Bit.ly up the game as Goo.gl chases fast

The war is on and the kiddy gloves are off. With the increased success of URL shortening sites such as Bit.ly (the year’s fastest growing website) and Tiny, the big boys have decided to join the party.

It’s no surprise really, with the increase of Twittering and other social networking activities more people are sending shortened URLs. To keep up with the trends both Facebook and Google have launched their own URL shortening sites, Goo.gl and FB.me.

Google who have launched their version in direct competition to Bit.ly say they have done it to provide us with the 3 s’s: Stability, Security, Speed. Now call us cynical, but we’re sure it has nothing to do with knocking Bit.ly of its success perch!!

While Goo.gl is only providing this service, at present, either through their toolbar or Feedburner, Bit.ly is plodding along and quietly keeping a grip of the market.

In retaliation to Google , Bit.ly have upped their own game and releasing a new service called bit.ly Pro. As a company this holds much more allure as it allows publishers to personalise URLS and send out branded domain names such as cite.ptr. And we don’t have to take Bit.ly’s word that people are linking through because the’ve kindly added a analytics dashboard that will show realtime stats of the total number of clickthroughs, geographic location and referring sites – which is a nice flourish.

You get the feeling that the war is only just beginning, and at a time when it should be a season of goodwill and sharing the love.