Three Easy Proofreading Tips for Freelance Writers

Writer's Resources....

Don't Rely on the Spellchecker

It doesn't matter if you're a new writer or a professional writer, typos and minor grammatical errors are a reality, and they will eventually show their ugly face in your content. I can't tell you how many times I've stumbled upon a typo in a blog post or website. Often times, the typo is minor. The writer may have accidentally dropped a "s," or used "a" instead of "an." The way I see, minor typos are going to happen....that's why we have editors. If typos and awkward sentence structures didn't occur....a lot of people would lose their job.

I don't minimize the importance of proofreading our work. In fact, I feel it's a necessity. At the same time, there's something about our brain that makes us blind to our own mistakes. For example, I once wrote a feature piece and re-read the article several times - five times to be exact. It was perfect - or so I thought.

Then, my husband read the piece. And there it was....on the second line....a BIG TYPO. Instead of "you're," I wrote "your." I could had smacked myself....I hate contraction mistakes!

I say all of this to make a point....you can't always control typos. But you can adopt a few tips and techniques to ensure error-free content.

• Read Your Work Out Loud: Before you hit the submit or print button, read your work out loud. This is one of the easiest ways to catch grammar mistakes and awkward sentence structures.
  

• Double Check Contractions and Homonyms: Pay extra attention to contractions and words that sound alike. These include words such as its and it's, their and they're, affect and effect, compliment and complement, etc.

• Proofread Another Day: Don't proofread immediately after finishing a piece. If you can, wait until the next day - or at least a few hours. This way, your brain isn't blind to obvious mistakes, and you're able to pinpoint errors.