Does Your Blog Need A Proofreader?

As writers and business entrepreneurs, do you always PROOF your posts or comments? Do you spend hours agonizing over the content on your posts only to decide not to post? Do wonder what would happen if you forgot to include a comma or used a hyphen in the wrong spot? Do you wonder if one misspelled word is going to cause you to look less professional?

Well wonder no more! The cyber police aren’t going to come banging down your door to fine you for improper grammar usage and unless your post is riddled with inconsistencies, huge grammatical issues, or hard to read sentence structures, your readers aren’t going to care, either.Blogging isn’t like traditional publishing. Every “i” doesn’t have to be dotted. Every “t” doesn’t have to be crossed. And every comma doesn’t have to be in its proper place. After all, in traditional publishing more than one set of eyes has gone over that reading material before it hits publication. When work is submitted to traditional publications, editors come back with requests to improve or clarify the work based on recommendations from their proofreaders and/or copyeditors. With blogging, there are usually no second pair of eyes.

Blogging isn’t about being “error-free”, though it couldn’t hurt. Blogging is about spontaneity. It’s about communicating with your readers on a more personal level. It’s about engaging in a conversation with your past, present, and future customers. It’s about sharing insights and showing a more human side to your business. It’s about being real. And being real comes with mistakes—grammatical or otherwise.

So go ahead and post. Post daily. Because the truth of the matter is this: If you spend your time fretting over every typo or grammatical mistake, you will never take part in this fascinating community of bloggers. And you’ll lose out. You’ll lose networking opportunities. You’ll lose viral marketing opportunities. And you’ll lose the awesome ability to build “friendships” with your readers and connect with your customers on a level you’ve never imagined. And you’ll lose the financial benefits of indirect sales.

And if you should receive an email informing you of a misspelled word, the wrong word usage, improper punctuation, and so forth, thank the reader, edit your post, and move on. In time, you’ll discover that your writing has vastly improved and you’ll feel less conscientious about your writing skills and more confident in the content you produce.