) or you are creating bundles on Bitly to share with your personal networks, Bitly offers you the ability to be social right from your link shortening dashboard.

One of the great features of Bitly is that it is, essentially, a content curation tool as much as it is a link shortener. By building a community and actively participating in it, you might find that you can access a bundle with some great new content or resources and add to your sea of most-visited websites.

Real-Time Media Map

One of the cooler tools that exists out there today is Bitly’s Real-Time Media Map. Though it is still working it’s way into the market (only showing information for the United States right now) it is a very unique, fun and informative resource.

Start by choosing the type of media you want to peruse (say for example magazines or newspapers) then see what accounts are being shared most actively in different states in real-time. You can track the hottest accounts and keep up-to-date with the most popular stories as they are shared with Bitly links.

As this tool evolves, it will certainly become something worth leveraging for your own insights and strategies.

 

Next time you find yourself shortening a link with Bitly, remember that the information you receive is much more than some data on the number of clicks you have had. What link shortening service do you use? Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!