Edit, edit and edit again.
21 Feb
Public service announcement
If you write something for others to read, be sure it makes sense. Simple enough, right? Apparently not, based on the frequent spelling, grammar and other errors I see in professional communications. What prompted this post, in fact, was a poorly written blog post. When I saw a tweet linking to a story about networking for bloggers, I thought it sounded interesting. Within 5 seconds of reading the post, however, I was hit by a glaring error in a subhead. Can you spot it?
Does your email address professional? Ugh. I stopped reading and started writing this.
My response to that blog post is a great example of how small errors can cost you big time. Looking for a job and have a spelling error in your cover letter? Trash. Emailing your customers about a new product and use the same adjective three times in one paragraph? Delete. Promoting an event and put the wrong date on the poster? Shit. And yes, I’ve seen each of these happen in real life. Small errors may seem innocuous but they can give readers the impression you don’t care, aren’t professional, or lack intelligence.
Making mistakes is human. Allowing others to see them is just plain lazy. There is no reason to publish or send anything full of errors. Had the author of the above blog post simply re-read what she wrote, she likely would have noticed (and fixed) that subhead. She could have been even more confident in the quality of the post had she sought editing help from someone else.
Having a second set of eyes read your writing will delay publishing or sending by only a few minutes. And it costs nothing if you ask a friend. (Be sure it’s someone you can trust to edit well—an English major perhaps, or that person who finds mistakes in everything she reads.) For important messages, particularly those that represent a company to its customers, spend a few dollars and hire a professional proofreader. You might be surprised how inexpensive and rewarding this can be.
End public service announcement.
