Permanent URLs for Twitter?

[anthonydnelson]

Great piece of advice on looking into building your own URL shortener. Not only can you guarantee it will be around, but you can potentially put some branding in there and stand out amongst the ow.ly, bit.ly, and t.co links.

[EGOL]

Can use use the actual URL?  That would get you a direct link.

Or, your idea of a permanent short URL that is 301 redirected on your main site would be a good alternative.

Links from tweets are sometimes used elsewhere and getting that linkjuice would be nice.

Also, if you use the actual URL or have complete control over the shortened URL you don't have to worry about it being changed on you.

[AlanBleiweiss]

Exactly. It's why I created the http://seoaud.it shortener for my own needs.

[JohnECF]

This sounds like a good idea. What service do you recommend for creating a custom short URL? Would bit.ly PRO work fine for this?

[JohnECF]

The actual URL takes up too much space. Also, you rarely see people using full URLs in tweets. From a "we know what we're doing here" perspective, the full URL might not be a great idea. Do you disagree?

Matt Cutts said (in the video linked to above) that any decent shortener will 301 redirect the shortened URL and thus pass link juice. I guess I am more concerned about it from a branding/tracking perspective now.

[JohnECF]

Thanks. This is great info.

[AlanBleiweiss]

bit.ly pro would work.  Personally I use yourls.org

[BlinkWeb]

Is your own shortner really necessary? I can't imagine it is.

[JohnECF]

Roger, I do not think it is necessary, but from a branding perspective, to stand out from the crowd of normal bit.ly users (I'm one of them, btw), it could be a good idea. It may be for my site.

I'd say it depends on the site and the niche.

[Hurf]

Rand talks about URL shorteners and their effect on link juice etc here: http://www.seomoz.org/q/is-there-anyway-for-redirected-links-to-still-provide-seo-value - Very good info (as you would expect from the bearded one...)