If you have seen more and more people talking about ‘su.pr‘ and you have no idea what they are talking about, StumbleUpon has decided to jump into the URL shortening game.

Following in the footsteps of Digg’s recent release of the DiggBar, StumbleUpon has released what has to be one of the most feature filled shorteners to date.

With everything from tracking shortened urls, viewing stats for how much traffic StumbleUpon sends to a given site, Twitter and Facebook integration, and much more, Su.pr is really living up to it’s name.

The service is still invite only, but there are a few invite codes floating around that will get you into the program. You can try ‘suprrww’, which worked for me. (Thanks Michael Farley)

Once you link up your StumbleUpon account, you are ready to get started. There are a ton of options with Su.pr, so lets look at each one.

URL shortening:

The first aspect is the core of the service, which is creating a Su.pr shortened url.

You will notice right off that integration with Twitter and Facebook was really important for StumbleUpon, which is smart as most people are looking for url shorteners for use within Twitter mainly.

Jump into your settings and give Su.pr permission to post to Twitter and Facebook, but it is not required to use the shortening service, which can be initiated with the ‘Just Shorten’ button.

Another cool aspect, as you can see, is the ability to schedule your message for a later time and day.

Lastly, and possibly the coolest, is that Su.pr offers a bookmarklet that not only shortens any page that you are currently on, but also has a drop down box that allows you to also post to Twitter and Facebook.

Using the Shortened URL:

Edit: Brian Chappell mentioned in the comments, which I just checked as well, and it appears the Su.pr links are now using 301 redirects.

This is possibly the only spot where StumbleUpon seems to have failed. After all the slack that Digg got over the way their DiggBar handled redirects, you would think they would not make the same mistake… but they did.

Even though they claim they handle redirects in a way that is SEO friendly, Danny Sullivan quickly pointed out that they are actually 302 redirecting instead of the prefered 301.

However, you will notice that there is an option in Settings, under promoted sites, for the ability to use ‘SEO Friendly Redirect’.

Not sure what this coming feature will include, or if it will apply only to the sites you have entered into the ‘promoted sites’ section.

Another major problem is that it iframes all users, logged in or out, which has also been a huge complaint amongst webmasters.

I am sure StumbleUpon will fix this, but Brian Wallace pointed out that the toolbar and the Su.pr links don’t play nice together. If you try to use the toolbar to Stumble a Su.pr link, it will take you to an error page.

Promoting Websites:

Marketers and webmasters will probably love the ability to add up to 3 sites you want to promote in your settings, which will then be displayed on the right sidebar of the iframed Su.pr pages.

Visitors will see your most popular content from the sites you entered in your settings to promote, along with how many views from StumbleUpon each article has received and the total views that the Su.pr has currently received.

The part that users may not like about the promoted content on the right sidebar, is that it is not necessarily related to the current page they are on.

Stats:

One of the biggest aspects people have been searching for in a good shortening service is the stats it provides… and Su.pr has loads of stats.

From the main page of your Su.pr profile, you are given a pretty basic dashboard view of the most recent Su.pr links you have created.

Clicking on the ‘View Stats’ link below any of the Su.pr links will give you a much more in depth look at the URL’s stats.

Not only do you get the number of clicks and the referrer type for people using the Su.pr links, but you also get stats on all of the following aspects:

• Views from StumbleUpon members, which is located right below the Clicks count
• Number of Retweets the link received and the actual Retweets near the bottom of the page
• Number of StumbleUpon Reviews the link has received
• The ability to download all the stats in a CSV file
• View clicks for the current day, the week, and over the last 30 days
• See your top traffic sources
• See the users who liked your page on StumbleUpon

Additional stats available from the main page of your Su.pr account include the following:

All clicks to all Su.pr links and suggested posting time

If you click on the display for either of the above stats from the main page, it will take you to a more detailed stats page. It also has a field called ‘Your followers on Twitter’, which I am guessing is going to show how many clicks are coming from your Twitter followers specifically.

Promoted Websites Stats

Clicking the display will take you to a more in depth stats page.

One interesting point about the ‘promoted websites’ stats, is that you do not have to be logged into an account or be the owner of the site to see the stats.

Just use the following URL structure to see the stats for any page you like: http://su.pr/report/domain/yoursite.com/

Want to stay on top of some of the coming features and changes? Then check out the Su.pr support forum here: http://stumbleupon.uservoice.com/pages/17634-general?lang=en

You can already see they have started on the API and allowing people to search through their Su.pr links. It appears a feature that would allow you to enter an RSS feed and have it automatically send the Su.pr link for new posts to Twitter and Facebook is also under review.

Did I miss anything? Please comment below if you have something else to add or some thoughts to share.