Worth starting a short URL site?

A

ADEPT

New member
I have always like the series of small URL sites and see them as a great way to advertise and a site that could be sold on easily.

I am now having trouble choosing whether or not to build one, I took a small look and there seems to be a fair few already running (maybe 50-100+).

So do you think it would be a waste of time to design one? I mean are they really used a lot or just by a minority consumer?

Thx,

Sam
 
Sam, the Internet is competitive, but there is place for everyone. It doesn't cost much to try, you are looking at perhaps up to $100 for startup expense altogether, while the long-term result could be more profitable.

I actually thought about the same idean before (I had the domain for it), but decided to use the domain for another concept which is more in line with other sites I run.

As the saying goes, it doesn't hurt to try.

Best,
 
Thx. I think i will have a go, the concept has always intreasted me. I think the hard part is going to be thinking up a name that hasent been used lol. Should be fun.

Thx again.
 
Usually if you are going to have a URL shortening site you would have a short URL of your own.
You have a 2 word hyphenated site and the just wont be attractive to people who want to shorten a URL.
 
I've decided to try this out too. I was thinking it over after I aquired a 3 char domain. I'm thinking of using it as a short url redirection service and have the neccessary script for it too. It's just a matter of seeing how it does. At this point, I don't see how it provided a good use though, in terms for the webmaster. Unless you can place pop ups or some ads, I don't see how you can generate anything back.
 
I think it's worth it. I remember way-back-when, in the days of my free hosting experiences, that short URL sites were the end all, be all. Free hosting hasn't really shrunk all that much, so I think the niche is still out there for the right domain.
 
The thing I don't get exactly is how you benefit from it. Do ads help you out? how do you sort of get anything back from it?
 
Harry said:
The thing I don't get exactly is how you benefit from it. Do ads help you out? how do you sort of get anything back from it?
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The absolutely ONLY way you can make it a great experience is if you provide a very well designed and programmed base for users to track statistics, etc. while you can collect their email addresses and contact information in order to sell to them later. However, there is so much competition out there at the moment that its very hard to come up with something that will stand out, and most of the services do not require any sort of sign-up process.

Best,
 
Well my idea is having a connecting page, warning them of the page there going to, incase of spam. Similar to when you login to this forum, displayed for a few seconds. If you try out my script then you see I have an ad system and I plan to have adsense there instead of my hosting thing atm. Thanks for the help.

Oh and with the short domain thing i have been trying hard to get a short domain and have just got to find a sutiable one that fits (or not in the end) The script can be changed easily to fit the domain, thank god.
 
Nowadys is quite dfficult to fin good andshor domain names. As far as know all short and nice dmain names are bought. If you have enough money to buy short and registered by someone domain name it would be realy good for you. You may ask for domains on namepros.com
 
I have a few, though I wouldn't sell them for cheap. 2 and 3 char domains are rare and the ones that have them are quite lucky.

I haven't looked much into the short url system yet, but I may try it out for a few months and see what happens.
 
The problem I see with starting a short URL web site is there is really no good way to make money. While it is not terribly difficult to host a web site like this, the only way I could really see profit is if you were to have advertisements on some sort of control panel.

I believe someone earlier suggested statistics about page views. I think this is a generally good idea, but the problem there is you cannot provide any real analytics about the users clicking the link besides the basic information. You cannot track their progress after leaving your server.


If you see room for potential profit than by all means give it a go. It would not require that much programming (at least the redirection).


Edit: You really do need a smaller domain name.

Old URL length: 21 ; New URL length: 26 symbols.
 
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Ya i think ppl like sites with small names and names that are not normally used like orkut , digg etc ... i think this also plays a major role in site popularity apart from the regular Search Engine Optimization, Which has become a very important part of achieving a decent Search engine ranking.
 
The only way to make money off of this is by redirecting over to a ad generated page and then redirecting again to the final location, however not everyone will prefer this...yet who knows...
 
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