Black Friday is designed to help businesses boost sales and end the year on a high note. But those sales don’t just happen on their own—you need the right strategy to maximize your sales this holiday season, starting with convenient, branded short links.
A short link is simply a shortened version of a website URL that’s easier to recognize and remember.
With Bitly’s shortened URLs, you can even customize the link with your brand name and a descriptive back-half so customers know exactly where it will take them. You can also track which offers and channels resonate with your audience to help you optimize future campaigns.
Here’s how you can use short links this Black Friday to share exclusive deals across social media platforms, emails, and SMS campaigns.
Note: The brands and examples discussed below were found during our online research for this article.
Benefits of using short links as part of your Black Friday marketing
As a business, you’re committed to standing out and increasing your sales during the Black Friday shopping event. Let’s explore how short links can elevate your marketing throughout this retail frenzy.
Simplify sharing across platforms
Short links make sharing promotional content on social media and emails easier. They also look cleaner and more professional than long URLs, making it easy for shoppers to click and find your products, coupons, and giveaways.
Custom, short URLs are also a big boost during the holiday shopping season. They can tell your audience who you are and what you’re offering with just a glance. Typically, a branded URL has your brand name and a custom back-half that hints at the content they’re about to see—giving shoppers the confidence to tap through to checkout.
So instead of:
yourbrand.com/black-friday-sales-page/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=holiday_sale&utm_content=ad1
You get:
your.brand/blackfriday
Track performance and engagement
Creating short links doesn’t end when you share—tracking and refining them are vital to helping them perform better over time. Performance metrics like total clicks and engagement reveal what’s working, helping you optimize your holiday campaigns.
With Bitly Analytics, you can monitor your short URLs’ engagement in real time and adjust them based on these insights to boost results.
For instance, if you notice that your Instagram post is getting many clicks but your email campaign is underperforming, you could make your subject line more engaging. Consider changing the placement of the link in the email to a more prominent spot, like in the first paragraph, to make it more visible.
Improve branding and trust
A unified branding experience builds brand trust and inspires more taps or clicks. With short links, you can keep your URLs consistent when you use a URL shortener like Bitly that allows you to set up custom domains.
With Bitly, you have the option to use the default bit.ly domain or use a custom domain that reflects your brand. This is an ideal way to build customer trust at a glance, as they can quickly assess the legitimacy of the link simply by looking at it. This familiarity makes your audience feel more secure, boosting your click-through rates (how often people open your link after seeing your ad).
Increase click-through rates (CTRs)
Short links, particularly branded ones, boost CTRs because people can easily associate them with your brand.
In addition, unlike long, generic URLs, branded links like your.brand/30offBlackFriday reiterate your offers and incentives so customers know what value you bring. Communicating where your link leads instills a level of trust and can make customers more likely to engage with them.
While Bitly Analytics offers plenty of insights into your link performance, you can combine it with another third-party tool like Google Analytics for an even more granular look at traffic and engagement.
Where should you include short links for Black Friday marketing?
This year, Black Friday shoppers in the U.S. will spend as much as $10.8 billion—$1 billion more than last year. So, this may be an excellent opportunity to incorporate short links to hit your sales targets. Here are some great places you can use short URLs to get more eyes on your best Black Friday offers:
Social media posts
Social media is an unrivaled channel for increased sales this holiday season. Sixty-eight percent of consumers keep up with brands on social media platforms, so this is an important avenue to leverage this holiday season.
Simply tie your links to Bitly Pages or landing pages with Black Friday/Cyber Monday (BFCM) promos and share them in your captions or bio. Links eliminate the hassle of manually navigating your website by taking customers straight to the page you want them to see.
Bitly Pages allow you to customize your landing pages and share them anywhere, so you can connect with potential customers wherever they are. When they open your link, they’ll be directed to your special Black Friday offers.
Pair your links with clear calls-to-action (CTAs) to guide customers and create a sense of urgency to make your audience tap your links instantly. Don’t hesitate to use hashtags to make your posts discoverable. Using hashtags like #BlackFridayDiscounts, #BlackFridayPromotions, or #BFCMOffers expands your reach.
Email marketing campaigns
Long URLs appear cluttered and unprofessional. Short links are the opposite—they are more professional-looking, keeping your Black Friday emails clean and concise. Uncluttered content has fewer distractions, allowing your subscribers to focus on those limited-time or early-access Black Friday deals.
Shortened links also make CTAs more appealing, increasing the likelihood that your target audience will take action. Because of their low character count, short URLs don’t detract from the CTA message. Instead, they support it by making the path to action easy to follow.
SMS campaigns
Shortened URLs can enhance your Black Friday SMS campaigns in multiple ways. First, their brevity makes it easier for customers to spot and read, encouraging them to engage.
When it comes to SMS messages, you have a character limit of 160, so keep them short and place the URLs prominently to drive quick action. Try messages like “Flash Sale! bit.ly/BlackFriday50” for a promo that gives customers a 50% discount on all sales this Black Friday.
Further, short URLs, particularly branded links, increase confidence since your audience knows you’re directing them to your page or another trusted site.
Paid advertising
Ads are key to grabbing attention when everyone is looking for deals this shopping season. Since paid ads have strict character limits, you must make your copy concise. Shortened links make it easy to fit your web address into your ad without taking up too much space.
Just like with QR Codes for Black Friday, you can track conversions with short URLs more accurately. Integrate short links into your pay-per-click (PPC) ads, Google ads, and social media ads to create a trackable path for customers. With tools like Bitly Analytics, you can monitor the number of visitors tapping your links and get engagement details by location and device.
Pair Bitly Analytics with tools like Google Analytics to get a bigger picture of your ad performance. This will help you determine which ads are most effective (and those that aren’t), enabling you to adjust spending based on return on investment (ROI).
Influencer collaborations
Influencer marketing could be the best opportunity to attract new, long-term customers this holiday season. When working with influencers, you can use branded short links to help you funnel their followers to your sales page. Whether they’re popping up in a TikTok bio or tucked in a video description, these URLs make it easy for fans to view your offers directly.
The icing on the cake? You can track total clicks with Bitly Analytics to measure their performance and make data-driven decisions in your future campaigns. For example, if you see an influencer’s post driving a high volume of clicks, consider allocating more budget to that influencer or similar ones.
If you notice a large number of clicks coming from a particular country or city, you can launch a localized campaign targeting that area to boost engagement and sales further.
Best practices for optimizing Black Friday short link performance
To get the most out of your Black Friday short links, you need to keep them performing at their best. Here are some tips on how to do just that.
Monitor performance in real-time to inform marketing strategy
Keeping tabs on short link clicks throughout your Black Friday campaign can give you the edge you need to stay ahead of the competition. Bitly Analytics dashboard allows you to track the number of clicks on each link received over time, so you can adjust your strategy based on real engagement data.
Here are examples of how these changes may look:
- If one or two links consistently outperform the others, take a look at what those links and/or messaging do differently. Did you use a different branding or formatting in the links themselves? Or did you try a different tone or style with the messaging? Take those insights and use them to optimize your other campaigns for consistent results across the board.
- If a link tied to one ad or email isn’t getting clicks, try tweaking the CTA to make it more compelling. Consider changing “Shop Now” to “Limited-Time Offer: 50% Off!” to add urgency, making visitors less likely to scroll past and more likely to open the link immediately.
- If most clicks come from one platform, say Instagram over LinkedIn, it’s a smart move to increase marketing efforts on the channel with more engagement. You may consider collaborating with more Instagram influencers, using Instagram ads, and posting more to boost brand visibility.
Tracking link performance in real time can help you enhance your marketing this upcoming season by revealing what’s working in your current strategy—so you can do it again and more effectively.
A/B testing for short link placement
If you want to improve customer experience and boost sales volume, A/B tests allow you to compare the performance of different links side-by-side to determine which links are performing best.
For example, you might experiment with different link placements—think in CTA buttons and social media bios or above the fold—to see when your links get the most clicks.
You can also test variations, like branded vs. generic URLs or different subject lines, to find which links are more engaging. Test one change at a time and combine these adjustments to optimize your links for increased conversion rates.
Combine short links with UTM parameters
UTM parameters are the bits of information added to a link that can help you understand visitors better.
A typical long URL with UTM parameters could look something like this:
bit.ly/BlackFridayDeals?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=black_friday_sale&utm_term=discount&utm_content=holiday_banner
- utm_source=facebook: Identifies that the traffic comes from Facebook
- utm_medium=social: Indicates that the link was shared through social media
- utm_campaign=black_friday_sale: Specifies that the link is part of your Black Friday sales promotion
- utm_term=discount: Identifies the keyword being targeted as “discount”
- utm_content=holiday_banner: Identifies that the link was used in a specific piece of content—in this case, a holiday banner ad
Adding UTM parameters to your short links helps you get deeper insights into the effectiveness of your channels and traffic sources. This information allows you to determine which social media platforms drive the most traffic to your site and most successfully convert visitors into customers.
With Bitly, you can easily add parameters to your links within the Bitly Connections Platform. This feature is cost-effective and minimizes human error from manual data entry.
Keep the tags clear and consistent for easy tracking in analytics tools like Google Analytics—this way, you’ll know the source of each traffic. To test how your UTMs will appear at the end of your link, try Google’s Campaign URL Builder.
Use Bitly Links to share your Black Friday deals this year
The holidays are here, and ecommerce businesses (including yours) want to seize every chance to make a sale this Black Friday. Short links drive engagement, help customers find special offers quickly, and provide insights to improve future marketing campaigns. For best results, you should use a URL shortener to easily create effective links.
With Bitly’s tools, you can create branded short links and monitor their performance in real time. Bitly’s Analytics Dashboard gives insights into link performance—clicks over time, top-performing clicks, and engagement by location and device—to help you understand your target demographics better. You can use this information to personalize your Black Friday marketing and increase your sales.
Ready to boost your sales this Black Friday with shortened URLs? Sign up for Bitly today!
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