Many bloggers are more than proficient with tools like newsletters, social media, and targeted advertising to increase their blog’s reach. However, most haven’t heard about blog hop – one of the most powerful free tools to increase blog reach.
What are blog hops and how can you use them to build your online presence?
In this article, we’ll walk you through everything you need to know about blog hops – what are they, what are they good for, and how to set up a successful blog hop.
Let’s start by defining what a blog hop is and move on from there.
What Are Blog Hops?
Blog hops, also known as blog link-ups or link parties, are online networking events hosted by bloggers and blogging communities. The primary goal is to connect bloggers in a niche and to share their audience with other bloggers.
Put plainly, blog hops allow you to visit other blog websites, discover new blogs, build relationships with other bloggers in your niche, and gain followers.
The main reason why you should participate in these types of events is to grow your blog traffic.
How does Blog Hop work?
There are many types of blog hops. Some are one-time events such as the Cheerful Love Blog Hop. This blog hos is hosted by Sixth Street Sundries to celebrate the release of their latest honey bee stamps.
Most blog hops are not a one-time thing. For instance, Author Toolbox Blog Hop organized a monthly blog hop until 2021 – currently, it’s on an indefinite hiatus.
No matter how frequently they happen, all blog hops work the same way – bloggers sign up to post something related to a specific topic during a specific period of time. The topic is usually something broad, like personal experiences in a specific industry. This way there is a little chance people will post the same thing,
Bloggers then write their posts and publish them. Once the blogs are published, the blogger will send the link to the post to the blog hop organizer. The organizer will then post the links to the posts on a single article or on a static blog hop page. Everyone who participated in the blog hop will then read the articles other bloggers posted and leave comments.
Some blog hops can also have some specific rules. For instance, the organizer may require bloggers to share every post in the hop.
Blog hops are usually organized with their own hashtag and social media posts. What’s more, the organizer may require you to include a small blurb about the blog hop in your article. This blurb serves as both the promotion for the blog hop and as a way for you to promote yourself to other content creators and their audiences.
Blog hops can include additional guidelines such as who can enter. For instance, you might need to be involved in a certain profession to be able to enter. Another popular guideline is the word count. Most blog hops will ask participants to limit their posts to a certain number of words. This guideline makes it easier for the readers to go through the entire blog hop and not end up reading just one article.
Are Blog Hops Worth Your While?
So, are blog hops worthwhile? Of course, they are. They’re an excellent way for your posts to get comments, and comments serve as social proof. If you participate in a blog hop you are guaranteed to get some comments.
If you’re a small blogger your blogs are probably getting little to no comments. In that case, participating in a blog hop will be a huge boost to audience count.
Blog hops are also an excellent opportunity for you to develop relationships with other bloggers in your niche. Later, you can work on collaborations with other bloggers and further expand your audience.
If you’re running a newsletter, these events are also a nice way to increase your subscriber count. Who knows, if some of the bigger creators like your newsletter they might promote it on their social media and take it to another level.
These events are one of the best ways to breathe new life into your blog and a way for you to become a part of a global blogging community related to your niche.
What Type Of Blog Works Best For Blog Hops?
Blog hops work for just about any type of blog. However, they work best for blogs that have a more personal feel to them. This is because they’re designed to connect with individual bloggers.
If you write your blog from your point of view, it will let people know what type of person is behind the blog. If your blog is written from a third-person view, the lack of personality might drive readers away.
How To Find A Blog Hop?
Unfortunately, there is no directory that lists blog hops for each niche. This means you’ll have to do some research.
The first thing you can do is get in contact with other bloggers in your niche and see if they know about any blog hops. If there aren’t any blog hops in your niche, you can try and organize one yourself. More about how you can organize a successful blog hop later in the article.
If contacting other bloggers didn’t bear any fruit you can always try Google. Type in “blog hops” + “your specific niche” and see what comes up.
Some blog hops are organized so that they coincide with a specific event and are invitation only. If you stumble on such a blog hop you can try and find a sign up for or contact the organizer directly and see if they can include you. Just be sure to have some example work on hand so they can get to a decision more quickly.
If nothing above worked for you, that might be a sign that blog hops don’t work that well for your niche. Don’t let that get you down, there are plenty of other ways you can promote your blog.
How To Join a Blog Hop?
Every blog hop has its own set of guidelines and rules. Some are invite-only, and some are more open. What most blog hops share in common is that they all rely on Google Forms for sign-ups.
You’ll have to enter your email address and your name, your blog’s name and its URL, and the topic of your blog post. Google Forms make it easy for the admin to add your info to a list and keep it updated as the blog hop develops.
How To Get The Most Out Of Every Blog Hop?
Participants in blog hops are required to check out your post and leave a comment. However, they are not required to visit your blog and subscribe to your newsletter.
If you want to make the most out of the blog hop, you need to make sure you’re producing high-quality content readers will enjoy reading. What this means for you is that you need to choose a valuable topic, edit your article, and track its success so you can figure out what works and what doesn’t.
Don’t rely on the number of comments you get. Track your post in Google Analytics so you get a sense of how the audience is interacting with the content.
How To Organize A Successful Blog Hop
Now that you’re well versed in what are blog hops and what are they good for, it’s time to learn how you can organize one yourself.
Have A Couple Of Co-Hosts
As many blog hop organizers will tell you, organizing this type of event alone can be pretty taxing. You need to keep in contact with participants, take care of the design of the static page, and generally make sure everything is running smoothly. Organizing a blog hop alone once or twice is perfectly okay, but if you’re planning on making it a regular thing – you will lose a lot of sleep.
By having co-hosts, your blog hop will appear on other blogs and expose you to a broader scope of content creators.
Pick A Specific Date And Time
If you’re planning on making your blog hop a regular thing, you need to set a specific day and time when it will go live. Participants will appreciate that greatly.
Find A Link-Up Tool
To be able to host a link-up on your WordPress website, you’ll need a link-up tool. We recommend you give InLinkz a try. The service is very stable and affordable. Yes, there is a minor cost associated with displaying links on your WordPress website, but it’s more than worth it.
Keep The Rules Minimal
There are quite a few blog hops out there that require you to follow the host’s social media, tweet about the hop, visit other posts, and share your thoughts about them. This is way too many rules if you ask us. We recommend you keep the rules as minimal and loose as possible.
For instance, you can make following the host’s social media a potential term. You can also encourage people to visit other bloggers but not mandate it. As for the content itself, you should only require it is family-friendly.
By limiting the number of rules, you’ll attract more bloggers to your hop by giving them more freedom to do what they want.
Select A Hashtag
Before launching a blog hop you need to research and come up with a unique hashtag. Thanks to the hashtag, you’ll have a much easier time tracking social media shares and it will allow participants to let their audiences know how to find other posts from the hop.
Design A Simple, Eyecatching Blog Badge
A blog hop badge is there to advertise your hop. Make sure you have one so other bloggers can grab it if they want to promote your blog hop on their sites.
As for the design, we recommend you keep the design similar to your blog hop’s brand. You also need to make sure to include the day when the hop is going live on the badge.
Once you’re done with the design of the badge, you have to create a grab code so the participants and your followers can grab it and share it on their websites.
To create a Grab Code Button you need to first upload the badge image to your media library. Then you need to go to Themes -> Widgets and find the text widget in the list of widgets. Then you need to drag and drop it to where you want it to appear in the sidebar. Once you’re done with that, you need to add the following code:
Switch the example.com href to the URL to your blog hop badge, and you’re done. You can find a more detailed tutorial on how to add a grab button here.
Don’t Forget To Include a Click To Tweet Prompt
We recommend you include a click-to-tweet prompt on every hop. This way visitors can easily prompt your blog hop on Twitter. Just make sure to include your Twitter handle and the hashtag of the hop so you get notified whenever someone shares an article from the hop.
Create Blog Hop Template
Design a template for your blog hop that you can use week after week. This way you’ll save hours of time.
We recommend you keep the design clean and simple. The link-up section of the blog hop will look a bit overwhelming, so you need to keep the rest of the hop as easy on the eyes as possible.
Create An Incentive So People Come Back
The whole purpose of blog hops is to meet with other bloggers in your niche. Still, you need to have some kind of incentive if you want people to return each week to your hop.
You have total freedom when it comes to this. For instance, you can feature the top three top viewed blogs from last week. If you use InLinkz, you’ll be able to see how many views each post racked up so you can easily pick the top three posts.
You can also share the most-viewed posts on your social media.
Another thing you can try out is to encourage participants to share a post they liked the most.
Promote Your Blog Hop
Don’t forget to promote your blog hop on all your social media. Bloggers can sometimes forget about your link party. If you set a reminder on your Facebook page, that will serve as an excellent reminder for them to come and join your hop.
