What is a “linky” or a “blog hop”? 
A linky/blog hop is when you go to a certain blog that is hosting the “linky” and link up your Blog by entering your blog URL to it; You will find a list of other blogs that have also posted and you can visit them all, leave comments and network. A blog hop is where those bloggers that have posted their URL also host a “linky” and you literally hop from one blog to another, leaving comments! A great networking concept and fabulous method to meet other bloggers.

Can I see an example of what a linky looks like? 
https://mummyconstant.com/the-yummy-mummy-blog-hop/ Check out my very own linky.

How to get a linky on my own blog?
Firstly you need to find one, I used: http://www.linkytools.com/. Sign up to the site and you will be taken to the dashboard, where you can create and edit your “linky”.

What do the settings mean? 
*based on the website above “linkytools“.

  1. List title – this is the name of what you want the linky to be called.
  2. Length of user – this is the number of people that can enter the linky, default value is 50.
  3. Column count – this is how many columns are displayed of blogs, once bloggers have started entering their details.
  4. Start date – when the linky tool is to start.
  5. Stop date – when the linky tool is to finish.
  6. List options –

Enable likes: this means that your readers can like a link entered
Likes options: choose an option based on how long you want the likes to continue
Is blog hop: this tells linky that it is a blog hop
Clicks open new window: this means that if people click on the URL then a new window will open and your blog stays in the background
Is private list: whether you want the linky to be private or public (readers can view the results or not)
Require approval: this means that you can review all entries before they are entered
List sort order: this is how the URL’s are displayed (oldest first or youngest first etc)
Email notifications: whether you want an email whenever a blogger adds a link
Gridlines on list: this is whether you want to display gridlines, to make the individual links stand out more
Show bible verse: this will show a bible verse on the linky
Scrolling window: this will display a scroll bar for the list if the list gets very long
Require email: bloggers will be required to enter their email address in order to post a link
Require name: bloggers will be required to enter their name in order to post a link
Require back link: this is a link that the blogger has to put on their blog, in order to post on your linky (its so that a blog hop can be possible)
Show in list directory: this will show your linky in their very own list directory for other people to see

Once you’ve edited the “linky” and set it up how you want it, you click the finished button at the bottom and you are taken to the dashboard. This is where you can get the code that needs pasting into your blog.

To post the code into your blog, you need to make sure that you are allowed to use Javascript in the posts, *Wordpress.com blogs will not work with this, but self-hosted WordPress blogs are fine.

In editing the post you get the visual option or the HTML option, type out your blog post in the visual mode, but when you need to paste the code you need to go to HTML. Paste it at the end of the text (you wont need to understand the HTML code then) and publish your post.

Preview your post to make sure it looks right and try the linky to make sure its working šŸ™‚

 

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Last Update: Thursday, 19th July 2018

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