Content Writing Errors
On the web, it’s easy to fall victim to errors when writing your content. Typos are understandable. Grammatical errors are not, considering the many tools that are available to catch these errors (MS Word grammar checker anyone?). In fact, grammatical errors can ruin your credibility quickly. That’s why it is important to edit your work and proofread it manually (that means using NO automatic tools) prior to publishing it. Would you want someone to read your work when it’s riddled with such errors as using you’re instead of your, and others? This material will examine the most common grammatical errors and attempt to provide tips and instructions on how to avoid them.
Let’s get started!
1. You’re and your. This is one of the most common errors that occur in everyday writing. It’s so easy to remember that I’m surprised many people simply utilize these words without any thought into their meaning. You’re is a contraction that means ”you ARE.” As in “You are the smartest person in this room.” Your is a possessive pronoun that is used to show the possession of something. As in “They used your car in the demolition derby.”
2. Lose and loose. This is another common error that I see everyday. Lose means to actually “lose something” like the following sentence “You are going to lose it!” Loose means that something IS loose, such as “The shoelaces on your shoes are loose!”
3. They’re, their, and there. Another error that’s too common on the internet is the very old switcharoos that occur with they’re, their, and there. There are significantly different meanings when using each of these words, and you will mess up the complete meaning of your communications when using them in the wrong context. They’re is a contraction that means “They are”. As in, “They’re the ones that did this”. Now, imagine if that previous sentence said “Their the ones that did this!”. That would not make much sense now, would it? Next, “their” is yet another possessive pronoun that denotes the ownership of something by multiple people. Such as “Their property came under possession by the bank once they missed several payments.”
And finally, we get to the next one: there. There is an adverb that means ”to that place” or “at that place”. The following illustrates one of the many proper usages of there: “How would you like to go there for your birthday?” I am hoping by now that you will put some additional thought into using these words and not use their in place of there! Imagine if you will that this sentence said, instead “How would you like to go their for your birthday?” It makes no sense and would you trust the credibility of someone that types something like that?
4. Too, two. These are errors that I come across a lot in web writing. It’s almost as if most people tend to use too and two almost interchangeably. That is not correct proper usage of the English language! First of all, too is used to denote the addition of someone or something. As in the following example “Let’s go there too!” Two is the actual verbal translation of the number 2.
5. Commas and semicolons. Yes, I see errors involving the use of these as well in writing across the world wide web. A comma (,) is used to separate words within a sentence and can contribute greatly to the meaning of the sentence. For example, the sentence “I saw Johnny run to the store, get his cake, eat it, and throw part of it away!” would look and have an altered meaning if the commas were switched around “I saw Johnny run to, the store to get his, cake, eat it and throw part, of it away!” Not only do commas add style and structure to a sentence, they can provide a whole basis for its meaning!
Be careful with how you use commas. I could go into about ten pages of how to use commas, but that’s beyond the scope of this article. Semicolons (;) are used to join two sentences together rather than using a join word such as and. Such as “I went to the store and they were out of the product I wanted.” Semicolons allow you to provide additional style and variations to sentences rather than saying the bland boring thing over and over again “I went to the store. They were out of the product I wanted. I wanted that product.” Notice the difference when a semicolon is used? “I went to the store; they were out of the product I wanted. I wanted that product.”
These are a list of the most common errors I’ve seen when it comes to grammar. There are others, but I wanted to make it a point for you to make sure to check and proofread your work manually. Don’t take a spell checker or grammar checker and have it automatically correct all of the errors in your writing. This will make your writing look haphazard and clumsy. To correct this, please take the extra step to manually proofread and edit your writing.
Your readers will thank you for it.