Add icons to wordpress menu - php

Question

I have some problems with Wordpress.. I tried to add icons from Wordpress -> Appearance -> Menu and it works but they are not clickable. I also want to remove the text from the menu icon and add it to "data-tooltip". And the last question is: How to add the menu item icons in a different element (not the "li" element) for example "span"?
My code should be:
<ul class="clear-list">
<li>
<span class="crt-icon crt-icon-home"></span>
</li>
<li>
<span class="crt-icon crt-icon-portfolio"></span>
</li>
<li>
<span class="crt-icon crt-icon-references"></span>
</li>
<li>
<span class="crt-icon crt-icon-contact"></span>
</li>
</ul>
But it actually looks like:
<ul id="menu-main-menu" class="clear-list">
<li id="menu-item-60" class="crt-icon crt-icon-home menu-item menu-item-type-post_type menu-item-object-page menu-item-home current-menu-item page_item page-item-7 current_page_item menu-item-60">Home
</li>
<li id="menu-item-55" class="menu-item menu-item-type-post_type menu-item-object-page menu-item-55">Experience
</li>
<li id="menu-item-54" class="menu-item menu-item-type-post_type menu-item-object-page menu-item-54">Portfolio
</li>
<li id="menu-item-58" class="menu-item menu-item-type-post_type menu-item-object-page menu-item-58">Testimonials
</li>
<li id="menu-item-53" class="menu-item menu-item-type-post_type menu-item-object-page menu-item-53">Contacts
</li>
</ul>
I hope you can help me! :)

Answer 1

Add icons: easiest way is to add icons via CSS.
You can to add class for each link in admin and to add icon as pseudo-element, for example if your icon is image:
.crt-icon a:after {
background: url(https://www.iconfinder.com/data/icons/ionicons/512/icon-ios7-contact-512.png);
background-size: cover;
content: '';
display: block;
height: 15px;
width: 15px;
}
If your icon is font-family - you can add it in 'content' CSS rule.
Add tooltip and remove text: you can do it with jquery:
$( '#menu-main-menu a' ).each( function () {
$( this ).attr( 'data-tooltip', $( this ).text() ).empty();
})