How to Edit a Website: Essential Proofreading Tools

Errors on your website can put off customers and damage your brand's credibility. These proofreading tools will take the pain out of editing a website

By Gloria Kopp

When you're presenting yourself and your business through your website, it's imperative that you give the best impression to your customers. Mistakes in writing, broken links and other errors throughout your website can reflect negatively on your company, leaving a bad impression on anyone visiting your website and considering your products or services. These mistakes may even cause people to call into question your qualifications and abilities to do the job you claim you're able to do.

Don't let mistakes in your website lessen your reputation or turn potential customers away. With the help of these essential proofreading tools, you can properly edit your website and eliminate any mistakes that may be present.

Grammarly

Free to add to your Chrome browser, Grammarly helps eliminate over 250 types of grammatical error from your writing, many of which won’t be found by Microsoft Word. Regardless of whether you’re writing an email, social media post, or a text document, Grammarly will ensure your content shines on all platforms.

Screaming Frog SEO Spider Tool

Take a tour through your website, and see things from the perspective of this meticulous crawler. You'll have access to data that can help inform your decision regarding your SEO efforts, as well as learn about any improvements that can be made to metadata, fix broken links and discover content that's been duplicated. Get a clear picture of your website SEO, with the help of Screaming Frog.

Hemingway App

This handy tool will give you a colour-coded readout of any mistakes you've made, as well as instant feedback on areas for improvement. Not only will the Hemingway App let you know of any obvious errors that need fixing, but it will also give you some suggestions for ways you can make your website content even better. At the end of the day, it's those small differences that can turn your writing from good to great, transforming it into something that customers will actually be interested in reading.

Readable.io

It’s important to ensure that your website content is up to scratch and matches your customers’ level of comprehension. With Readable.io, you'll get a measure of where your writing is at, so you can make the necessary adjustments to bring it in line with what your customers want to read and can understand.

Avoid sloppy copy:

There are plenty of tools online that can act as your virtual proofreader

Cite It In

If you're making any references throughout your content, whether it's to information you're citing directly, or to resources that your customers will find interesting and useful, make sure that you've put together the proper citations. Cite It In will do all of the complicated work for you, and all you've got to do is give them the information they ask for.

ProWritingAid

No one wants to post content online or send out emails wondering if they've made a silly typo, or if there's a better way they could have worded something. ProWritingAid helps you eliminate those worries by correcting mistakes and making suggestions as you work. It's downloaded right to your computer and works within your word processor to edit as you go.

Easy Word Count

Keep within a specified word count with the accuracy of this instantaneous online tool. It's been shown that websites with content between 2,000 and 2,500 words are generally ranked highest among other websites in the same subject area. With this Easy Word Count, you can help give your site the best chance at receiving the highest ranking possible.

EssayRoo

When it's time to call in the professionals, the team at EssayRoo will provide you with expert proofreading and editing for your business website content, so no embarrassing mistakes go unnoticed, and potentially cost you customers. Get your writing reviewed by a real person, who can see things in context and pick out anything that looks or sounds awkward.

UK Writings

Sometimes the best resource for writing amazing content is someone who is an experienced professional in the field, and knows your industry. The team at UK Writings is staffed with experts in all fields, who can provide you with the feedback you'll need to make changes and improvements, so you're able to provide readers with the best possible content.

Academized

The cache of guides that Academized has compiled can help answer all your questions on grammar, punctuation and style. Its plagiarism checker can also help detect any instances of duplication, even if it’s unintentional. The last thing you want is to have customers think you've just lifted your content from someone else. It can absolutely destroy your credibility and your name as a reputable business, and could also see you penalized by Google for duplicating content.

So, put the best face on your business with the highest quality written content, edited to perfection with the help of these essential proofreading tools.

About the author

Gloria Kopp is a digital marketer and business consultant from Manville City, USA. She is a regular contributor to websites such as Engadget and Huffington Post, and manages Studydemic, an online blog about trends in educational technology.