Accessible if no plugin?

Hello@flatword

Hope you are doing well.

At this moment you need to have a WordPress environment use the BetterLinks plugin.

However could you please explain with a real life example with a real URL what you are trying to achieve so that I could have better understanding of your enquiry and I will try my best to provide assistance

Hope you understand

I understand. I didn’t think there was a way but I wanted to check.

On the Godadday website, I have a footer link to another website. I want to add UTM parameters to that link but I don’t want them visible if someone hovers over the link. So I thought of BetterLink since I use that in many other sites.

Thank you

Hello again,

Can you use the site where BetterLinks installed?

You can create your target website’s short link with the UTM using BetterLinks and then use the short link on the footer of your non WordPress website.

This way when the hover over your footer link they can only see your short link which was created by BetterLinks

Is this something you’re trying to achieve?

Let me know your thoughts

I can? I thought the definition of the short link is resolved at the site that has the link. But you are saying the link I create in any site is usable by any other site?

Let’s say the Godaddy site is called JoseWorld.com and it has a link in the footer to Agency.com.

Currently the link to Agency.com looks something like this:

https://agency.com?utm_source=xxx&utm_medium=yyy

If I had WordPress and BetterLink in the JoseWorld.com, the betterLink would be a link like this https://JoseWorld.com/go/agency, correct?

So if I add a BetterLink in the Agency.com, it would be a link like this https://Agency.com/go/agency, and I could use that in any site even if that site was not WordPress and had no BetterLink installed? If so, where does the value link get resolved?

I see now that I can do that after all. Thanks.

Perhaps I stated a bad example. That one works fine because the person hovering over the footer in the origin site will see a url of the destination site so they won’t think it’s a problem.

But say I have a button in the google business profile of company Acme.com. I want that button to have UTM parameters but use a BetterLink. And assume that Acme.com is hosted on a non-wordpress site so they do not have BetterLink. If I create a BetterLink from another WP site called Rockets.com, then the url someone sees when hovering over the Website button in the Google Business Profile for Acme.com will show a url with the domain Rocket.com. That is not acceptable. So that is the problem I was trying to see if there’s some workaround.

For instance, is there a way to not force the BetterLink to start with the domain of the WP site that the plugin is installed?

Also, can you explain how/where the BetterLink is resolved? Does BetterLink immediately update DNS servers so that the link is usable anywhere in the world instantly? My tests show the links are available right after I create them.

Thank you

• This reply was modified 5 months, 3 weeks ago by flatword.

Hello again @flatword,

Now I can understand your inquiry properly, thanks for the details.

Actually, what you are asking for is called Custom Domain support. With that, you can use an external custom domain that you own inside BetterLinks to create short links using the custom domain.

That feature is not available at this moment, but the good news is it’s in development and should be available very soon keep an eye out here : https://betterlinks.io/changelog/.

Regarding your other questions, BetterLinks does not immediately update DNS servers. Instead, it works by creating short links that redirect to your original URL with UTM parameters. These links are usable right after you create them because the redirection happens on the BetterLinks installed server side, not through DNS updates. This means there is no propagation delay, and the links are available instantly anywhere in the world.

Best regards,
Pial

Thank you for that info. If you think of it, reply to this post once that feature is available.

As for how this works, if I create a betterlink and then copy and paste it in a browser, it works. But how does that link know to first go to the betterlink server for redirection?

And then at some point the links are updated on DNS servers so that if the BetterLink server is not working, the links created via BetterLink will keep working forever?

Hello @flatword,

You’re welcome! I’ll be sure to update you once the custom domain feature becomes available.

Regarding how BetterLinks works:

1. Redirection Process: When you create a BetterLink, it generates a short URL that points to the WordPress site where BetterLinks is installed. When someone clicks on that short URL, their browser sends a request to the server hosting that WordPress site. The server then processes the request and redirects the user to the original URL with the UTM parameters appended.
2. DNS and Link Persistence: BetterLinks does not update DNS servers with the short links. Instead, the short link always points to the server where the WordPress site with BetterLinks is hosted. This means that as long as your WordPress site’s BetterLinks Plugin is operational, the redirection will work seamlessly. If your WordPress site is down, the short links will not work because the redirection logic is handled By the BetterLinks on your server. Currently, there is no built-in mechanism in BetterLinks to ensure the links work independently of your server. The short links rely on your site’s infrastructure using BetterLinks to resolve and redirect to the final destination.

Hope it makes sense.

Best regards,
Pial

Thank you