M-ini.me

The Problem

I build my own apps and promote them myself, and I kept hitting the same wall with every link shortener I tried. None of them accepted international payments from where I live, so upgrading past the free tier simply wasn't possible. And the free tiers were painfully limited: a handful of links, 'basic' analytics that stopped at a raw click count, short retention windows, and no way to export my own data. I couldn't see where my clicks were coming from, which channel was actually working, or who my audience really was. Those were the exact questions I needed answered to promote my apps without wasting a small budget.

What I Built

So I built the tool I couldn't buy. M-ini.me shortens links and generates QR codes, then tracks every click with geographic, device, browser, and referrer breakdowns, giving me the audience insight I was missing. Links group into campaigns so I can compare channels side by side, and everything is exportable, so the data is genuinely mine. It ships with a real free tier (100 links), honestly-priced paid plans for people in the same position I was in, and a RESTful API with webhooks for programmatic use.

• Owned the analytics pipeline end to end, so every click is logged server-side with location, device, browser, and referrer, instead of leaning on a third party.

• Shipped a genuinely usable free tier of 100 links so the tool stays accessible to people locked out of paid plans, exactly like I was.

• Made data portable from day one with exports and a REST API, so no user ever feels as trapped as I did.

• Priced for reality with a 6.99 USD Starter tier that someone running small campaigns can actually afford.

• Split the fast redirect path from the dashboard so link resolution stays instant even while analytics are being processed in the background.

• Treated campaigns as a first-class concept rather than a tag, so channel-by-channel performance is obvious at a glance.

Results & Live Status

M-ini.me is live and in daily use: 10,000+ links shortened, 1,000+ active users, and traffic from 110+ countries at 99.9% uptime. A typical 90-day window moves roughly 24,000 clicks and 18,000 unique visitors with full geographic and device breakdowns, the exact reporting I originally went looking for and couldn't buy. It now runs on a free-plus-paid model with Starter and Pro tiers, serving marketers through the dashboard and developers through the API.