As you discover more about WordPress, you may occasionally come across something called a blogroll.

A blogroll is a list of links pointing to external websites or web pages displayed on your sidebar area.

According to official WordPress documentation …

“The term ‘blogroll’ was originally used because it was a list of links to other blogs, but you can include links to any sites.”

The Links feature lets you add a links section to a widget-ready theme.

Prior to the release of WP v3.5, Links were a built-in feature of the WordPress CMS. After the release of v 3.5, the Links manager and blogroll sections were kept hidden by default in new installations …

Before …

(WP Links Menu – pre v 3.5)

After …

(The Links Manager – excluded from WordPress after WordPress version 3.5)

If you have had an earlier version of WordPress than 3.5 installed and updated your installation, then the Links Manager would be removed, unless you have previously used it. If you’ve never used Links Manager, however, or if your site installation is new, then this function will become invisible – you won’t see it on the menu.

 

How To Add A Link Section To WordPress

You can add a link section to your sidebar menu by creating a custom menu, or use a plugin like the one shown in the tutorial below.

If you can’t see the Links Manager section when you log into your WP admin area you will need to install a plugin. This tutorial will show you how to add and manage blogroll links on your site’s sidebar using WordPress plugins.

Link Manager

(Link Manager Plugin)

Download URL

http://wordpress.org/plugins/link-manager

Plugin Description

You can use this plugin to display the Links feature on your dashboard, even if you update WordPress to a later version or remove all of your existing links.

Note: All this plugin does is add a single line of code to WordPress to restore the hidden feature. When we last checked, the plugin had not been updated for some time, but it should still work fine. If you don’t want to use this plugin, then use the plugin below instead, or contact us for help editing your site’s template code.

Simple Links

(Simple Links Plugin)

Download URL

https://wordpress.org/plugins/simple-links/

Description Of Plugin

Simple Links attempts to recreate the same concept as the built-in WP Links Manager while removing the shortcomings of the deprecated functionality.

How To Install Link Manager

To install the Link Manager plugin on your site, do the following:

From the WP admin area, go to Plugins > Add New …

(Plugins Menu – Add New)

Click on the Install Plugins > Search tab, then type in “link manager” into the search field and hit Enter …

Find the plugin in the search results screen and click Install Now …

Activate the plugin after installing it …

After activation, the ‘Links’ function is restored to the navigation menu area …

(WordPress links menu)

Plugin Configuration

We recommend setting up link categories first before you start adding any new links. This way, you can assign any new links to link categories you have already created.

Link Categories

To create a link category, go to your WP navigation menu and select Links > Link Categories …

(WordPress Links Menu – Link Categories)

This brings up the ‘Link Categories’ page.

Enter information into the following fields:

• Name: What you enter in this field is the link category name that will display on your site.
• Slug: The slug is the search-engine friendly URL bit of your link category name. It must be in lowercase letters and contain no spaces (use hyphens to separate words).
• Description: Some themes may display a link category description. (Optional)

When done, click the Add New Link Category button to save your new link category name …

(Link Categories page)

Your new category will now show in the list …

(Link Categories area)

Tip: Blogroll is the default link category name. Unless you specify the category when adding a new link, WordPress will assign new links to the default category …

(Default link category)

You may want to change this default WordPress link category name to something that will make sense to your visitors. This not only makes it easier for users of your site, but any new links that you add to the Links section will automatically appear under the new category name …

(Consider changing the default link category name to something better suited to your business)

To change the ‘Blogroll’ link title, hover your mouse over the item and click on the Quick Edit link …

(Quick Edit)

Change both the Name and the Slug with a new category name (remember to keep the slug in lowercase letters and replace all spaces with a hyphen), then click on the Update link Category button …

(Quick Edit)

In our example, the link category name ‘Blogroll’ has been replaced with a more suitable category name (e.g. ‘Recommended’).

Let’s add a description for this link category. To add a description to an existing link category, click on Edit under the category name …

(Link category description)

Enter your link category description field and click Update finished to save your settings …

(Edit Link Category page)

Repeat this process to add as many link categories as your site requires.

Once you have set up your link categories, you can being adding new links.

How To Add Links

To add a new link, choose Links > Add New in the main navigation menu …

(Links Menu – Add New)

This loads the Add New Link’ screen in your browser …

(Add New Link screen)

You can also access this screen by clicking on ’Add New’ in the main Links page …

(Links – Add New Link button)

The ‘Add New Links’ page includes a number of sections:

Name, Web Address & Description

The first section lets you enter details about your link …

(Name, Web Address& Description – Add New Link)

Enter the following information:

• Name: What you enter in this field will display as the category your links will be assigned to.
• Slug: The slug is the web address part of your link category. Use lowercase letters only and do not include spaces (use hyphens to separate words).
• Description: Some themes may display a link category description in the links section, or as a tool tip when visitors hover over the link name with their mouse.

Categories & Target

Select a Category and Target for the link …

(Categories & Target – Add New Link)

In the Categories section, tick one of the link categories you have already added, or click on the ‘+ Add New Category’ link to create a new category.

Next, select a target frame radio button for your link in the Target section. This lets you specify where your link should open when clicked on by visitors:

• _blank means that when visitors click on the link, a new window will open up in their web browser to display the content for that link. This lets your visitors see the link information without leaving your website
• _none means that when visitors click on the link, they will exit your site and a new site or page will load in your web browser window instead.
• _top opens the link at the top level of the frame system if you’re using frames. If you don’t use frames, or if you don’t know what frames are, then ignore this option.

Link Relationship XFN

This area provides some additional link functionality …

(Link Relationship (XFN))

Link Relationship (XFN) – XFN (XML Friends Network) lets you define your relationship with the linked person. For example, if you have a professional relationship with Matilda Silva and you link to her blog, you would probably tick co-worker or colleague.

XFN relationships are optional for WordPress links. You can ignore this section and all your links will work just fine. Defining relationships with XFN makes your links more understandable to some websites and search engines that use this information.

rel – This field lets you specify the ‘rel’ attribute that will be assigned to your link. The rel attribute defines what relationship exists between the current document and the linked document. For example, if you don’t want search engines to follow your link, enter nofollow into this field. Other ‘rel’ attributes include author, index, help, start, etc. Separate multiple ‘rel’ keywords with spaces.

You can learn more about XFN by visiting the site below:

• WordPress Codex: Defining Relationships With XFN

Advanced

The last section allows you to specify Advanced features for your links (some themes will ignore this. You can leave the fields in this section empty unless there’s a good reason to use them) …

(Advanced fields)

The Advanced link settings section contains the following:

• Image Address: Specify an image to be displayed with the link. To use this feature, add the URL of your image and make sure that your image is small (around 16×16 like a favicon).
• RSS Address: If your theme allows it, the RSS feed associated with the link can be displayed next to your links.
• Notes: This section lets you add notes for your own internal reference.
• Rating: You can add a rating score to the link if you want to sort links by rating (see the ‘Links’ widget section below).

Enter information into the above fields or just leave this section blank, as these fields are not essential for links to work.

When you have finished adding your new link information, click on the Add Link button to update your link settings …

(Click on Add Link to update your link settings)

Note: If you select the checkbox next to Keep this link private, the link will not be visible in your Links section …

(Make your links private)

Making links private lets you toggle link visibility on and off without deleting these (this is useful if you want to use seasonal links) …

(Making links private toggles their visibility on and off)

To see all the links you have added to the Link Manager, go to your dashboard menu and click on Links > All Links …

(Links – All Links)

You will be taken to the ‘Links’ page. The table of links displays all your links and link information (e.g. URL, link categories, rating, etc.) …

(Links screen)

Tip: To view or hide information in the Links table, click on the ‘Screen Options’ tab near the top of the screen …

(List of links – Screen Options)

Display/hide information on your Links table by ticking/unticking their check boxes …

(Table of links – Hide or display screen options)

Editing Links

To modify a link in the Link Manager, go to the WP dashboard navigation menu and click on Links > All Links to bring up the links screen …

(WP Links Menu – All Links)

Locate the item you want to edit and click on Edit to bring up the link’s information …

(Editing your links)

Make the changes you want to the link …

(Edit Link screen)

After editing your link, you can:

• Click on Update Link to save your link details,
• Click on Visit Link to see your link and make sure that you have set up its URL correctly (your link will open in a new window),
• Click Delete to delete the link if it’s no longer required …

(Update Link button)

Removing Links

To remove a link, go to the navigation menu and select Links > All Links …

(WordPress Links – All Links)

This takes you to the ‘Links’ page.

You can delete links individually, delete multiple links, or remove all links.

To delete links individually, hover your mouse cursor over the link title that you want to remove from the link table and click Delete …

(Deleting links)

To delete multiple links, either tick the checkbox next to every item that you would like removed, or select all links by clicking on the checkbox next to the ‘Name’ column header …

(Delete multiple links)

Select Delete from the ‘Bulk Actions’ pull-down menu, and click the Apply button to delete your selected links …

(Links: bulk-delete function)

Your selected links will be deleted …

(Deleted links notice)

Plugin Usage

Now that you know how to set up link categories and how to add, edit and delete links, it’s time to make links display on your website.

Links Widget

The Links Manager plugin adds a ‘Links’ widget to your ‘Widgets’ page.

To access and configure your Link widgets, go to your WP navigation menu and select Appearance > Widgets …

(Appearance – Widgets)

This brings up the ‘Widgets’ page.

You will see a ‘Links’ widget in the Available Widgets section …

(Links widget)

Drag the ‘Links’ widget to one of the active widget sections in the Widgets screen and drop it wherever you would like your links to display …

(Add a links widget to your widget bar using drag and drop)

The Links widget offers various options. You can specify what information you want displayed about your links and how many links you want displayed on your sidebar menu …

(Link widget options)

You can add as many link widgets to your sidebar and footer as you want. This allows you to create and feature a number of different link lists throughout your site …

(You can add multiple link widgets to your sidebar)

Select a link category to display links for a specific category …

(Link widget options – Select Link Category)

You can sort links by Link rating, Link title, Link ID, or display links in Random order …

(Link widget settings – Sort by options)

After setting up the Links widget, click Save to update your settings. Your links will now appear on your sidebar …

(Links can be displayed on a sidebar)

As the above example shows, you can display specific links to your site visitors (e.g. a list for a specific link category only), and add multiple lists of links to your sidebar menu.

Need help using widgets? Go here to learn more about widgets:

• Using WordPress Widgets

Link Manager – Additional Information

If you have many links, the Links Manager plugin allows you to easily administer these using sort, search, and filter functionality.

Sorting Links Function

To sort links, hover your cursor over the title of the column you want to sort and click on the little triangle displayed next to the column title …

(Sort links)

Finding Links

Type a search term into the search field and click the Search Links button to search for links …

(Search links)

Filter Links Function

You can filter links by categories …

(Filter your links by category)

You can also search and filter links in the Link Categories screen. Use the ‘Search Link Categories’ button to find link categories, or click on the category links in the ‘Links’ column …

(searching and filtering links in the Link Categories page)

This brings up a list of all links listed under a specific link category …

(Links filtered by category)

Additional Link Options

If you plan to add a lot of links to your website, or if you want to add a ‘Links’ page to your site (i.e. not just add links on your sidebar), then you may want to look at using a plugin that can help you administer links.

Link Library

(Link Library Plugin)

Plugin Download URL

http://wordpress.org/plugins/link-library/

Plugin Description

Link Library lets you output a list of your link categories and a complete list of all your links together with notes and descriptions …

(List of links created with Link library. Screenshot taken from Link Library plugin documentation.)

Link Library creates a page on your website that contains a list of all of the link categories in your Links area, and all links listed in these categories. Additionally, you can select a sub-set of categories to display or not display, show only one category at a time, display a search box and find results based on visitor queries, display a form to accept user submissions that can be moderated by a site administrator, and even generate an RSS feed of your link collection so that your site users can be made aware of any additions made to to your link library.

Visit the plugin site to learn more about using this plugin:

• Link Library Plugin For WordPress

Congratulations! Now you know how to add a link section to WordPress.

We have written a detailed article on creating HTML hyperlinks in your WordPress content. Go here to learn more about this:

• How To Use The Internal Linking Tool In WordPress

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