One link, the right screen
A short link that opens your iOS or Android app at the screen the campaign is about, falls back to the store or the web as you choose, and sends everyone else to your web page.
On Starter, Pro and BusinessRegister the app once
In Settings › Mobile apps. For iOS, the app's URL scheme and its App Store link; for Android, the package name, the URL scheme and the Play Store link. One record holds both.
Point a link into it
On the link's Routing tab: the app, a path such as /offers/autumn, and where a phone without the app goes, the store listing or
your web page.
Read it in the same numbers
The click is counted before the phone is sent on, with its country, device and system, so app traffic sits in the link's analytics beside every other click.
What a tap does
The order every deep link follows. Nothing about the phone is guessed before the click is counted.
- 1TapSomeone taps go.northwind.com/autumn on a phone.
- 2ChecksSafety, status, dates and password, as for any link. A flagged or disabled link stops here.
- 3RoutingTargeting rules and A/B variants pick the web destination, as they always do.
- 4CountedThe click is recorded: country, device, system, referrer. Then the phone is sent on.
Android
An
intent:// redirect. Chrome opens the app at /offers/autumn, or the fallback when the app is not installed.
iPhone
A one-tap page: Open in the app, or Continue without it to the fallback.
Everyone else
The web destination, as usual, after the link's pixels if it has any.
Open in the app
go.northwind.com/autumn opens in its app when you have it.
Short links by Brevily · Report this link
Set it per link
Three fields: the app, the path, the fallback. The console has them on the link's Routing tab, the API at the same route, and the app records live in Settings › Mobile apps. Sending no app removes the deep link.
What the API doesapp Northwind (iOS and Android)
path /offers/autumn
fallback the App Store or Play Store page
What actually happens on a phone
The parts that catch people out, written down rather than found in production.
Android
An intent:// redirect. Chrome opens the app at the path; without the app it
follows the fallback, the Play Store listing or your web page.
The Android record needs a URL scheme: without one, Android
visitors get the web page. Some apps' built-in browsers do not
follow an intent:// address.
iPhone
A one-tap page on the short link's own domain: Open in the app, or Continue without it. iOS will not open an app's URL scheme without a tap, so the page is always shown. Without the app, Continue without it is the way on.
No association files
Brevily does not publish apple-app-site-association or assetlinks.json on your domain. With them the system would open the app before
the short link loads, and the click would never be counted.
One click, counted once
The click is counted at the tap, with one first-party cookie on the short link’s domain, like any other. Whether the app then opened is not recorded: your store and app analytics know that.
After an install
On Android, a Play Store fallback carries the link's path as the install referrer, so the app can open that screen on its first launch, and on a Starter, Pro and Business link with conversion tracking the click too. On iPhone it is not possible: the App Store carries nothing to a fresh install, which opens at its start screen.
Small print
A path starts with /, up to 1,024 characters, no spaces. Switching an app off sends every link
into it to the web. On a plan without deep links the setting
stays but is not used.
Deep links come with Starter, Pro and Business
Starter is $19 a month, Pro $59 and Business $199, in USD. Dodo Payments, the merchant of record, adds any tax at checkout.