Not only am I a freelance writer, but I also work for some clients as an editor and / or a proofreader. I am writing this as an editor to all freelance writers.

When you are submitting your work, whether a sample to get a job or your 100th piece for a long-term client, you should ALWAYS check your work. We all know that the freelance marketplace is full to the brim with writers and wanna-be writers, so losing out over not taking an extra 5 minutes would be very sad.

So, what do I mean by check your work? At the most basic, re-read and check your spelling, but that’s not all.

Yes, you read right, re-read your work and spell check it. You would be shocked at the number of submissions I get that are full of errors, both spelling and grammar, that are clearly highlighted by Word! There is nothing more frustrating for an editor who is receiving work to have to spend the time correcting these types of obvious errors.

To give you some ideas of what you should be doing, here are three reasons that I have rejected writers:

Check Spelling and Grammar

While you should spell check every document before you submit it, do not only rely on Word. There are times when words are spelled perfectly correctly, but they are in fact the wrong word. Common examples include art instead of are, in and on, if and of, three and there and my all time favorite error … legal statues (should have been statutes).

Most of the time, the articles that are being written are less than 500 words, so it shouldn’t take more than a few minutes to run the spell check in Word and also re-read your piece prior to submitting it. Not doing this vital check makes it appear that you are not that concerned with the position or you do not really want it. With a long line of writers waiting to give the job a go, do you really want to lose the work over 5 minutes of your time?

Follow Writing Guidelines

I can’t stress this enough!

Some clients have very specific guidelines and others are a lot more lax. Be sure that you know exactly what is expected of you before you submit your piece. Guidelines can include everything from word count and formatting to English dialect to be used, tone of the article and very specific requirements for how to write numbers, dates, etc.

If you are provided with a style guide, read it and use it to check your articles to ensure you meet all of the requirements. A colleague actually dropped a writer as they continued to submit articles that were not formatted in Arial 11 pt font with 1.5 line spacing. This may seem like something very small, but when you are receiving a lot of articles, correcting formatting quickly becomes a waste.

I find it very frustrating when I have to return articles because they are not written using the requirements that are very clearly laid out in the writing style guide that was provided. Many editors agree with this sentiment and, even if a writer’s writing is superb, it is just not worth the time and hassle of correcting these types of errors.

Know Your Audience

I have clients in Canada, the US and the UK and all want their work done using the English language of that country. Now I have lived and worked in all three countries for some years, so my knowledge of the differences and quirks is pretty good, but I still set the appropriate language in Word. This way, any that I miss will be picked up by the spell check. I have actually stopped using a writer that was from Australia and, even though I asked her on several occasions (read over 10) to write in US English, she always submitted her pieces written using Australian English.

Also, know who specifically you are writing for. Are your articles addressed to a very particular group in the population or are they meant to be more wide ranging? Is the tone formal or chatty? Can they be date specific or should they be timeless so they do not become outdated (leading to changes having to be made)?

If you are ever unsure about anything that you have to submit, it is better to find out before you start than have something returned for revision, or, even worse, rejected because you have not followed what is required of you.