How to proofread your blog posts

Proofreading your blog posts is very important. Proofreading means to find errors in your writing before you finally publish or submit your content. Proofreading includes finding spelling, grammatical, punctuation, formatting and syntax errors, and other inconsistencies in your writing.

Why proofreading is so important? Blog posts with a lot of spelling, grammatical, punctuation, formatting, and syntax errors ruin the reading experience of the reader. Silly mistakes in your writing may affect your blog. When readers read your content with a lot of errors, they may lose their interest in your blog. When readers read such content, they may think that you are not serious about what you are doing.

I am not saying you should be well versed in English or any other language in which you write. It becomes more difficult if you are writing in a language that is not your native language.

Everyone makes mistakes. Even the people who are brilliant in English or any other language make mistakes because no one is perfect. I am just saying that try to make fewer mistakes in your writing so that your content looks more professional and readable.

I am also not good in English as it is not my native language. Though I am also bad in Hindi which is my native language. I can speak Hindi, but I am not writing in Hindi. The moral of the story is that I am bad at everything. Even after studying in an English medium school, I am not good at English which is a shame for me. Even now I don’t understand part of speech like noun, pronoun, adverb, etc. I am equally bad at tenses.

So, how I proofread my blog posts. I use three software for proofreading blog posts. Don’t worry, it is not that difficult as you are thinking. The three software that I use is as follows

1. Ginger proofreading software

In my opinion, it is one of the best proofreading software. My English has improved because of this software. At some point, I had to write emails for something, but my English was just okay. One day I came to know about this software, so I started using it for proofreading my emails. It improved my English a lot. I came to know about the mistakes I used to make. The limitation of the free version is that you can proofread an only a certain number of characters at one time. If your blog post is long, you have to proofread whole content in small portions. The free version provides basic proofreading. You can buy the premium version if you want more features, but in my opinion free version is enough.

2. Grammarly proofreading software

The other software that I use to proofread my blog posts is Grammarly. It is equally good as Ginger. Free version provides basic proofreading like finding spelling, grammatical and punctuation errors in your content. One advantage of Grammarly over Ginger is that there is no restriction of number of charcters in free version of Grammarly. You can proofread whole text at once in Grammarly. If you want more features, you can upgrade to premium or business plan. I use free version.

3. Google Translate

I rarely use Google Translate for translating my content in Hindi. I use when I use complex language or when I want to make sure that what I write is actually what I meant. I use Google Translate to paste my content from MS Word to its window so that I can use Grammarly in it. I will explain it later.

One thing I want to tell you before you use these softwares is that don’t rely completely on them as they are not 100% correct all the time. In my opinion, they are fairly good, but don’t rely completely on them. After all, they are just software. Sometimes, they don’t understand what you want to write or convey. Sometimes they don’t understand in which context you are talking about. If you know decent in your language, use your brain also before making changes in your content.

Also, you don’t need to use both Ginger and Grammarly. If you don’t want to use both, you can use any one of these, it is your choice. I use both for accuracy. But, sometimes, there is conflict occurs between two software. In this case, I use that content which I find more accurate.

Now, I will tell you how I proofread my blog posts. First I tell you how to use them on a computer as I use the desktop. Later, I will also tell you how to use them on your mobile.

1. Firstly, open Ginger online proofreading software in one tab of your browser.

Online Ginger proofreading link

2. You also have to install Grammarly extension in your browser. I have given links for the extentions in different browsers below

Google Chrome
Mozilla Firefox
Microsoft Edge

You will see a small G in green in Google translate window and top right side of the browser after you install the Grammarly extension.

3. Now open Google Translate in another tab of your browser.

4. Copy text from MS Word to Google Translate. Change language on the right side of the box in Google Translate if you want to read your content in your language also otherwise doesn’t change the language.

5. Now, Grammarly will show you errors that are highlighted using red underline. When you take your cursor on those errors, Grammarly suggests the appropriate word. Just click on the suggested word and it will replace the word that you wanted to change.

6. After using Grammarly, I use paste that content to Ginger to find more errors. I copy the text in paragraphs because of limitation characters in Gingers. When you paste your text in Ginger proofreading software, it will show you errors in red color. Click on Ginger it button below the box to find errors. It will show corrections in blue color. Just copy it and paste it where want to use proofread the text.

Now I will tell you about how to proofread your blog posts on mobile. First, you have to install the Ginger or Grammarly app from the Play Store if you are using Android. If you are iOS, install these apps from Apple Store. The Ginger app has a limitation of the number of errors you can correct while Grammarly has no such limit. On mobile, you can use only one of these at one time, so it is your choice which you want to use.

To change the keyboard, you have to long-press the spacebar. Now, you can select the keyboard you want to use to proofread your content. I am using Nokia 7.2 and Android 10. The way of changing the keyboard can vary from phone to phone and operating system to operating system.

You can also change virtual keyboards in the following way in Android 10.

1. Open Settings
2. Open System
3. Open Languages & Input
4. Open Virtual Keyboard
5. Now open Manage Keyboards
6. Now you can turn on or turn off Ginger or Grammarly.

When you use Ginger, you will see The alphabet on the right side. It shows the number of errors also. When you click on it, it will show you errors. Now, you can make corrections.

When you use Grammarly, you will see the G alphabet in green color and the number of errors. When you click on it, you will see errors and suggestions to correct them. Just click on them to make corrections. Swipe right and left to see errors.

In this way, you can proofread your content on the computer and mobile.

Proofreading is important to make your content professional and readable.

Always proofread your content.