← Insights
Their, there or they're? Comma or no comma? Grammar rules and proofreading are daunting for even confident writers, and for less confident ones the worry can keep them from starting at all.
A friend of mine wanted to write a blog about her work behind the scenes in the sports industry. Every time she sat down, she got tangled in the technicalities, got frustrated and abandoned the draft before the story was told. What she needed was to forget the rights and wrongs and just write. She was too worried about how she would fix the copy afterward.
Sound familiar? It is a common problem, and many people give up with "I can't write." The truth is they usually can, and often very well. They just need help editing. Behind every good writer is a good editor, someone with a grasp of style and grammar and an eye for the things the writer cannot see anymore.
For my friend, that person was me. I offered to clean up a few posts and help her launch. A year later her blog was thriving. All it took was for her to be brave enough to let someone mark up her work.
Every writer needs a second set of eyes.
Writing is personal, and it is uncomfortable to hand your words to someone whose job is to find the errors. As a writer, the worst feeling is getting a document back covered in red. But once the panic passes, every one of those marks makes the piece stronger and more readable, and readers appreciate every error the editor caught.
Here is my own example. Early in my PR career I was asked to write an article about a client's customer whose crews and equipment were working on the Crazy Horse Memorial. I researched and wrote and researched and wrote, and finally had a 2,000-word labor of love about that very special mountain craving in South Dakota.
Did you catch it? Mountains do not have cravings. They have carvings. Every single reference in the article said craving. Spell check never blinked. Thank goodness for the agency's copy editor, who, after she stopped laughing, helped me fix it before it went to the magazine.
Two decades later that typo still haunts me, and it is why nothing I write goes out without at least one other person proofing it. My editors have caught mistakes that would have been very embarrassing in print.
Whatever kind of writer you are, do not go it alone. Find someone willing to read your copy and give honest feedback about how to make it stronger. You will learn a great deal and your readers will notice the difference.
Need an editor and do not know who to ask? Todd and I are a message away on our ‣ page.