Part of our "Start a Successful Freelance Writing Career" Video series
( Read the transcript )
Allow someone to be your "pre-editor."
Your submitted work will probably go through an editor unless you are working for a person or company who wants you to take care of all that yourself. An editor's job is to make sure writing is an enjoyable read, conducive to the pre-specified needs of the buyer, grammatically correct, and without any other type of errors such as spelling problems. This is not to say that you should send a piece off to your editor and expect him or her to sift through an abundance of errors or switch the writing around to totally revamp everything in an attempt to make it more readable. Instead, you want to deliver a piece to your editor which is as close to being a finished product as possible.
You will earn a better reputation as a writer and probably receive more work from the buyer if you make the effort to only deliver the best. For this reason, you should have someone in your life who you can ask to read through your writing in an attempt to find common errors which you just can't see because it's your work. After all, your word processing program cannot be expected to catch every little problem, especially when the problem can't be recognized as a problem by the program.
For example, mixing up there and their might not be caught by your computer, but it may result in your editor gritting his or her teeth. Someone who reads your work before you send it off to your editor might also be able to point out writing idiosyncrasies that you have a tendency to do without realizing it.
Using certain phrases such as sort of, kind of, or that's like can become a habit which you don't even realize you have until a reader points it out to you. It is much better to have a friend point it out to you instead of someone who is paying you for your work.
Your submitted work will probably go through an editor unless you are working for a person or company who wants you to take care of all that yourself. An editor's job is to make sure writing is an enjoyable read, conducive to the pre-specified needs of the buyer, grammatically correct, and without any other type of errors such as spelling problems. This is not to say that you should send a piece off to your editor and expect him or her to sift through an abundance of errors or switch the writing around to totally revamp everything in an attempt to make it more readable. Instead, you want to deliver a piece to your editor which is as close to being a finished product as possible.
You will earn a better reputation as a writer and probably receive more work from the buyer if you make the effort to only deliver the best. For this reason, you should have someone in your life who you can ask to read through your writing in an attempt to find common errors which you just can't see because it's your work. After all, your word processing program cannot be expected to catch every little problem, especially when the problem can't be recognized as a problem by the program.
For example, mixing up there and their might not be caught by your computer, but it may result in your editor gritting his or her teeth. Someone who reads your work before you send it off to your editor might also be able to point out writing idiosyncrasies that you have a tendency to do without realizing it.
Using certain phrases such as sort of, kind of, or that's like can become a habit which you don't even realize you have until a reader points it out to you. It is much better to have a friend point it out to you instead of someone who is paying you for your work.
