Just the other day I gave Google’s URL shortener a try. Worked just fine, of course, but I
was struck by a nice little detail. In the list of URLs you’ve shortened, there’s a column
that shows how many times the URL has been clicked and a little graph that shows clicks
over time:

In the past I used bit.ly. Now, bit.ly gathers and presents the same data, but I never noticed.
Why? Because instead of just showing you the data on the front page like Goo.gl does, they
hide it behind a rather cryptic “Info Page+” link. There is a column title that makes sense
(“Real-time stats”) but it’s light gray and hard to read:

On the few occasions when I actually navigate to a URL shortener site, I tend to be in the middle
of a process—sending a link to someone, posting a link somewhere, etc. In other words, I’m in
there to do a job and get out. So if a service has a neat feature they want me to pay attention to,
they’d be smart to make it obvious.