Scouring every article for errors was part of the job, and if you read hundreds of anything, be it Gawker articles or tweets from Weird Twitter or works by Isaac Asimov, you begin to notice writing habits. What follows are the 10 most common copy problems I’ve found on The Content Strategist. The word often begins the last paragraph of a TCS piece, as it does here, here, and here. It’s been used four times in one article, and two “ultimately’s” have appeared within six words of each other. (Isn’t the whole point of a study to go in deep on something?) Using “luckily” when there’s no luck involved “Luckily” is such a common transitional word that people overlook its meaning. But here, the comma implies that this story is Thompson’s only insightful article—it’s not, so there should be no comma. If there’s more than one of the thing being described, it gets no commas. By using “etc.” instead of completing the list, we leave readers wondering what, exactly, brand guidelines involve. Read publications known for their stellar writing and you’ll notice that transitional phrases almost always never begin sentences.
For more than two years, I read every single article on The Content Strategist. This loyalty was not borne out of rampant TCS fandom, though I did and still do love the publication, but out of a sense of duty. A self-proclaimed grammar nerd, I was Contently’s copy editor, a defender of proper grammar and style, and a bulwark against bad jargon and clichés.
Scouring every article for errors was part of the job, and if you read hundreds of anything, be it Gawker articles or tweets from Weird Twitter or works by Isaac Asimov, you begin to notice writing habits. I sure did. Mistakes I’d have to keep fixing every time we published a piece. Overused phrases that I’d add to a list. Idiosyncratic antics I’d know to look for from specific writers. (Some of these are not necessarily errors.) What follows are the 10 most common copy problems I’ve found on The Content Strategist.
1. Overusing “ultimately” to tidily wrap up an article
Once, in a fit of frustrated curiosity sparked by removing five instances of the word “ultimately” in one post, I did a Google search to see how many times we’d used the word on TCS. There were hundreds of results. Today, there are over 300 posts that use the word.
The word often begins the last paragraph of a TCS piece, as it does here, here, and here. It’s been used four times in one article, and two “ultimately’s” have appeared within six words of each other. I’ll concede that “ultimately” sounds more sophisticated than “basically” and more appropriate than “when all is said and done.” Ultimately, though, TCS writers could cut back on this habit.
2. Using “in-depth” so much it loses meaning
A standard-length interview with a marketing leader is in-depth. A 35,000-word Mother Jones “investigative report” is in-depth. A study we conducted is in-depth. (Isn’t the whole point of a study to go in deep on something?) “Longform content” is in-depth. A checklist, by very definition something itemized and broken down, is in-depth. When everything is in-depth, nothing is.
3. Using “in fact” in reference to non-facts
We live in a “post-truth” world of “alternative facts,” so I understand the need to ground our writing in indisputable information. Yet we occasionally fall prey to using “in fact” when referring to things that are, well, not facts.
We write that playing it safe with content strategy “feels like the prudent move, but, in fact, you’re dooming yourself.” That’s not a fact, that’s a prediction. “In fact, brands are creating some of the most innovative and engaging content on the web.” Contently is in the business of promoting brands’ quality content, but the quality of anything is a matter of opinion. “In fact, with a more widespread and nuanced view on an industry like financial services, a freelancer could arguably bring”—I’ll stop there. If you say “could arguably” in the same breath as “in fact,” well, that’s just, like, your opinion, man.
4. Transforming nouns into verbs and verbs into nouns
A plague in the corporate world, changing nouns…
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