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App Guides

Link Shortener

Turn long URLs into short, branded /l/<slug> links with automatic UTM tracking and click analytics, all inside Aidelly.

When you post a link, two things happen badly by default:

  1. The full URL is ugly and eats up your character budget (especially on X).
  2. You have no idea who clicked it, from which post, or how often.

Link Shortener fixes both. It turns any URL into a short aidelly.ai/l/<slug> link, automatically adds UTM tags so your analytics tools see the source, and reports clicks back to you per link.

This guide walks you through:

  1. Shortening a URL inside a post
  2. Creating a manual short link for sharing outside Aidelly
  3. Reading the click analytics
  4. Editing where an old link points (without breaking it)

Before you start

Nothing to install or configure. Link Shortener is on for every workspace by default.

If you're on a custom domain (white-label), short links use that domain instead of aidelly.ai. Otherwise they use the default.

Step 1 — Shorten a URL inside a post

The easiest path is to let Aidelly shorten automatically while you write.

  1. Open Create Post (or any composer in Aidelly).
  2. Paste a long URL into the caption.
  3. Aidelly detects the URL and offers a one-click Shorten action above the input.
  4. Click Shorten.
  5. The long URL is replaced with the short version. Original URL is preserved in the link metadata.
  6. Continue writing the rest of your caption normally.

Why this matters on X: a post with any URL costs 22 AI Credits (vs 2 for a plain post) because X charges a premium for links. The short link still triggers that — but it gives you the click data the premium otherwise wouldn't.

Step 2 — Create a manual short link

For links you'll share outside Aidelly (email, slides, in person), make one manually.

  1. Open the Tools menu in the left sidebar.
  2. Click Link Shortener.
  3. In the Create short link panel, paste the long URL in the Target URL field.
  4. (Optional) Add a Source platform tag — e.g. email-newsletter, keynote — so you can filter analytics later.
  5. Click Create.
  6. The new short URL appears in the list above. Click the copy icon to grab it.

Step 3 — Read the click analytics

Each short link tracks its own clicks.

  1. Open the Link Shortener page.
  2. Each row shows: the slug, the destination URL, total clicks, and last clicked time.
  3. Click any row to open the detail panel with a click-over-time chart, top referrers, and a per-day breakdown.
  4. Toggle Active only at the top to hide deactivated links.

For campaign-level rollups, the clicks also feed into Analytics so you can see them alongside post engagement.

Step 4 — Change where a link points (without breaking it)

This is the killer feature short links give you that bare URLs can't.

  1. Open the link's row in the Link Shortener page.
  2. Click Edit destination.
  3. Paste the new target URL.
  4. Click Save.
  5. Every old post and every old slide that used this short link now redirects to the new destination. Click history stays intact.

Real-world use: you tweeted a link to a sign-up form. The form is now closed. Edit the destination to point at a waitlist page instead, and every old tweet quietly does the right thing.

Step 5 — Deactivate a link

When you don't want a link to work anymore (campaign over, sale ended):

  1. Open the link's row.
  2. Toggle Active off.
  3. The short URL now returns a 410 (gone) instead of redirecting. Click history is preserved for analytics.

Common pitfalls

  • My short link returns 404. It's been deactivated. Toggle it back to Active in the link row.
  • The link didn't shorten automatically in the composer. That's only enabled for certain platforms (where short links materially help). You can still create the link manually from the Tools menu and paste it in.
  • The UTM tags aren't showing up in my analytics tool. Some tools strip UTM params. Confirm the destination URL still has the ?utm_source=... suffix when you preview it.
  • The click count looks low for a popular post. Some clients pre-fetch links (Slack, iMessage previews). These don't always count as real clicks — Aidelly de-dupes obvious bot/preview traffic.

What to do next

  • Use short links inside your Link in Bio blocks for per-link analytics
  • Pair with Analytics to see clicks alongside post engagement
  • For multi-account campaigns, set the source platform field so each row is filterable

Link in Bio

Build a branded one-page hub for every link you share from social bios, with an in-app editor, automatic brand styling, and click analytics.

Analytics

See what's actually working across your connected accounts — by platform, by post, over time — and turn the patterns into your next content plan.