Proofreading & Editing Blog For Students, Researchers, Business Professionals and Writers

20Dec/070

Going off at a Tangent

Twisting ideas to promote your client

By now, if you have been reading my posts, you will have gathered that I am not a so-called "creative writer". I do not produce literature. I have no burning desire to write a novel, unless it's guaranteed to be a bestseller ,which will keep me in the style to which I sincerely wish to become accustomed. I am a commercial animal, I write for pay and I look at writing as a means to earn my living and to form the bedrock of a business I am building.

That said, it does not mean that I am not imaginative nor creative with the ideas that flow and am used to delivering work products for my clients. It certainly does not follow that I am in any way less passionate about what I am doing, while I also have a fierce pride in my work, and delivering the very best I can provide for clients. Some of my work is "mindless pap" as I often say to enquiring friends and family and in my honest opinion it is just that - advertising and promotional rubbish. Nevertheless, it is good advertising rubbish and I can say that because it performs the task that my clients wish to achieve and I get paid for producing it.

Today, my work for the most part is not "mindless pap" as my clients and the projects have become more interesting. Writing assignments has started to exercise my mind and imagination to a greater extent, than figuring out how to get 800 words on a paper dealing with Japanese "Geta" shoes, or producing a dumbed down series of articles on alternatives to Viagara. Even when you are confronted with a topic that readily lends itself to a simple churning out of some more advertising rubbish you can exercise your imagination and tackle the subject from a different perspective. I firmly believe that the confidence I have acquired in two years of commercial writing has encouraged me to take alternative approaches to handling a client topic.

Earlier this week I had to write a series of blog posts for a site called Your Health Reporter which promotes altenative therapies, amongst which is the use of a slimming pill derived from a cactus in the Kalahari Desert, Hoodia Gordonii. Your Health Reporter, is a relatively new client for me and initially I started off with the "Lose the keg and get a 6 pack" style of posts for the slimming and fitness products that are being promoted. Last week I altered the style and that produced some incredible results.

25Oct/070

Top 10 Beginner writing Tips

1) As a writer you need to be very clear in your mind about what you want to write about. If the concept and purpose of your intended material is steady and clear in your mind, then conveying it becomes simpler.

2) The second most important aspect in writing, is lucidity of thought and expression. No one is going to have the patience to read your work if it’s something that doesn’t make a lot of sense. We cannot go on rambling now, can we? The stream of consciousness method ought to be left alone to the professionals in this field. For beginners, lucidity is the key. Let it be your mantra, have – lucidity – lucidity – you get the drift.

3) Checking out your facts and information when writing on any topic is a must, as you don’t want to look a little (well, a lot!) silly. The material could be read by thousands, so a blooper in any information would get spotted straight away and reported! Believe me, if you’re not going to sell yourself, attract positive attention and gain a prominent reputation as a writer, if you don’t watch those mistakes (did you spot that one?), then you should look for a different avenue.

17Oct/070

Blogging for Pay

Blogs are a steady source of income for a new writer

A blog is an online diary crossed with a dynamic web page and the word “blog” is actually a contraction of “web log”. The practical result is a web site that allows a user to post their content and at the same time use web site functionality. A blogger can include links to other web pages, insert pictures, audio and video as well as a host of other features without the need for specialist web programming knowledge. From a commercial perspective, company and marketing blogs are the primary tool for promoting websites which need fresh, updated content on a regular basis.

They offer a great opportunity for novice writers to cut their teeth and earn a regular income at the same time.

My initial writing projects consisted of short articles, usually no more than 500 words long; however, once you have completed a batch of articles that's it, you're back to square one looking for the next paying project. A blog needs updating frequently, usually on a daily basis, so there are plenty of opportunities to post to blogs for a weekly or monthly fee. I quickly latched on to this and now I regularly post to a stream of blogs that form the core of my writing income and provide me with some financial stability. We're now going to take a look at setting up a blog for you, as a showcase for your services and your work which will also get your hands dirty with blogging.

8Oct/070

Writing Tips – Addition to Supaproofread.com

You will see that we are constantly updating the supaproofread.com site with new and interesting content. We've just added the writing tips section, which provides hints and tips for writers, whether you're writing for business, academia, yourself or your employer. These tips range from 10 tips to proofreading you paper to the main differences between American and British English. More writing tips are due to be added in the coming months, so keep track of the lastest news and information by clicking on one of our RSS feeds to the right. Alternatively, if you don't have an rss generator, just click on the link get the Supaproofread RSS Feed to get the RSS feed for your own program.

If you just want to display the feed on a drop down menu, so you can check any new posts on the blog when opening IE or firefox, then simply click on the XML version of the feed and select live bookmarks to provide you with changing and current information.

If you do have any questions on this, then please leave a comment.

28Aug/073

Who’s going to pay me to write?

Right now, at this very moment, we are living in a time when there is unprecedented demand for written content. Demand is so high that even a Third World native with a very basic mastery of English can make a good living from writing. As a native English speaker, you are going to have a major commercial advantage over the competition and can command a higher price for your work.

That may sound great, but who is actually going to pay me for my work?

Simply place “writer paid work” in any search engine and you'll uncover a stream of offers, some pushing writing courses and some opening the door to a new career. I did this when I started out two short years ago, and I even parted with some money as well, but what actually has honed my skills so far has been getting my hands dirty and asking for work. You can short-cut a lot of the time you spend looking for a paying writing job by visiting Craig's Lists, GetaFreelancer (GAF), eLance and a host of other sites that require simple registration, no money and provide you with access to a swarm of projects that need someone to write English content.