What is a Link Expander?

Have you ever wondered: Where does this link go? The link expander follows the path of the URL. It will show you the full redirection path of URLs, shortened links, or tiny URLs. This sort of service is also referred to as a URL expander, link checker, URL checker, redirect checker, link tracker, URL tracker, redirect tracer, link follower, 301 redirect checker, redirect tracker, URL tester, and so on.

When the link expander traces a link, the results display all the links that you are being redirected through including php redirects, htaccess redirects, NGINX redirects, JavaScript redirects and meta-refreshes eventually leading you to the final destination. Learn about 301 redirects here.

Why use this redirect link checker?

This redirect trace tool allows lets you troubleshoot links issues and perform competitive intelligence in a way that wasn't possible before.

Troubleshooting Redirect Issues

This tool is like a link redirect detective that will follow your URLs and help you diagnose complex linking problems. As you migrate your website or rename URLs on your website, you need to forward that old URL address to a new URL address. It is best to test your URLs to ensure they go to the correct places and do not encounter an HTTP 404 error along the way. Keep in mind, if you end up creating redirect chains, any error encountered during the redirect process could prevent the user from reaching the final destination.

SEO Redirect Chains

If you are an SEO expert, you are continually looking to increase your website’s rankings. Google’s core algorithm is based on how websites link to each other. Link influence (PageRank) is passed when someone links to your site, but that influence has historically been diluted with redirect chains. By making your redirects as direct as possible, you are ensuring that your website is getting as much PageRank as possible. This, like many other SEO topics, is a controversial debate. Nevertheless, from a business risk perspective, the more redirects involved in the process of getting to your website, the more opportunities exists for that chain to become broken, thus losing all of the PageRank influence and traffic. If a search engine crawls a link that redirects and breaks due to an error, the page will eventually lose rankings or be delisted.

Affiliate Link Tracking

If you are an affiliate marketer, then you likely use short links or tiny URLs to mask or shorten your links for social media platforms and other websites. If one of your redirects break then your affiliate income for that particular URL ceases. Grabify Link Expander can help you with check your affiliate links to ensure they are redirecting to the correct places.

Tiny URL Expander

If you want to know where a tiny link goes, then you can also use Grabify Link Expander. It will show you exactly where that tiny URL goes and the full path of it. This is great to use if you are unsure where the link will take you or you want to see what affiliates are involved in the redirection process.

Cutting Out Middle-Men Affiliates

As an affiliate marketer, you want to keep your profit margins as high as possible. To do this, you need to cut out all the middle-men affiliates. The Grabify Link Expander will show you all the affiliates involved in the link redirection process. To get the path to the affiliate, look at the final destination. The link directly before it would be the real affiliate program. Everything else is getting a piece of the affiliate revenue. So, trace all your current affiliate programs and make sure you are signed up directly with the source, not a sub-affiliate program, and you will make more money.