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Tips in manually proofreading your own SEO content writing
Posted on May 21, 2014
When you’re doing SEO content writing and publishing by yourself (whether by choice, or due to budget constraints), proofreading can be quite tricky. For starters, you don’t have the benefit of another set of eyes to see some important details you were not able to catch yourself when you scan your work.
However, spotting basic errors nowadays is aided by various programs like Word and Open Office which should be convenient for a writer and thus one is expected to avoid errors. Manual proofreading then is employed to check critical errors or details that your computer program can’t identify.
While scanning your own work for errors can certainly be quite difficult, it’s never impossible. With a little practice, you’ll be able to establish your own no-fail solo proofreading system. Here are a few tips to get you started:
1. Know the grammar basics. It’s a must for any web content writer. Publish an article dripping with grammatical and typographical errors and you lose your credibility as a writer and content marketer. If it helps, brush up on your grammar basics before attempting to proofread. There are vast learning resources you can find online.
2. Set your work aside for a couple of minutes and grab a cup of coffee. Better yet, if you don’t have a deadline to beat, let it sit for a day or two before you start spot checking your work. This “reboots” your eyes, which can help you notice errors and details you may have overlooked before.
3. Check website URL’s. If you’re publishing blogs or SEO content with links to outside sources, it’s best to make sure that links aren’t broken or misleading readers to the wrong website.
4. Print it and read aloud. For reasons yet to be determined, printing and reading your article aloud gives you a different perspective on your content, which can help you spot mistakes or weed out words and phrases which may not sound right. But this only works if you have a printer ready and lots of paper to spare.
Remember that in spot checking your work for errors is not an option in SEO content writing. It’s a must. A careless typo can hurt the quality of your content and could have an adverse effect on your online reputation.