The best content marketing includes engaging narratives that sell your company without you laying down a sales pitch. These pieces are informative and useful. Readers share this content to engage their own audiences and increase their own credibility on a subject.
However, even the most ingenious piece of writing can be undone by a wayward apostrophe or misspelled name. Don’t believe us? Sit tight. In this post, we’ll share the most important proofreading questions to ask yourself. We’ve also included the consequences of what happens when you don’t follow these rules.
The reality is that if you create content marketing, you’re also a proofreader. It’s not the most glamorous task but it sits among the most important ones.
1. Have you spelled your company’s name correctly? Check the text and all graphics.
No really. Some companies’ names are prone to auto-correct mishaps. I’ve even had it happen to me at Pressboard. My phone autocorrected Pressboard to “press board.” It was a close catch!
Case in point: HotDocs is a company that produces document generation software. This software is meant to find typos in all your documents. The irony in this typo is excruciating.
Case in point: Valley News owned up to their mistake, which is great, but you don’t want your audience laughing at you just as you’re smirking at this image. It undermines your authority.
2. Have you spelled all names correctly? Double check the spellings of your co-workers and their professional titles.
You might have an easy going supervisor, but he’s not going to be impressed if you misspell his name in a press release. Is it Johnathan or Jonathan? Here’s a sneakier one: Is it a Project Manger or a Project Manager? Manger and manager are both words, so spell check programs won’t catch this.
For some people, titles are an important part of their professional identities. Save you and your co-workers embarrassment by double checking before you push send.
Case in point: Australia’s Parliament House learned that it’s important to double check the spelling of the US President’s name. Sure, you might not know that it is spelled “Barack Obama” with one r. Who will notice though? Barack Obama!
3. Do you know your homophones? Learn them.
Homophones are words with identical pronunciation but different meanings and spellings. The difference might be obvious for some words such as “night” and “knight”, but many are not. Spell checker likely won’t catch it either.
Case in point: Attention to detail is important with eyeglasses. This sign for Top Specs is not demonstrating this quality.
4. Do you know your possessives?
Festival’s or festivals? Mostly commonly, the difference between a possessive noun and a plural noun is that devilish apostrophe. Before you add an apostrophe, make sure that noun is possessive. Are there multiple festivals or is it the festival’s VIP pass?
Case in point: This Yahoo News mistake is easy to understand because there is only one Batman. This means it must be a possessive (proper) noun.
5. Does this piece make sense? Read the piece aloud.
This is the easiest way to find out if the piece contains any awkward sentences or words. Reading your own work aloud forces you to slow down and find awkward elements in the piece.
Case in point: Whybutwhy.com has a great example of a nonsensical sentence. No one wants to read that sentence. Content marketing should contain writing that is easy to understand. Don’t make it difficult for the reader. He’ll quickly lose interest.
Do you trust a company that can’t be bothered to check for spelling mistakes? Maybe, but you will question the author’s ability to write. If you’re in the communication business then attention to detail truly matters.
Yes, it’s best to avoid dangling modifiers, but those aren’t the most egregious errors. You might spend hours researching every word in your piece without much gain. Correct spelling and basic grammar goes a long way to adding credibility to your authority on a subject. When in doubt, double check.
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Hope you enjoyed the read.
If you liked this post check out Rosie’s tips on Setting Blog Guidelines
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