Branded links, a powerful evolution of standard short links, enhance your brand’s visibility and trustworthiness with every click. This article explores what branded links are, how they function, their benefits, and how you can create them to strengthen your digital presence.
What is a Branded Link?
A branded link is a type of short link that references a brand name or keyword within the domain name and URL slug. Branded links are often referred to as vanity URLs or keyword links.
What’s the difference between branded and unbranded links?
Unlike generic, unbranded short links, branded links incorporate your business’s name or key terms into the domain and slug, making them more recognizable and trustworthy to users.
Branded links work by utilizing two main components: branded short domain names and branded URL shortening. Let’s breakdown these components to better understand how branded links work.
Branded Link Shorteners
Instead of using generic shorteners like Bitly or TinyURL and giving them free advertising, users can create branded links with their own custom domain name.
Once your branded short domain is set up, you can start shortening URLs using your own brand name along with custom keywords, called a slug.
The slug is a part of a URL that comes after the domain name, immediately after the slash.
With a branded link shortener, you can customize the back half of your URL to make it relevant to the specific content or campaign (e.g., “/sale” or “/new-product”).
Example of a Branded Short Link
For example, let’s say Burger Shack is wants to promote their Special Offer, found on their website at https://www.burgershack.net/store/offer-list/special-offer/.
First, they’ll need a branded short domain. In this case, they can acquire a condensed version of their domain like brgr.sh to use for creating branded short links. ccTLDs like .sh are commonly used for this purpose.
Once their short domain is set up, they create the following short link to share their offer link: brgr.sh/special-offer.
This short link is not only easier to fit into any platform, but it also provides a number of other benefits for the business.
Benefits of Using Branded Short Links
Branded links provide a wide array of benefits. Here are some of the most common:
More Brand Impressions
Every time a branded link is shared, your brand name is displayed, increasing brand recognition and reinforcing your brand’s identity across different media.
Higher Click-Through Rates (CTR)
Studies have shown that branded links can improve click-through rates up to 34% compared to generic short links. While generic links could take users anywhere, branded links provide users with trust.
Improved Link Management
Instead of looking for a URL in a long list, your branded links will immediately communicate what content it leads to, making managing your links much simpler.
Greater Brand Reputation
Branded links help maintain a professional image and can positively influence brand reputation due to their clear and direct naming.
Do Branded Links Affect SEO?
Branded links can impact SEO in numerous ways, for both good and bad. Let’s break it down.
Pros
Branded short links can provide SEO benefits in two ways: internal linking and backlink acquisition.
Internal short links are often used by larger websites in their link structure to track and measure the effectiveness of their on-page SEO.
As your branded links are shared online, they pass link juice to your main website via backlinking. These links over time could increase your domain authority.
Cons
Using a custom domain for branded short links can have negative effects on SEO through duplicate content and broken redirects.
In order to avoid duplicate content issues, utilize proper redirects to make sure search engines know that your main domain, not your branded domain, is the canonical link to be referenced.
In order to avoid broken links, set the index and 404 redirects for your custom domain to your main website. This way you won’t miss out on any traffic if your short links break.
How to Create a Branded Short Link
Creating branded short links with Sniply is straightforward by following these steps:
- Open your Sniply dashboard and go to the link tool.
- Paste the long URL you’re sharing into the URL field, then click the settings icon.
- Under ‘Domain,’ select the branded short domain name you’ll use for your branded link.
- Under ‘Custom,’ enter a keyword that connotes the content you’re sharing to customize the link slug.
- Lastly, click ‘Shorten‘ to generate your branded link.
Generate Branded Short Links with Sniply
By incorporating Sniply branded short links into your digital marketing campaigns, you can enhance user engagement, boost brand awareness, and track the effectiveness of your content with precision. These links not only streamline user experiences but also fortify the credibility of your digital content.
