11 Jun Copyediting Star Wars: Before and After
Copyediting and proofreading are essential cogs in your content development machine. Without them your message risks falling flat or worse: actually damaging your brand. When it comes to good copyediting there are some tried and true methods for ensuring your content is up to scratch.
Today we’re going to take a well-known excerpt from Star Wars and use it to illustrate some of these methods. Yep, you all know the one.
It is a period of civil war.
Rebel spaceships, striking from a hidden base, have won their first victory against the evil Galactic Empire.
During the battle, Rebel spies managed to steal secret plans to the Empire’s ultimate weapon, the DEATH STAR, an armored space station with enough power to destroy an entire planet.
Pursued by the Empire’s sinister agents, Princess Leia races home aboard her starship, custodian of the stolen plans that can save her people and restore freedom to the galaxy.…
Without further ado, let’s dive in.
1. Keep your sentences snappy
Run-on sentences are your worst nightmare when it comes to good copyediting. Particularly online, overly long sentences will, at best, trip your reader up. At worst you risk losing them to reader fatigue – a phenomenon in which your reader gives up on your message because the effort of reading it becomes too much.
Let’s look at our example.
“Rebel spaceships, striking from a hidden base, have won their first victory against the evil Galactic Empire.”
Now try to read it again.
“Rebel spaceships, striking from a hidden base, have won their first victory against the evil Galactic Empire, taking possession of secret plans to the Empire’s ultimate weapon, the Death Star, an armored space station with enough power to destroy an entire planet.”
Exhausting huh? A good copy editor will ensure you don’t commit this sin, keeping your readers on point and your message clear.
2. Vary sentence length
Flow is important when it comes to reading. Without it you risk alienating your readers and muddying your message. One of the keys to good flow is varying your sentence length.
Let’s rewrite our example to illustrate what we mean.
“It is a period of civil war. Rebel spaceships are victorious. They struck from a hidden base. Secret plans were stolen. The Death Star is dangerous.”
Reads a little like a list of ingredients for a particularly bland recipe doesn’t it? To help maintain flow, you should vary your sentence length. A good copy editor will be able to catch issues like this one before they become a problem, ensuring your message flows well and readers are kept comfortable.
How short can a sentence be? As short as one word. Yes. One. How long can a sentence be? Some novellists get away with sentences that stretch into the hundreds of words. For copywriting, about 20 is the maximum.
3. Keep your tone and style consistent
Your copy is often a prospective client’s first port of call with your brand. It’s essential that it remain consistent with your company’s look and feel, as well as with the rest of your copy. A good copy editor will ensure your content’s tone and style remains consistent.
As an example of inconsistent tone and style, let’s look back to our example. Imagine if it were written like this:
“It is a period of civil war.
Rebel spaceships, striking from a suuuuper hidden base, have won their first victory against the gross, evil Galactic Empire.
But ho! Rebel spies hath managed to steal secret plans to the Empire’s ultimate weapon, the DEATH STAR, a bigly armored space station with enough power to destroy an entire planet.
Pursued forthwith by the Empire’s sinister agents, Princess Leia races home aboard her leet starship, custodian of the stolen plans that can save her people and restore freedom to the galaxy.…”
You’re probably making a face right now and you should be. Inconsistency like that can cost you readers and, from there, leads.
Your Brisbane copy editor
Well, that was a journey (far, far away). Now you know just a few of the ways in which a copy editor can help your content shine. So how about it? Ready to employ a professional in Brisbane to ensure your copy is up to scratch? Contact Search And Site Authoring today to see how we can help you.
No Comments