How to reduce typos

There but for the grace of you-know-who

This isn’t a post mocking the poor victims of the dreaded typo. Oh go on, just one then…

This truly isn’t a post mocking typos because, as a copywriter, I flirt with the potential of making a painful, embarrassing and possibly litigious typo every day.

You probably won’t eradicate all typos from your writing – your mind can’t help but skip errors or force you to see what you want to see – but you can minimise them by following these simple steps:

1. Use your spellchecker

2. Print your document, put it in a drawer and leave it overnight (or as long as time allows)

3. Next day, read it aloud (no matter how silly you might feel doing so). A quick mumbled skim won’t do it – give it the full BBC newsreader treatment

I promise you’ll spot more errors reading a printed version of your document than you will on screen. You’ll spot more errors coming back to your writing with a fresh pair of eyes than you will if you simply type and send. And you’ll spot more errors when you read out loud than you will if it stays in your head.

Give it a try, let me know how you get on.

e 03/20/2015
f Mike Brown
4 Copywriting Tips