BL.INK offers a few different options to quickly see which content is currently trending through the analytics.
Viewing Individual Link Analytics
Once a link has been created, users may click on it to reveal individual link data. To see an individual link’s click data, start by logging in to BL.INK. Then click Links > My Links. Find the link in the list and click on the keyword.
From here, scroll down to the Click Analytics section to see clicks by hour, day, week, and the last 30 days. BL.INK also offers click data by geography, referral site, and even individual IP address.
Viewing Overall Analytics
For a higher-level view of link data, a good place to explore is the BL.INK Home Dashboard. This is the default view upon logging into the BL.INK account. The Dashboard default view is data from the last 7 days, but the filter function in the top navigation above the charts can be used to change the date range. Users can filter by date range, link owner, and tags.
NOTE:
Due to account permissions settings, not all users have access to view data for other users' links. Check with the account administrator to request broader access.
On the dashboard, users will also have quick access to Clicks, New Links, Conversions, Device Traffic, Trending links, and Recent Activity.
The Link Analytics Report
On the left navigation, click Analtyics, then select Overview. Here, users are able to see statistics for all links and filter by date, user, tags, and more.
The Device, Referrers, and Location links at the top of the Click Analytics box offer more in-depth information about where the traffic came from and what device visitors used to view a link.
The data is updated hourly and the default view shows the last 30 days for the top 10 links, but the filter menu can easily show more or less - or users can select a custom date range. Users can also filter by user (choose All Users to see whose links are ranking the highest in the organization as a whole), and by tag or keyword.
TIP:
Some customers prefer to export and import data to easily manage or alter large link volume. To Import or Export, click Links in the left navigation, then select Export or Import. For instuctions on importing links, click here. To read more about Exporting links, click here.
Resetting Clicks
Click counts can be reset for an individual link by going to the link's edit page. To do so, navigate to the menu on the left side of the dashboard and click Links, then select My Links.
Locate the link and then click the edit (pencil) icon to the right of the link.
At the bottom right of the page, click Reset Clicks.
For more information on click limits, and the options for when a link reaches the limit, check out this article.
How long does BLINK preserve my click data?
BL.INK keeps your data for the lifetime of your link. We will never delete click data without your explicit permission. If you have reached the click limit on your account, there are several options that we cover in this article.
As long as your links are active, and they have not reached the click limit, we will continue collecting click information.
Are previews counted as clicks in BLINK?
Currently, BLINK counts a link preview as a click. For example, if you share a link in an SMS message, and the end-user taps the link to preview it, it is counted as a click for both Android and iOS devices.
There are some key differences with how these clicks are reported from the different operating systems.
Link previews or prefetch clicks from an iOS device are reported the same way that a regular click is. But for a link preview or prefetch click from an Android device, the data shared from the device is from an Google IP address. BLINK uses the device's registered IP address to report general location analytics, which means that a preview click's location would be different than the end-user's location in the analytics.
These are some example IP addresses that are registered to Google:
- 64.233.172.132
- 66.102.7.108
- 66.102.7.96
- 66.102.7.97
- 66.102.9.68
- 66.102.9.69
- 66.102.9.70
- 66.249.83.40
- 66.249.83.41
- 66.249.83.42
- 66.249.93.68
- 66.249.93.69
- 66.249.93.70
- 74.125.212.228
- 74.125.212.229
- 74.125.212.230
- 74.125.213.41
- 74.125.213.42
- 74.125.213.43
NOTE:
This list is not exhaustive - there may be other examples of Google IP addresses that appear in your raw click data that are not included above. You may look up an IP address using an external IP lookup tool.
You may also see this snippet in the user agent string in your raw click data to help you identify Android preview clicks:
Google-PageRenderer Google (+https://developers.google.com/+/web/snipBL.INK Analytics vs. Other Platforms
It is common for customers to compare the clicks received from various sites and social networks to the clicks reported in BL.INK.
Analytics numbers from Facebook and Twitter could be higher or lower than what is reported in BL.INK. For example, some promoted tweets have much higher click numbers than BL.INK and normal tweets have fewer numbers.
First, it is important to know how those clicks are being counted. Facebook counts a "click" as any type of engagement (clicks, hover, like, profile view, etc.) so a "click" between Facebook and BL.INK isn't really an apples-to-apples comparison.
Twitter, Facebook, Google, and other platforms do not share their algorithm for click counting, so, unfortunately, BL.INK cannot speak to another company’s data reporting, but BL.INK can share how clicks are counted in our Analytics.
BL.INK stats are unfiltered and BL.INK reports every click that a link receives - with 4 exceptions (see below). BL.INK does not limit clicks based on unique clicks (though BLINK analytics do break down unique and total clicks for each individual link), application clicks, etc. The raw details are reported at the bottom of the individual link page so users can see the hostnames of each click.
Click Exceptions
The following types of traffic are removed to provide a clearer picture of human-generated stats.
1. Systems that self-identify as a "bot" (ex: googlebot)
2. IPs added to your Block IP list will be removed from your stats
3. Preview/pre-fetch clicks identified through HTTP headers
4. Clicks originating from known and published data center IP blocks (ie, AWS)
All other click traffic will be visible to users through BL.INK click analytics.
Many customers use BL.INK as a baseline to measure effectiveness on "common ground" across the various sites.
Since Facebook and Twitter both use different methods for counting clicks, it is hard to get a sense of how they truly compare to one another.
When using BL.INK for both sites, while the numbers will vary somewhat from their numbers, users can measure Facebook versus Twitter clicks within BL.INK with greater equality.
Need more explanation or have specific questions? Submit a ticket!