Whether you’re editing your own blog posts or someone else’s, this editing checklist will help you catch any errors and present your audience with a polished finished product.
It’s divided into 3 sections:
All of these elements are equally important for bloggers, as you want to make sure your readers and Google get a good experience from your piece.
Let’s get into it.
Let’s get the most time intensive part out of the way first. This section focuses on getting your words perfect, readable and clear.
If you’re self-editing, your mind will be clouded directly after writing it and you’ll be blind to your mistakes.
Wait a day, and read it aloud all the way through. That way, you’ll be able to instantly spot mistakes.
Is the article broken up into a clear structure? Traditionally, a blog post is structured like this:
Here’s an infographic to elaborate:
Using Grammarly, check the article through for flagged spelling and grammar issues.
Now, check to make sure you’re not using inconsistent language.
For example, standardize ‘ebook’ / ‘e-book’ / ‘eBook’.
If you use a style guide, refer to that:
Back up any unsupported sources, and research any claims to ensure they’re fact, not opinion or inaccuracies.
Using Google Doc’s research pane for quickly sourcing claims or doing proper research on an incorrect one:
Filler words make your writing sound weak, but they’re easy to find and remove.
Check here for a list of 297 compiled by Shane Arthur.
Be wary of using adverbs. Adverbs are almost always unnecessary, as demonstrated here:
Happiness, quickness, and thoughtfulness are implicit in the verbs — there’s no need for the adverbs (happily, quickly, thoughtfully).
A good app to catch these is the Hemingway Editor.
The passive voice is unclear, and sounds weak. Here’s an example of passive vs. active:
By converting the sentence from passive to active, it’s shorter, sounds confident and clear.
Cliches — like ‘crystal clear’ — are hallmarks of bad style. Instead of using the first term that comes to mind, be creative or cut words out.
Here’s a list of 681 cliches so you can familiarize yourself with them.
Readers tune their brains out when they read cliches because they’re ‘pre-digested’ phrases that have lost meaning over time.
Similar to cutting adverbs. Instead of using 3 weak words, use 1 strong one to give your writing more impact and clarity.
Example:
Commas are a hotly debated issue in the academic world. For bloggers, it’s just a matter of consistency. Whether you choose to use Oxford commas or not, make sure you’re being clear and consistent.
To use Grammarly’s example:
Another element of bad style is that bloated, faux-academic tone you get from junior writers. If you wouldn’t say it in a casual conversation, then edit it so it sounds like a real person said it, not a machine.
For the definitive guide on this topic, check out On Writing Well.
Okay, that’s not what Plato said. Regardless, it’s still important.
Once you’ve written an awesome article, you want to make sure people can find it. You do that by signaling to Google that your article is about a certain topic.
Here’s exactly how to do that, with help from Backlinko’s infographic on the topic.
Your article’s title — the H1 — is the most important on-page element to optimize. If you’re writing a guide to making the best pizza, then you’re going to want to indicate that in the title.
For example:
To make sure your article’s title is an H1, inspect the element by right clicking it in Chrome and choosing ‘Inspect Element’.
See when I hover over the title, it says ‘h1’ in the tooltip floating just above.
Instead of having a URL that looks like this…
www.process.st/2016/05/content-marketing/the-ultimate-editing-checklist/
Try one like this…
www.process.st/editing-checklist
Not only is it easier for humans, Google understands much better what the article is about because you cut the clutter.
To increase the time a user spends on your page, use interesting multimedia to hook them and keep them sticking around.
Use at least 2 of the below items:
As explained in the image above, you can never use an H2 without an H1, never an H3 without an H2 first, etc.
Think of it as indented bullet points, if it helps.
To make sure you (again) signal to Google the purpose of your blog post, include your keyword:
Show Google your page is backed up by quality, authoritative sources by linking out to other sites.
A guideline from Brian Dean recommends you use 2-4 outbound links in every 1,000 words you write.
This should be easy if you’re writing a well-sourced article!
Page Authority flows through links, so if you get a backlink to a page with 20 internal links, these pages also get passed authority.
See Wikipedia, the masters of internal (or ‘deep’) links, for a masterclass:
Visuals are partly for SEO, and partly to make the reading experience more enjoyable.
In this time of limited attention, images drag the reader into the content. Great visuals show the reader instant value and make them more likely to stay on the page.
Get rid of this garbage:
At Process Street, we make sure all of our graphics are even custom-made, edited for quality or screenshots.
As Kathryn Aragon says, images should not be:
For a better overall design aesthetic, keep your media full-width. Compare these examples:
To edit for this, either find higher resolution versions of the same images or replace low-res images with high-res ones.
The good thing about screenshots is that you have total control over their size so can always find a way to make them full-width.
To optimize for Google Images search volume, make sure you’re titling and alt-tagging your images properly. Do this by saving the files with descriptive, keyword-optimized titles, and by editing alt text in HTML view:
Tap into your brand assets — logos, branded images, image templates — to create consistent images in keeping with your blog’s style.
Below are examples of what we do at Process Street. Note the consistent font, color pallette, and icon style:
