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What You as a Writing Client Can Do To Help Ensure Accurate Writing on the Internet

2008-02-16T20:21:00.000-08:00

In my last post I discussed the impact that poorly written and not accurate writing has on the internet. If you are a client who needs writing quite often, you can do your part to help raise the quality of writing on the internet. Of course, this puts you at a risk to pay more as prices go up but remember that you get what you pay for. If you pay writers too low, they will have to find other writing work to make up the income and this could impact quality and the production of an accurate article.

Give sufficient deadlines. If you have a deadline and you know about it well in advance, hire a writer well in advance. Don’t wait until the last minute, post a job, and expect a writer to jump through hoops because you didn’t think ahead. And, if a quick turnaround is actually required then pay the writer extra for going the extra mile for you.

Ask a writer to list references used. If you question where a writer obtained the facts for the article or other writing product they sold you, ask them to provide the references used. A professional will have that information readily available and will be happy to show it to you because it helps to give credibility to their work.

Never post your homework on the internet for a freelancer to write. You never know. You may be a writer someday and if you don’t learn to write in college then you might post sub-quality work on the internet too. Then, you’ll wish you hadn’t posted your essays for someone else to write. People who post homework on the internet for hiring writers to complete typically don’t pay well thus making more contribution to writing on the internet that is not accurate and of poor quality.

Look at the writer’s portfolio carefully. If the writer does not have a portfolio then you should not even consider him or her. Even beginning writers who have never sold anything should have a portfolio with samples showing their ability to do accurate and quality writing. The popularity of blogging also makes it possible for a writer to display their personal works.

Use Copyscape to check things. Although Copyscape does not protect against writing that may have been stolen directly out of a book, it will at least spot works copied all or in part from another web page.

If a writer is selling you articles too cheaply then ask why. Some writers with real talent are starting out on the internet and may be offering a low price because they have no reputation. That is perfectly okay but you as a client should just ask the writer why. The answer you get should give you a gut feeling as to the writer’s honesty. If anything, just ask for one or two articles, pay the writer for his or work, and review them to see if you want to continue on with the writer.

Pay your writers at intervals during long projects. If you hire a writer for a large project that takes up most of the writer’s time then make sure you pay him or her at intervals during the project. Writers just generally write with a clear head when they have full stomachs and the utilities are paid.

Bringing the Characteristic of “Accurate” Back to Internet Content Writing

2008-02-08T22:06:00.000-08:00

Writing accurate web content is very important to me and anyone who goes by the title of professional writer should have this as their priority too. However, the internet has been plagued with writing produced by authors who do nothing but recycle someone else’s factually-wrong article and sell it to someone else who might post it and spawn another writing from it in another factually-wrong way. This is why finding accurate content on the internet is very difficult. If you are a writer or marketer of written works, you should not accept promoting commerce of poorly-written articles, e-books, and web copy that are not accurate. Here’s why:

Writing that is not accurate creates the market for the $0.50 article. Low quality breeds extremely low prices. Writing becomes driven by price only and buyers focus little on accepting accurate work. Freelance content writers have to take on more work in order to keep their electricity on. More work and no letup on deadlines inevitably results in articles and other writing works that are not accurate and drives the price down. Why should a buyer pay 15 cents a word when he can get it for a half-cent per word and turn it over to an editor who charges a half-cent per word too?

Writing that is not accurate can dangerously lead people in the wrong way. If you are a writer and writing health remedies that are not accurate, you could actually put someone in danger if they read your material and take it word-for-word. Now, the low-quality writer might say, “They should know better than to believe what they read on the internet.” How a writer with this attitude sleeps at night is a mystery but enough said on this point.

Writing that is not accurate does nothing to promote respectability of the internet. It continues the stereotyping of the internet as a place where only scammers and con-artists do business.

A client who buys writing that is not accurate discourages good writers. Writers love to write. They also like to eat and take care of their families. But when market prices for internet writing become depressed, those who care about accurate writing will go elsewhere. And the void left will be filled with those who spin articles, copy articles from other sources, and create articles by automated methods that make no sense at all—all methods of writing with no quality of being accurate. Then, these same “writers” post their substandard work all over the internet.

In my next post, I will give some suggestions as to what you as buyer of internet writing works and web content can do to help in bringing the “accurate” back to internet content writing.

Welcome to My New Blog

2008-02-02T07:33:00.000-08:00

This is the first post on my writing blog. I have been writing for a couple of years and decided to rearrange my services so that the focus is web content writing. I intend to use this blog to share tidbits from the writing profession, make announcements, announce my products, etc., etc....

Stay tuned.