I’ll introduce reasons why shortened URLs should be avoided for internal sharing because they have too many disadvantages.

Disadvantages of shortened URLs

Shortened URLs are often used internally, but I’ve listed the disadvantages since there are many:

• You don't know what site it is until you open the URL
• It takes extra time to display because of redirection
• It's unclear how long the URL will remain accessible
• Searching for the original URL doesn't return hits in internal tools (Gmail, Slack, etc.)
• Various services (Gmail, Slack, Trello) don't expand the URL nicely

Advantages of shortened URLs

Personally, I see only disadvantages, so unless there are benefits like:

• Want to show a shorter URL to users (for printed materials, etc.)
• Want to track click counts

I think it’s better to stop using shortened URLs randomly for internal purposes.

URL shortening services can end at any time

Google announced that it will terminate its URL shortening service goo.gl on March 30, 2019, and we don’t know when Bitly might end its service either.

When URL shortening services terminate, we’ll be the ones troubled by dead links everywhere, so it’s wise to stop sharing shortened URLs indiscriminately.

That’s all from the Gemba where I’m evangelizing that using shortened URLs for internal sharing is full of disadvantages.