There is some confusion about linking a site or video on Facebook and Twitter, the two most commonly used social media sites.
Often, people will put links there, but they have to be copied, then pasted into a browser to work.
We're all really lazy online, and don't want to copy and paste, so usually, no one will visit your site or link if you do that.
Others try to put the whole HTML code in, which just makes it all look cumbersome and scary.
It is fairly easy to do it correctly, but a couple of hints will help.
The simplest rule to remember is, just make sure the web address you post has all these elements:
So, instead of typing in the actual site address, they just type "go see My Fancy New Website"! So, if the site you're linking to your fancy new website, which is called "My Fancy New Website", and the address is fancywebsite.
com, no one will be able to click on it to get to your site unless it says "http://fancywebsite.
com".
If it has a www.
in the name, that's fine, as long as you still keep the "http://" at the beginning and the.
com at the end.
If you want them to go to a specific page within your website, you can, of course, add more after the.
com part.
The program won't make it a link until you hit the space key.
So if you want to send people to"http://fancywebsite.
com/funnypost/" it will wait for you to type the whole thing before making it a "Live" link.
This also works in most word processing programs like MS Word, OpenOffice and WordPerfect.
Yes, adding that bit at the beginning does take up precious characters in your allotted 140 in Twitter, but if no one gets to your site, those extra 6 characters you saved by leaving it out don't really do much for you.
When you make sure the whole thing is there, you're helping your lazy readers and followers actually get to your site, so you're helping yourself by getting all those wonderful visitors.
Not bad for typing a few extra letters!
Often, people will put links there, but they have to be copied, then pasted into a browser to work.
We're all really lazy online, and don't want to copy and paste, so usually, no one will visit your site or link if you do that.
Others try to put the whole HTML code in, which just makes it all look cumbersome and scary.
It is fairly easy to do it correctly, but a couple of hints will help.
The simplest rule to remember is, just make sure the web address you post has all these elements:
- The domain name.
That's fairly obvious, and most people do that correctly, but leave out: - The "http://" bit.
This is actually the most important thing, and the one that most people leave out or type incorrectly.
It's actually the bit that most of those sites look for to see if they need to make it into a link. - The "top level" domain.
This is the.
com or.
net or.
org at the end of the address.
As long as you have the http and the top level domain, as soon as the program behind the social media site sees them, it will turn it into a link as soon as you've done typing the whole thing.
So, instead of typing in the actual site address, they just type "go see My Fancy New Website"! So, if the site you're linking to your fancy new website, which is called "My Fancy New Website", and the address is fancywebsite.
com, no one will be able to click on it to get to your site unless it says "http://fancywebsite.
com".
If it has a www.
in the name, that's fine, as long as you still keep the "http://" at the beginning and the.
com at the end.
If you want them to go to a specific page within your website, you can, of course, add more after the.
com part.
The program won't make it a link until you hit the space key.
So if you want to send people to"http://fancywebsite.
com/funnypost/" it will wait for you to type the whole thing before making it a "Live" link.
This also works in most word processing programs like MS Word, OpenOffice and WordPerfect.
Yes, adding that bit at the beginning does take up precious characters in your allotted 140 in Twitter, but if no one gets to your site, those extra 6 characters you saved by leaving it out don't really do much for you.
When you make sure the whole thing is there, you're helping your lazy readers and followers actually get to your site, so you're helping yourself by getting all those wonderful visitors.
Not bad for typing a few extra letters!