Comments on: 8 Reasons to Clean Up Your Online Copy

By: What’s Your Style? | Fathom SEO Search Engine Marketing Blog

What’s Your Style? | Fathom SEO Search Engine Marketing Blog — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 16:46:41 +0000

[...] content and polish up any style inconsistencies you may have.� This is also a good time to look at typos and other common grammatical mistakes.� Don’t forget to think about the search engines, too. � And don’t just take my word [...]

By: Praise for Facebook's Grammatical Awakening | Fathom SEO Search Engine Marketing Blog

Wed, 09 Jul 2008 12:37:57 +0000

[...] Elementary school teachers of English everywhere should rejoice.� Now if only something could be done about loose vs. lose and its vs. it’s. [...]

By: SEO700

SEO700 — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 14:12:47 +0000

I think using proper english on a site is one of the most importamt things to do. Using improper english will make the site look sloppy and like the person or company just doesn’t care.

By: Paul Richlovsky

Paul Richlovsky — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 21:45:22 +0000

You’re welcome, Colleen. And I hope you don’t leave your language unplanted after plowing it.

By: Colleen

Colleen — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 17:47:00 +0000

Thanks, Paul for these great tips. I know I will try to fallow them.

By: Mike Murray

Mike Murray — Sat, 23 Feb 2008 15:00:36 +0000

One client spells a product two ways on two pages – swing sets and swingsets.

I think that’s a good strategy – separate pages for this approach. Poor grammar can be excused if it’s a rarity. If it’s reguarly sloppy, a visitor may question the integrity of the product or service – perhaps in subtle ways. You may never know the impact or the lost opportunity.

By: Paul Richlovsky

Paul Richlovsky — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 19:49:18 +0000

To answer your first question, Art, the hyphen is not necessary, though it seems fashionable these days to use it for emphasis, as you might pronounce a negative prefix with extra force. On the second point brought up by Ian and yourself, I’m aware that traffic could be gained by alternate spellings or punctuation. I think optimization for errors needs to be looked at case-by-case, although as a writer and image-conscious individual, I generally frown upon adding obvious visible writing errors to your site. You’ve got to ask the question, is the extra traffic I’m getting worth whatever potentially embarrassing alterations I’m making?

By: Ian Davenport

Ian Davenport — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 14:21:06 +0000

Great post Paul! Art makes a great point about gaining a competitive advantage if the public searches for incorrect spellings. Also, for words that are commonly mis-spelled, it may be a good idea to optimize your site for both words, the correct and the incorrect version.

By: Art

Art — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 21:50:00 +0000

I would definitely agree that using proper English makes your site look more professional.

That being said, how do you feel about websites using common mis-spellings (is the hyphen unnecessary?) for their own SEO benefit?

It seems to me that if the majority of the public doesn’t notice correct grammar, using incorrect grammar might give you a competitive edge in SEO.

By: Wes

Wes — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 20:07:37 +0000

Great tips. I’d also recommend paying attention to homonyms such as their, they’re and there. All three sound the same, but have very different meanings.

By: Paul Richlovsky

Paul Richlovsky — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 17:32:02 +0000

I appreciate the humor.

By: Tom

Tom — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 15:51:56 +0000

Nicely-done Blog postt, sir!!!