There’s something almost magical about a brand new blog post up on your blog or website. You spent all that time writing about a subject you love dearly and think your adoring public will just eat up. Thus, you want it out there as quickly as possible so people can start reading it and spreading it around the Internet.

However, there’s also something anti-magical about a blog post that’s unreadable. Even a few errors can drive readers mad and make them click away as soon as their fingers let them. If the blog post is enough of a mess they may never come back again!

That’s not the only reason why you should make sure to edit your work, though. Here are a few other incentives to taking a second/third/fourth glance at what you’ve written.

Misconstrued Meanings

As much time as you put into the blog posts you write the last thing you want is somebody to take something out of context. Alas, it’s a very common occurrence and can happen with one wrong word or grammar error. (Think, “Let’s eat, grandma” vs. “Let’s eat grandma.”

For example, you could spend the whole blog post talking about how well your product works in the average office only to see it fall apart with one sentence. Instead of saying “compatible with all home computers” you accidentally type “incompatible” and never notice the error to correct it.

Of course many will realize what you meant and still be interested. However, some will just see what you wrote and move on, never taking the time to consider it was an error. This could easily lead to tons of lost sales. If you had just taken the time to look over your work or gotten a friend to edit it, all this could’ve been avoided

It Reflects On Your Business 

Having grievous errors in your blog posts don’t just make your blog look messy, it ultimately reflects on your business as well. They may seem like tiny mistakes, but enough over time can negatively impact your bottom line.

Does this seem extreme? Just like any brand representation, you often only get one chance to make a good impression. That first impression is likely to last forever for most people, even if they stick around. If they see a messy blog first thing, they may not take you as seriously as you think.

Of course this doesn’t just go for blog posts. Every single thing you put online or send out to media represents your company. If you type up a post on Facebook or comment on a video on YouTube in your company’s name and it’s nonsense, poorly spelled, or just plain offensive, it reflects badly on your company.

A Look Back 

Of course everybody makes mistakes sometime, it’s bound to happen. Most PR pros type an unbelievable amount of words in a day so at some point you’re bound to make an error. The trick is to catch it in time.

Like with most stuff you write, you don’t always see the mistakes you make, either. You can look over a document a thousand times and never see you made a grammatical error…until it’s pointed out!

This is why it’s important to let someone else give a document a glance over, especially if it’s super important like a press release or news item. A fresh pair of eyes can do wonders in finding where you need to do a little editing.

How many times do you typically edit a blog post or press release before sending it out into the world?

This article is written by Mickie Kennedy, founder of eReleases (http://www.ereleases.com), the online leader in affordable press release distribution. Download a free copy of the PR Checklist – a 24 point list of Press Release Dos and Don’ts here: http://www.ereleases.com/offer/prchecklist.html

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