Enterprise Link Management: To Build or To Buy?

We regularly work with clients weighing the option of building a link management solution in-house or outsourcing the project to an established third party. The BL.INK platform was built to meet the many needs, different requirements, and evolving use cases of our variety of clients across many different markets and business models. 

In several cases, our customers built a solution internally and have been restricted by their current options for years. A switch to BL.INK gives them more features, endless integrations, and greater flexibility and control – and often at a reduced price.

So, we’ve put together a checklist of things to consider when making the choice between building or buying a link management platform.

Room for Growth

When weighing the pros and cons of in-house link management, it’s important to consider that a link management tool must scale in capacity to meet the growing business needs.

Scaling includes multiple users, team collaboration, and supporting the growing needs of a distributed organization. Scaling also means an active roadmap and continual evolution of our product to deliver new and valuable features.

With BL.INK, our plan options are designed to provide endless options and configurations allowing BL.INK to scale with your business for years to come. 

Taking Ownership

Another important consideration when deciding whether to build or buy your link shortening solution is who owns the project? Is the person or team responsible for building the system going to be around and available to make updates and manage the system built later down the line? 

Is this the best use of the time and resources it takes to maintain an in-house link management system? If using an open-source baseline, do they have time to maintain patches and upgrades and keep the system tuned?

When buying a link management system like BL.INK, we take care of it all. BL.INK has been in business since 2008 and has evolved to support many customers for over ten years of their evolving needs. You can count on us to be there to help maintain the platform and safeguard your links.

Out-of-the-Box and Custom Features

Keep in mind — as time goes on, your needs and use cases will evolve. The current scope of the link management system may change over time. Instead of relying on an in-house team to keep tabs on the ever-changing trends of the short link landscape, let BL.INK take the wheel.

We’re always keeping a pulse on the evolving needs of our clients, and adding new features to BL.INK all the time. 

If you have a use case not met by current features, we’re happy to dive in and help you solve the problem at hand. We love hearing your feedback and working in partnership with our clients to make short links and link management a breeze!

Ease of Integration with External Marketing and Engineering Tools

BL.INK was built for the Enterprise — keeping in mind that our clients often use a suite of tools and platforms to help make their lives easier. We’ve made it a priority to offer native integrations with other applications, like Sprinklr, Khoros, Zapier, and more.

Additionally, our API is incredibly robust, and we’re always looking for new partners! Our goal is to provide easier integration with evolving marketing and engineering stacks. If there’s a particular integration you need, feel free to reach out — we’d love to chat more!

Eyes on the Prize

Internal solutions may detract from core competencies and more value-added technology that is core to your company’s strategy.

When using BL.INK, you can trust that your needs come first. Your team can focus on the task at hand, and we’ll handle what we’re best at — maintaining and managing your URL shortening experience.

Flexibility for Multi-User Teams and Brands Across Organizations

BL.INK is designed to meet the needs of multiple teams and business cases that can expand and evolve to allow adoption across the entire organization rather than solving single-use challenges. We’ve built multi-user and multi-brand functionality right into BL.INK’s DNA. 

Time is Money

When choosing to build a link shortening platform in-house, you must factor in the time it takes to build it, scale it, test it, and support it. 

If you’re planning to outsource your link management platform to BL.INK, we are always ready to help you grow. The platform is ready immediately and can be deployed promptly to avoid wasted opportunity costs or a lengthy time-to-market.

More Money, More Problems

Another major factor to consider is cost. Ultimately, it’s frequently more cost-effective to outsource link management to BL.INK, especially when you factor in features like API capabilities, security, redundancy, maintenance, evolution, and time. Let BL.INK do the heavy lifting.

Support at your Fingertips

And last, but certainly not least, BL.INK supports every aspect of our platform and ensures that all users and interested parties are well supported and represented in the fabric of our platform. It’s not another function that internal teams must learn, support, and maintain.

Interested in learning more? Request a quote today!