Grammar is a critical aspect of any website. Whether designing a business or personal site, you can never go wrong with proper grammar usage. Why is this so? Poor grammar can spoil an excellent written piece and put off the readers. However, you can easily avoid blunders and have your readers enjoy every aspect of your writing. There are common grammar mistakes to avoid when designing a website. Let’s learn about them.
1. Punctuation Errors
Proper punctuation is an integral aspect of writing. Whether writing for your website or other written documents, a well-punctuated piece always stands out. There are various punctuation blunders, and dash symbol mistakes are pretty common. To avoid this, go through the dash rules, and understand how dashes can change the tone of your sentences.
Other punctuation errors include;
- Missing commas
- Unnecessary quotation marks and exclamations
- Overuse of apostrophes
- Improper use of commas and semicolons
- Wong use of hyphens and dashes
It’s advisable to check and proofread your work before publishing. Besides, there are multiple tools to aid you in doing this, and many are free.
2. Spelling Mistakes
These involve misspelled words and are typical for words with similar pronunciation and a different meaning. Examples of commonly misspelled words are;
- Acceptable
- Absence
- Achieve
- Acquire
- Accommodate and more.
To this, know the exact word that you want to use. You can as well lookup the correct spellings online in case of doubts. Also, be keen on double letter words. Be cautious when using them and avoid spelling words phonetically.
3. Use of Passive Voice
Passive voice occurs in sentence construction quite often. It happens when the object of an action becomes the subject of the sentence. And this is when you place the object at the beginning of the sentence rather than at the end. Why is this not right? The use of passive voice makes your writing sound unclear and weak.
4. Missing Words
Often, we type too fast and don’t proofread the work thoroughly. This leads to missing words, resulting in n incomplete sentences that don’t make sense. To determine missing words in your sentences, watch for missing subjects, predicates, or other essential parts of grammatically correct sentences. Also, use words such as; like, that, a, an, and the, for more clarity.
5. Sentence Faults
There are various sentence faults to avoid in your website design. The common mistakes include fragments, complex sentences, wrong comma splices, and more. Complex sentences make your writing look ambiguous and are difficult to understand.
Similarly, sentence fragments are pieces of incomplete sentences. Avoid them by using simple sentences, and don’t make them too long or too short.
6. Very Long Paragraphs
Readers seek websites with easy-to-read content. The use of long paragraphs makes the information hard to read and will put off many readers. Therefore, break up your paragraphs into shorter sub-paragraphs and try anything around 100 words. Sections above 200 words are way too long and complex. They may only attract highly skilled readers.
7. Shifting Tenses
It is easy to shift from one tense to another when writing. This is not advisable, though. Moving from past tense to present and back impacts the flow of your information. Use them to indicate changes in the timeframe of an action or when you have a valid reason for doing it.
In Summary
Even the simplest grammar mistakes can ruin your web content. To avoid this, proofread your work thoroughly and, if possible, use the many online tools to help you. You may also want to perfect your grammar skills, and acquiring a reference book will go a long way. Search online for the best reference books and pick the latest publication for updated information.