Before the Paparazzi ~ Week 5 ~ Homemaker On a Dime

When is the right time to hold a link party?

So you want to hold your very own linky party. Congratulations for reaching this milestone! But before you proceed, here's a word of caution. Blog party is not for the faint of heart. It's both time-consuming and rewarding at the same time.

How do you know when you're ready? Definitely it's not when you reach a high number of followers, and definitely not when you have a lot of posts published already. You are ready when you're willing to work hard to make your blog party a success.

Ok, you're willing to work hard and put in the hours required to make your blog party a success. The next crucial step is to identify your goal as to why you're holding a link party. Is it because you want to meet other excellent bloggers? Or is it to increase your audience to showcase your creative projects? Or is it to increase your followers? Once you've identified your goal, you now have a way of measuring your party's success. So what are the next steps after identifying your goal? This brings us to the following:

3 Things You Need Before Hosting Your Link Party

1) Have your party button ready. You can either make it yourself using free graphics and personalizing it using picnik.com, or you can hire somebody to make one for you. Plan well on how your party button will look like because it is your link party's brand.

2) Choose your link party tool. If you want to know vital stats such as how many views each linking post gets, then Inlinkz is the way to go. Inlinkz also offers free text link ups. If you want details on the reasons why <a href="http://www.homemakeronadime.com/2011/04/inlinkz-as-link-party-tool-totally.html">Inlinkz as a link party tool totally rocks</a>, please check out the post.

3) Invite, invite, invite. Remember that participants in your link party won't just magically appear - they have to be informed that you've got this awesome party that they'll benefit from. I've seen a lot of blog parties that died a slow death simply because no one came (or because the host just got burned out). You might think it's a shameful self-promotion when you invite others to join your party but remember that if it's for the good of many, then go for it. How do you invite them? Definitely visit each blog one by one and tell them. If you apply the <a href="http://www.homemakeronadime.com/2011/03/etiquette-in-sending-invites-to-your.html">etiquette in sending invites to your linky party</a>, you'll have a high success rate of positive responses, and will eventually have higher number of party participants. You can also email the friends that you've made throughout your blogging career and 100% of the time, they'll support you.

Now that you've started your party, if you're just starting as a host, it's a good idea to respond to people asap and spend time visiting their linked project to thank them for joining your party. It's also important as a host to <a href="http://www.homemakeronadime.com/2011/02/is-your-blog-sociable.html">make your blog sociable</a>, meaning, make commenting on your blog easier by turning off your word verification and being not a "no-reply blogger."

The whole point of the party is to have fun so just enjoy, relax, and learn creative ideas from your party guests. Occasionally, you'll get some critical emails cloaked as "suggestions for improvement" but don't let these deter you from enjoying the party. I started my first blog party in January this year, and I've enjoyed it ever since. Hope you'll have fun, too!

Don't for get to stop by Hyphen Interiors, Kristy's guest poster this week is from.