How Working with an Editor Helps Your Business Maybe you think that copyediting and proofreading are luxury items in your publications budget. Or that nobody will notice if a few mistakes slip through in your Web site copy. But truthfully, copyediting is a necessity and not a luxury, because people will notice mistakes in your copy. Here are more ways in which a professional copyeditor can benefit your business, in addition to making suggestions about text additions, deletions, and clarifications: - An editor writes “zingier” headlines – so potential customers will be drawn into your Web site by zinginess - An editor breaks up dense paragraphs – so potential customers will actually read your copy because it is easy to read - An editor introduces correct punctuation and good grammar – so potential customers will be convinced that your product or service is high quality, since copy that advertises it is high quality - An editor has ideas about when to italicize or boldface words or phrases – so potential customers will be interested in reading text Web site text is different from magazine articles and book chapters. The pages are smaller, paragraphs are shorter, graphics or photographs often accompany text. Web site “visitors” are assumed to have a shorter attention span than book or magazine readers. This means that a reader spends just a few minutes reading text at your Web site. It makes sense that you will want to present your company or services in as professional a light as possible. How to Hire a Copyeditor Copyeditors can be found through professional organizations such as Bay Area Editors’ Forum, Bookbuilders West, consulting and marketing organizations, directories of editorial professionals, ads in newspapers and magazines, and by looking up copyeditors on search engines. Employing a good copyeditor to shape up your Web site text will ensure that your message is conveyed beautifully – and that’s not just editorial spin!

The hyperlinks of any website can be roughly divided in four categories with no real distinctions but which you need to employ using a rule of thumb: a) Clix generating click throughs (brand awareness)* b) Clix generating repeat visits by internal referral (e.g. bookmarks, newsletter signups, brochures); c) Clix generating traffic (agreements for inbound links, online marketing for third parties); d) Clix generating sales

*Do not confuse our use of term “click throughs” with click throughs as in pay per click concept. Pay per click is all about inbound traffic into a site. Here, I am discussing internal navigational path.

Once I have idea of a website’s structure along these lines, I start floating into writing stage and as I go along, I tend to keep a continuous check that profile of content and links actually match up with vital points.

Each website is unique of course and to categorise links into four categories very rigidly does not make sense. For instance, a link to an article that has also been published elsewhere on web creates both inbound traffic and repeat visit value and possibly also a click through.

It makes sense to assess each link and construct content around it on using common sense. In this process, I tend to take into account a number of factors, including navigational path, design possibilities and optimal content size.

Although most sites differ, links making up navigational path are generally quite similar in their relation to vital points; click throughs are generally way less closely related to a site’s vital points than for instance sales clicks. Or at least when you build up your sales idea right, ultimate click will be entirely logically connected with your business concept. As for middle two categories, they generally are somewhere in middle in relation to vital points too.

There is not a lot else to writing good website content, apart from gloating over results with your clients a few months later!