06

Nov

You Sure Do Write Good: Consider Grammar When Blogging

Posted by: Carolyn Young

Some people might not notice incorrectly phrased sentences, misspellings, or typos. But personally, I find it distracting. Whether you’re a grammar stickler or not, when you write for your business blog be aware that some of your customers may be sensitive to the old lessons we learned in school. So, if your company style is anything more than extremely casual (MTV and Surfer.com need not abide), you probably know that certain grammatical and spelling errors can diminish the impact of your message. So, get in the habit of checking, and double-checking, your work – even when blogging.

I know what it’s like to be so passionate about what you are writing that you dump all your thoughts into your blog, publish it, and hope that readers will be moved by your words. We’re huge advocates of regular content writing. But don’t let your readers miss out on your message because they are too sidetracked (or turned off) by major grammatical errors – those that make your post difficult to read. Sure, the rules of grammar are more lax for conversational style writing (typical for blogs), but run-on sentences, for example, are still a no-no. The goal is to make sure your reader doesn’t have to strain or re-read sentences to understand your point.

If you don’t have anyone else to check your work, the best thing you can do once you have completed your blog is to leave it alone for at least an hour. Step away, and then come back to read it as if you were someone else. You’ll be surprised what you missed the first time around.

Some common mistakes to look for when re-reading your blog:

• Comma usage: Be careful not to underuse or overuse these little guys. There are “rules,” and breaking them can break a sentence. Check this resource for more info.
• Word usage: Watch out for words that have similar sounds, but different meanings when written. If you use the wrong word, some readers may know what you mean – others may have to think twice. Examples:
  • there/their/they’re
  • where/wear/we’re
  • its/it’s
• Typos: It’s easy to miss typos when you are in the moment of writing your blog, which is why it is helpful to leave it alone for a little bit and return with a fresh perspective.

The beauty of blogging is that writing style is often very casual, and strict rules of grammar are usually not a consideration. The point isn’t to have a blog that would receive an A+ by an English professor (in fact you probably want to avoid that, too). The goal is to have a post that is easy to read by your audience and gets your point across effectively. Paying a little extra attention to a few basic rules of grammar can help.