Should I avoid links in the first cold email?

Not as an absolute rule. One link to your own established domain is fine and is what any normal business email looks like. The advice to avoid links entirely is an over-correction to a real problem — that the WRONG kind of link genuinely does hurt. A shortened URL, a shared tracking redirect, or a link to a brand-new domain with no reputation are the actual risks, not the existence of a link.

Do URL shorteners like bit.ly hurt deliverability?

Yes, and this one is well supported. Shorteners hide the destination, and the shared domains are used heavily by spammers, so filters treat them with suspicion regardless of where your particular link goes. Never use one in cold email. If you need a short link, host it on your own subdomain.

Does link tracking hurt deliverability?

It can, depending on how it is implemented. Click tracking rewrites your link to pass through a tracking domain first. If that tracking domain is shared across every customer of your sending tool, you inherit the reputation of everyone else using it. A custom tracking domain on your own subdomain avoids that, and most sending platforms support one — it is usually a DNS record and ten minutes.

How many links are too many in a cold email?

One is safe, two is usually fine, and beyond that you start to look like a newsletter rather than a personal message. The ratio matters more than the count: several links in a sixty-word email is a stronger spam signal than the same links in a long newsletter the recipient subscribed to.

If I can't link, how do I drive registrations for a webinar?

Ask for interest first and send the link in the reply. That is not just a deliverability workaround — a reply is a positive engagement signal that helps reputation, and someone who asked for the link is far more likely to attend. If you do link directly, make it one link to your own domain with a custom tracking subdomain.

Do Links in Cold Email Hurt Deliverability? Separating Rule from Folklore

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Someone on r/Coldemailing asked a question that exposes how much folklore is in this space: if the first email shouldn’t contain links due to deliverability concerns, how do you drive webinar registrations?

The premise deserves examining before the question gets answered, because the rule is mostly wrong — but it is an over-correction to something real.

Do links in cold email hurt deliverability?

Factor	Real risk	Why
URL shortener (bit.ly, tinyurl)	High	Hides the destination; shared domains heavily abused by spammers
Shared tracking redirect	High	You inherit the reputation of every other customer on that domain
Link to a brand-new domain	Medium	No reputation reads as suspicious, same as a new sending domain
Several links in a short email	Medium	Link-to-text ratio looks like bulk mail, not a personal note
One link to your established domain	Low	This is what a normal business email looks like

Read that list again and notice the pattern: none of the real risks is “a link exists.” Every one of them is about which domain and how many.

Where the folklore came from

The “no links in email one” rule is a reasonable heuristic that got flattened into a law. It originated because the risky cases above are common — people do use bit.ly, sending tools do default to shared tracking domains, and cold senders do link to brand-new domains they bought last week. Telling someone “never link” prevents all of those mistakes at once.

It also costs you the thing you were emailing about. A rule that reliably prevents conversions is an expensive way to avoid a problem you could just fix.

How should you use links in a cold email?

One link, to your own established domain. Not the new sending domain you bought for outreach — your real site, the one with history.
Never use a public URL shortener. This one is close to absolute.
Use a custom tracking domain. If your sending tool rewrites links for click tracking, point it at your own subdomain (go.yourdomain.com) rather than the platform’s shared one. It is usually one DNS record and ten minutes, and it is the highest-value fix on this list.
Watch the link-to-text ratio. Three links in sixty words looks like bulk mail. The same three in a long newsletter does not.
Never link to a domain you would not want associated with your reputation — including free file hosts and redirect services.

How do you drive signups without a link in the first email?

For the original question — driving registrations without torching deliverability — the best answer is not a workaround, it is a better sequence:

Ask for interest in email one. Send the link in the reply.

This wins twice. The deliverability risk in the cold email drops to zero, and a reply is a strong positive engagement signal that actively helps your sending reputation — the opposite of what a click on a tracked link does for you. You also get a far more qualified registrant, because they asked.

If you do want to link directly: one link, your own domain, custom tracking subdomain, and no shortener.

How do you test whether your links are a problem?

Content-based spam risk is measurable, so measure it instead of following rules of thumb. Paste your actual message into the spam checker — it scores the message the way a filter would and names what it objects to, including link-related signals.

And keep the proportions in mind: links are a minor content signal. Domain reputation is what actually burns domains, and authentication problems outrank both. Check SPF, DKIM and DMARC before optimising a hyperlink.