14 DAY TRIAL // Goo.gl, the URL shortening service from Google can now filter users based on their device, redirecting users to the appropriate mobile app or the default Web-based version of your site.
This feature only works if the mobile app has been properly setup following Google's App Indexing recommendations, a feature that lets Google's search engine crawl and index mobile applications.
The App Indexing service is currently available for Android apps and iOS devices (in a limited release), and it has been powering Google Search for quite a while, allowing users to open a mobile app from their results page, instead of using a browser.
The same feature is now available for Goo.gl links, enabling developers to control where their users go based on the devices they're using.
Even if App Indexing is available in a limited release and does not currently open iOS apps from Google search results pages, the deep-linking feature will work as intended for all goo.gl shortened URLs regardless of the user's platform.
Users will open links based on their underlying platforms, inside a mobile app or a browser
This update can be of quite some importance if properly integrated with social sharing toolkits, allowing developers to filter traffic to the appropriate platforms.
Controlling what features should be best accessed via the mobile app and which through the browser may seem trivial at a first glance, but they can help users save bandwidth on their mobile subscriptions by not loading much bulkier interfaces designed for large screens in the first place.
This is irrelevant for large services and apps like Google Maps, YouTube, SoundCloud, and the rest, where appropriate mobile versions are delivered even through a mobile browser. Unfortunately, not all hybrid mobile-Web apps implement similar systems, nor do they have the development resources of the aforementioned companies.