Bitly is a shortener, much like Campaigntrackly’s homegrown, free shortener, ctrly.io. Both platforms are able to preserve all your tracking utm tags. Here is a very quick animated GIF that shows you how this works in practice:
What Is ctrly.io, and Does It Preserve Your UTM Tags?
ctrly.io is CampaignTrackly’s homegrown, free URL shortener. It turns long tracking URLs into short, easy-to-share links while keeping your UTM tags intact.
How does it work?
When you shorten a URL, ctrly.io keeps the full destination URL—including its tracking parameters. Anyone clicking the short link is redirected to that destination with the UTM tags still attached.
For example, this tracking URL:
https://example.com/sale?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=autumn
could become a short link like https://ctrly.io/abc123 (illustrative example). Your UTM tags aren’t visible in the short link, but they remain part of the destination URL, allowing your website analytics to identify the campaign traffic.
How do I shorten a tracking link?
- Add your UTM tags to the destination URL.
- Visit ctrly.io, paste the complete tracking URL, and click Shorten.
- Copy your short link and share it.
You can also automatically shorten links as you build your tracking URLs in CampaignTrackly.
See it in action
Try CampaignTrackly for free or learn more about our shortener that also offers branded domains, click analytics, QR codes, and bio pages.
