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Oct 23

Automatic Bit.ly Links for WordPress Blog Posts

Categories:

WordPress

by dragonblogger

One thing I do often when about to share articles is quickly post my article link to Bit.ly so that I can easily share the article on Social Media and keep track of the click analytics that Bit.ly provides.  I have a plugin called WP Bit.ly on one site, but this plugin seems to be broken and only working because it was configured previously.  I had to find a replacement for WP Bit.ly and found an excellent one that is even more functional with WG bit.ly shortener 0.2.1.

What is WG bit.ly shortener?

WG bit.ly shortner is a WordPress plugin that does 2 things, #1 when you click publish or schedule on a post, it will send the link through the bit.ly API and generate you a bit.ly link for your article.  It will not do this when you save draft and only does this for posts you publish or schedule to publish at a later date.

It will then display your bit.ly shortened link and # of clicks in a small box in your WordPress post editor for that post.

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Setting up and Configuring WG bit.ly shortener

Setup is simple, just install WG bit.ly shortener from the WordPress plugin repository (it is completely free) and activate the plugin.

Go to your Tools –> WG bit.ly to configure it with your API key

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Enter your bit.ly username and the API key

imageYour API Key can be found in your bit.ly account settings under Advanced –> Show Legacy API Key.

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That’s it, now whenever you create a new post and publish or schedule it it will generate a bit.ly shortlink automatically for your WordPress post.  If you want to generate bit.ly shortlinks for previous articles all you need to do is edit a previous article and click the update button, this will generate a bit.ly shortlink for that WordPress post so that you can share it on Social Media and start tracking the clicks.

-Justin Germino

dragonblogger

dragonblogger

IT Security Manager who is also a part time technology blogger and loves all things Wordpress and Social Media
dragonblogger

@wpcypher

dragonblogger
Wordpress Web Hosting

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  • http://tomjamieson.wordpress.com Tom Jamieson

    Hey Justin — great review! I use the YOURLS plugin on my blog, which you can connect to bitly, or a few other link shortening services. Plus, I have a personalized short URL connected to my bitly account — tomj.us

    • http://www.dragonblogger.com Justin Germino

      The problem with customized short links is that they are blocked or not recognized by many proxies.
      So if anyone visits links from work..ahem on breaks or lunch and it is a corporate network with an auto proxy, they will likely consider any such links spam and block them.

      bit.ly is popular enough and well enough known it is generally trusted, I have seen many shortlinks fail through proxies and therefore don’t use a custom one myself as a result.

      • http://tomjamieson.wordpress.com Tom Jamieson

        Wow, I wasn’t aware that could happen. Thanks for the info. Have you had any experience with the YOURLS plugin?

        • http://www.dragonblogger.com Justin Germino

          No, I haven’t come across it. It is one of those things where I searched for WordPress.org archives found this plugin and just used it. I didn’t go seeing if any were better because all I needed was to auto shrink with bit.ly and track clicks and this plugin does that.

          • http://tomjamieson.wordpress.com Tom Jamieson

            ok, just curious. I haven’t seen many reviews or experiences across the web, but it has worked well for me so far.

          • http://tomjamieson.wordpress.com Tom Jamieson

            Actually what initially drew me to it was that it could connect to is.gd, tinyURL and bit.ly. However, it doesn’t track clicks on my admin panel; I have to go to the bitly site for that. So maybe I will check out WG.

          • http://www.dragonblogger.com Justin Germino

            Yeah this one tracks clicks inside the post, so on the edit post screen it shows the bit.ly links and clicks which it reads in from bit.ly API. But it only does Bit.ly no tinyURL or is.gd.

  • http://twitter.com/wordpressential wordpressentials

    thanks for this helpful information!i have been looking for an information about this for a long time. i just begin to use this inside my website.!