there’s a psychological benefit in forwarding and masking domain names — people are more likely to follow the link if they are not given the impression it’s a “hard sell” to buy something. When we see a link containing lots of letters and characters, most of us know its leading to a product — but if it is masked with a shorter domain name, it isn’t as obvious. If the person likes what you have written, if what you have written solves their problem, they are more likely to follow the link.

Jeanne