{"id":9902,"date":"2022-01-27T08:30:31","date_gmt":"2022-01-27T14:30:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.webii.net\/blog\/?p=9902"},"modified":"2022-04-01T10:08:02","modified_gmt":"2022-04-01T16:08:02","slug":"copyediting-your-website-content","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.webii.net\/blog\/copyediting-your-website-content\/","title":{"rendered":"The Importance of Copyediting Your Website Content"},"content":{"rendered":"

Once you have gotten all of the content integrated into your website, you need to edit it. The first stage will be reviewing the writing to see how cohesive and effective it is. Your business has a particular voice that needs to shine through, whether it\u2019s playful or professional. Are you accurately delivering your brand in not just your body text, but also your headlines and subheads? Have you incorporated enough relevant media into your web pages? Has the content been <\/span>optimized for search engines<\/span><\/a>? Is your reader going to understand the full scope of who you are from reading <\/span>your website content<\/span>?<\/span><\/p>\n

When you have ensured that your site looks professional, you need to work on <\/span>copyediting your website content<\/span>. A copy editor differs from a content editor. Rather than checking the strength of the text, they identify more specific mistakes. By using your <\/span>in-house style guide<\/span><\/a>, the team member who is editing your copy will check for errors in spelling, grammar, punctuation, and syntax. They will also look at your metadata, image placements, and charts and graphs, or do any necessary fact-checking. The main goal for a copy editor is to enforce the text’s flow so that the reader won\u2019t be confused. Let\u2019s dive into four key ways that you will inevitably benefit from <\/span>copyediting your website content<\/span>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Credibility<\/span><\/h2>\n

If you have made several errors in your text, you are going to look like you don’t care. Consumers today are especially skeptical about the online marketplace, so even the simplest misspellings can affect your credibility. They will inevitably turn toward your competitors if they have lost confidence in your business. Imagine spending all that time creating timely, interesting content that just makes people bounce. It\u2019s important to win them over from the first time they interact with you, and continue to win them over the more time they spend with you. <\/span>Copyediting your website content<\/span> helps your specific details appear more reliable. Just in case, once a copy editor has finished their work, someone else\u2019s fresh eyes should proofread the content to ensure it is ready to go live.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Photo by kaboompics on Pixabay<\/em><\/p><\/div>\n

Readability<\/span><\/h2>\n

When your content isn\u2019t worded clearly, your visitors could have no idea what you are trying to say or what you are offering. On that same note, too many words in a sentence or paragraph will likely turn them off. <\/span>Yoast<\/span><\/a> found that, in order to have user-friendly content, you need to use approximately 20 words per sentence. This is ideal for <\/span>anyone\u2019s reading comprehension<\/span><\/a>. What this doesn\u2019t mean is that you should be writing on a child\u2019s level. It simply means that you should be clarifying your thoughts in a clean manner. Copy editors are able to tighten phrasing and eliminate unnecessary sentences so that the author\u2019s message is streamlined. <\/span>Your website content<\/span> should not be repetitive and full of jargon, nor should it be too short that you are missing out on critical elements to your story.<\/span><\/p>\n

Consistency<\/span><\/h2>\n

Copy editors need to make sure that every web page matches. <\/span>Invest Northern Ireland<\/span><\/a> says that this is necessary for both functionality and visual elements. Consistency ranges from navigation to page layouts to typography to branding. If you are using charts, for example, they need to be uniformly formatted, for the sake of visual appeal. When you reuse the data from those charts elsewhere on your site, it needs to be identical, unless there has been new research that has changed the numbers. Regardless, when <\/span>copyediting your website content<\/span>, it is important to look back at the information that has already been pushed. This will allow you to create a <\/span>stronger linking strategy<\/span><\/a> and web design, as you will be increasingly aware of what your website\u2019s hierarchical structure looks like.<\/span><\/p>\n

Accuracy<\/span><\/h2>\n

Accidentally writing a false statement could be bad for your business. This is why part of the copy editor\u2019s role is to verify the names, dates, locations, events, and quotes in <\/span>your website content<\/span>. If your business is in a very technical industry, this might mean that there is a lot of fact-checking that needs to get done. For this reason, copy editors triage fact-checking by how important the fact is. They prioritize details that could get your business in trouble or would be embarrassing. These are crucial to retaining the support your business needs because, if your information can easily be discovered to be inaccurate, you lose any leverage you had. Alternately, lower-priority details fall into the category of factual correctness, such as if the title of someone you mentioned isn\u2019t exactly correct. Copyediting leaves no stone unturned.<\/span><\/p>\n

Infographic: How To Copyedit<\/h2>\n
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Infographic resources from Canva.com and Megan Marshall<\/em><\/p><\/div>\n