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proofreading

How long is your drink?

While there is an expression about having a long drink, length is not usually a measure of drinks. So I was surprised to see an ad for 300m of a soft drink in some recent junk mail!

As always, the message is that proof reading is really important – best done by someone else or at a later time as proofing as you write has limitations.

Of course, the person preparing the ad may have written 300ml and something happened at the design or printing stages, but that is why printing proofs also need to be checked carefully.

Ad for 300m coke

 

Poor spelling impacts on your content

Quality content is more than the message – it also has to be presented in a way that is easy for people to read and understand.

Many people will tell you that the message is more important than spelling or grammar – and it is, but only to a point. A great message is lost if the spelling and grammar are poor.

Last night, I saw a page on a website that shows how important spelling can be – as even one wrong letter can make a big difference.

We make real-estate CD’s. [Business] can also make and host your web site, with promotion as the key fucus.

Using a u instead of an o is not just a typo we can ignore – the new word is too close to another word and that is what now catches our attention – not the original message.

It also changed the reader’s interpretation of the ‘presenting in a unique way’ in the following sentence, creating giggles instead of interest in their professional services.

It comes back to proofreading your work – not just a quick glance or use of a spell check, but a genuine check of what you have written. And the best proof reading is done a day or so after the writing or by another person. The quality of your content will improve through this simple process and maintaining a ‘focus’.