- Knowing the difference between Your and You’re. Your is all about possession – ‘It’s your book’ or ‘your bag’. You’re is short for you are – as in ‘You’re leaving your book in your bag’
- When to use Lose and Loose. This one I am sometimes guilty of myself but all you have to do is think about it for a minute. You can lose your keys and your wallet – perhaps because your jacket was too loose. Get it?
- Using e.g and i.e. If you want to give an example of something, e.g is the one to use. But if you’re looking to explain something in a simpler way, then it’s i.e ‘Hairdressers use a variety of different tools, e.g brushes, combs and pins.’ or ‘Hairdressers use lots of technical equipment to manipulate hair, i.e tools of the trade.
- Their where? Over there! There can be a place or used as a pronoun. For example, ‘There is no food in the cupboard.’ Their is plural – so you’re talking about more than one person. so ‘their shopping was still in the car park’ would make sense.
- Particle Problems. Some sentences can be tricky – confusing people no end, like this one: ‘Featuring four head sets and two switches, my mum brought the machine into the kitchen’. Most people will read that and think my mum is made of steel. This is because the first bit of the sentence does not modify the next bit of the sentence. A reader always expects this. If they don’t marry up you’ll just confuse everyone.
If you’ve been given the job of updating the company blog or newsletter even just knowing where to start can feel intimidating. We are all experts at putting things off. When a task looms large in our heads, it can sometimes feel easier to just ignore it and do something easier instead. All writers procrastinate. […]
A quick heads up on why the words at the top matter. Headline writing is a true art form. Armed with just a few well chosen words you can convey a great deal within a matter of seconds. It’s no surprise then that with so much riding on headlines a lot of thought goes into their […]
Writing for a living can be very rewarding. Every day you create something new; bringing new ideas to life. But EVERYONE has little bugbears about their profession and writing is no exception. Now it goes without saying that I love what I do… but every so often I feel the need to count to ten. […]