Amazon has launched it’s own shortened URL, amzn.to, powered by bit.ly’s new Pro service. Twitter’s default (for now) URL shortener has 6,000 corporate clients, including Amazon. The online retailer joins other corporations like nyti.ms (NYTimes), huff.to (Huffington Post), on.cnn.com (CNN) and yes, tcrn.ch (Techcrunch). Last year, the company rolled out it’s own truncated URL (internally created): amzn.com/ (followed by a product code or a category). While that extension still works, Amazon has emphasized bit.ly’s urls on its Twitter pages, and now its custom amzn.to.
Every Amazon link and every product in the online marketplace can now be shortened to an amzn.to url. For example, Kindle’s url goes from this mess:
http://www.amazon.com/Kindle-Wireless-Reading-Display-Generation/dp/B0015T963C/ref=amb_link_352822542_3?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=center-1&pf_rd_r=1M1FK26JH3WD8N4FJX4K&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=1260157962&pf_rd_i=507846
To a more elegant:
http://amzn.to/c6f1m5
With hundreds of Amazon links floating through Twitter on a given day, “Amzn.to” becomes a powerful branding tool for the company.
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On Tuesday, bit.ly revealed phenomenal stats (3.4 billion shortened links in March) and new features on its Pro Service (its platform for corporate clients). Under bitly.Pro, the entry-level (includes custom domain) will continue to be free but customers can opt for the enterprise product, a $995 a month service that includes a dashboard with traffic data, automatic shortener for all links from a client’s site and a real-time feed of click data.
Update: Well this could throw a wrench in bit.ly’s plans: Twitter’s CEO says the site will launch its own link shortener. No word yet on how this will affect bit.ly.
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