Ramblings of a Coffee Addicted Writer: Writing Tips Wednesdays

Showing posts with label Writing Tips Wednesdays. Show all posts

Wednesday, May 7, 2014

Writing Tips Wednesday: 1 Simple Tip for Better Online Writing

Hello everyone, it’s Brenda from Daily Mayo, back for another Writing Tips Wednesdays!

Writing is pretty much my life- and how I make my living, which is super cool.

I’ve written online for many years now, and I’ve picked up a few tricks for how to write for an online audience. It turns out, it’s not the same method used for writing, say, for your high school English teacher.

I’m going to show you the easiest way to improve your online writing without even changing any words.

The wrong way:

This is my post. I am going to talk about fish. Fish are the best thing ever. I think fish are the best thing ever because they have fins, gills, scales, and can breathe underwater. Some fish don’t have teeth, while others do. My favorite fish are the fish that have bug-out eyes, because it is hilarious. Fish, fish, fish, fish, fish, and more fish. Seriously, fish are the best. I have a pet fish named Sammy, and it has been alive for 14 years. Crazy. In conclusion, I love fish and so should you.

Ok, so, let’s talk about this fish paragraph for a minute. What is wrong with it?

The biggest problem with the above paragraph is that it is long. Guess what doesn’t work well for online writing? Large, clunky paragraphs. People get intimidated if they think a page will take ages to read, and large chunky paragraphs look like they would take a long time to read.

So, the easiest thing to do is break up the paragraph. Watch how much easier it is to read if we break it up some:

The right way:

This is my post. I am going to talk about fish.

Fish are the best thing ever. I think fish are the best thing ever because they have fins, gills, scales, and can breathe underwater. Some fish don’t have teeth, while others do.

My favorite fish are the fish that have bug-out eyes, because it is hilarious. Fish, fish, fish, fish, fish, and more fish. Seriously, fish are the best.

I have a pet fish named Sammy, and it has been alive for 14 years. Crazy.

In conclusion, I love fish and so should you.

See? It’s easier to read in smaller chunks. In fact, you can make any of your online writing more reader-friendly simply by breaking it into smaller chunks. Imagine you are writing a picture book (adding pictures also keeps people interested), and each paragraph needs to be small enough to fit under a picture. That will keep you from making paragraphs that are too long.

Another benefit of this style of formatting is it allows readers to read every word of your post and discourages skimming. You don’t want anyone to skip the words you spend so long writing, do you?

How do you make your writing online-friendly?

Brenda is a fellow book-lover and coffee-addict. She is a freelance writer, punctuation nerd, and grammar enthusiast. Her favorite book genres are Science Fiction, Fantasy with a Twist, and Dystopian. Brenda blogs about books, writing and more at Daily Mayo. Find her here on CaW for Writing Tips Wednesdays the first Wednesday of every month.

Follow Brenda on Facebook and Twitter or subscribe to updates from Daily Mayo to keep up with all the exciting things in her life; ranging from drinking coffee to get through the day to drinking coffee just for fun.

Editing: Necessary or Not?

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This past Monday, I was a guest on the Stories for Children radio show hosted by the World of Ink Network.

Although the main topic of the show was about children’s books, we went off onto a tangent about some of the differences between Indie writing and writing published by large publishing houses.

One difference that you will often see is a difference in editing.

Editing has clear goals. In my mind, editing is the process of:

Eliminating any typos, grammar, and spelling issues.
Directing the writer to place the ideas in a more organized fashion or suggesting other organizational changes
Pairing down copy so that the idea can be presented in the fewest words possible, or at least, to clarify the point of the story.

Some Indie books are amazingly good and are actually better than many of the books published by big-name publishers. I personally love The Woodlands series, and think it is better than Divergent, and possibly even The Hunger Games.

But on the other hand, some Indie books are published with sloppy errors that make them challenging to read- possibly due to the lack of a qualified editor.

I have read numerous books with typos, spelling issues, convoluted plots, unnecessary content, and a host of other issues that you would not see in a book published by a larger publishing house (usually).

However, some of these slightly-awkward books had amazing and unique plots that I very much wanted to read about.

So, the question we were left with in the show, and what I have still yet to decide an answer for, is: Is it worth overlooking the editing issues if the story is good?

My initial instinct is to say no; simply because, a person who cares about their writing should be determined to present it in the best way possible. I suppose it is sort of like showing up at a business interview in a rumpled suit. The candidate may be qualified for the position, but a rumpled suit shows a lack of care that will probably convey to the interviewer a lack of care about the position.

But on the other hand, if the interviewer (or book publisher), selects someone (or a book) who looks better, that person could lack the substance of the first candidate.

So, in the end, I guess I believe that if a story is good, both the author and the publisher should be responsible for ensuring it is presented in the best light. What errors the author misses the publisher should address. After all, it is their name on the book, too!

What do you guys think?

Writing Tips Wednesdays: Giving 100%

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Our society is built around coasting as much as possible. We coast at work; only doing 5 hours of work a day and messing around the other 3 hours. We coast at home; doing as few chores as possible to keep the mold at bay. We coast while helping others; giving just enough of time or money to prevent guilt.

Blame instant entertainment access, mega-cities, a culture of laziness, a sense of entitlement, or anything else that you want- but the fact remains, most of us tend to do as little as possible to get by.

5 Writing Personalities You Can Have

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When writing for the print industry or the web, everyone tells you to have you own voice. But what does that really mean?

Finding your voice is simply a matter of writing with personality. No one wants to read boring informational articles (well, maybe some people do) or stories, which is why adding personality is effective. However, there are several ways you can do this.

You can be the casual conversationalist

This is where your writing sounds more like a casual conversation than your high-school research paper. It is adding conversation-style words to your writing rather than traditional written words. This is the style I write in most often and the style that most of my writing clients prefer.

You can be the funny one

Humor is engaging and fun. The trouble with humorous writing is that to become funny, sometimes there has to be something to make fun of, which can be a slippery slope. If you ever visited the website Cracked.com, you can see what I mean. Their articles are usually quite funny, but often in a mean or condescending way. If you want to write for humor, then you’ll have to have a tough skin. Additionally, finding something that your readers will find funny in addition to something you find funny is fairly difficult. You’d be surprised at how many jokes are inside jokes.

Writing Tips Wednesdays: 5 Tips for Starting Anew in 2014

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If you’re anything like me, getting back into the swing of things after the holidays can be tough. I enjoy the holiday season, and I try to take off as much time as possible to spend with friends and family during that time. I do less work in December to make room for family time.

But, after January 1^st, going back to writing again can seem like a drag. So, what are some ways to stay motivated for a new year? My favorite ways are listed below:

Review Your Goals

You had goals that you started in the previous year. In 2013, I wanted to increase my blog following and write a book. I accomplished both of those things, but I don’t want to end there. This year, I am modifying my goals to obtain bigger, greater things. I always want to move forward. Having something to work towards is motivating and helps me pull through the after-holiday blues.

Plan Something Fun

Daily work can get boring. To keep motivated to work, planning something fun can be a good option. This could be a fun break a few months into the year, or perhaps a fun goal, like a reading challenge or something you buy yourself after you reach a big goal.

Stick With It

I find that January can be a hard time for staying motivated. In some instances, the best thing you can do is just stick with it no matter what. No matter what you are writing or working toward, just try to make progress every day. After you start to meet your goals, then you will more than likely become more motivated to continue throughout the year.

Don’t Give Up

If you didn’t meet your goals from last year, or didn’t quite get where you wanted to, you may want to throw in the towel. For example, perhaps something you wrote was rejected or passed over in favor of someone else. You don’t have to throw in the towel. There are thousands of opportunities for a person who doesn’t give up. If you continue on your path and don’t give up, eventually, you will end up in a place that makes you happy.

Stay Positive

It is easy to look forward to the year and get overwhelmed. You don’t have to look at the entire year at once. Sometimes, the easiest way to stay positive about the year is just to look ahead to next month or even next week. Staying positive will help you reach your goals- no matter what they are.

How are you facing 2014? Are you facing the year with open arms or dragging your feet a little?

Writing Tips Wednesdays: Dealing With Writer Burn-Out

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I've been a writer for a long time. For most of my writing career, I have ghost written for other people. I often get burnout writing other people's ideas. So that is why I decided I was tired of writing for other people and I wanted to write something for myself. Enter NaNoWriMo.

If you are not familiar with the concept, it is National Novel Writing Month. The goal is to write 50,000 words between November 1st and November 30th.

I was able to complete my goal (read how I did it here). I did get to 50,000 words. But what I was not prepared for was how I would feel afterwards.

Writing is draining. I always imagine each word like a tiny smudge of yourself that you leave behind like a snail's slimy trail. The more words you write, the less of yourself there is.

After writing 50,000 extra words in November, I can definitely tell you that I feel like a drained snail. It has been extremely hard to continue working since I reached my goal just before Thanksgiving.

So, what have I done to keep motivated? Basically, three simple things.

3 Simple Ways to Keep Writing after Burn-Out

Set Goals: Goals are how you stay focused on what you want to achieve. If you don't have any solid goals, then there is no way you can make it past burnout. I like to plan daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, and yearly goals.
Do the Bare Minimum: Normally, I try to do a little more than I have to do to get ahead. But when facing burnout, the minimum is enough for a while. Just make sure you start doing extra again after a small rest period to avoid life-long procrastination.
Plan for Breaks: You will need a lot of off time to recover from burn out. I plan to take off at least a week in late December to make up for my burnout. I have also taken several small breaks each day. My kitchen has never been so clean.

So, that's it! What do you do to keep going if you are feeling burned out by writing?

Writing Tips Wednesdays: Bad Writing Advice Everyone Should Follow

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One of the best writing tips I ever heard is usually considered bad advice in the writing community. This writing tip won’t win you any awards, and it certainly isn’t a way to create the best books, blog posts, or essays in the world.

What is the tip?

Just write something.

Even if you have practically nothing to say, you are still better off writing something down.

Why? Because writing is rarely about extreme talent or having something clever to say. Writing, like many things, is simply a matter of practice. The more practiced you are, the easier it will be. The best way to become practiced at something is to do it. When you pledge to write, no matter what, then you will preventwriting procrastination and get farther than you ever thought possible.

This month, I am participating in National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) and National Blog Posting Month (NaBloPoMo). If you are unfamiliar with NaNoWriMo, it is the challenge to write 50,000 words of a novel in one month. You have to write about 1600 words a day for this to happen. NaBloPoMo is simply committing to post something every day on your blog.