5 Ways You (Yes, You) Can Make Copy Good

5 Ways You (Yes, You) Can Make Copy Good Everythingabout a write-up ?its perceived value, efficacyand message ?rests upon good copy. Copy issubstance and without it, even the most skilledand well-meaning writer and his article will beignored or derided, the article's message lostand considered worthless. Is it still any wonderwhy people go through great lengths in order toproduce a good piece of writing? Learn the ways

you, too, can make copy good:Know what you'll be writing about.There is nothing worse or even more pathetic thana writer who bluffs. True, many writers havewritten well-fabricated tales and passed them offas genuine but they were able to do so only becausethey backed up their writing with plenty ofresearch.If you were asked to write about cryptozoologyright now, for example, how much would you be ableto produce without using a single reference?Probably not a lot even to convince your7-year-old niece.To avoid groping blindly about regarding yoursubject and make your copy good, do research.Use at least three good references for yourwrite-up. If you have to interview someone for itor try something yourself, then do so. This willallow you to gather enough information to use with

your write-up.Think about your readersYour readers or audience have different voices.To make your copy good, consider carefully whatit is they like and are interested in and then zeroin on those. Speak their language so they becomemuch more comfortable with what you have to say.If you're writing for kids aged 9 to 12, forexample, you wouldn 抰 use the kind of languageyou write with if your audience were men and womenin their 20s and 40s, right? Remember thatyou're trying to sell an idea through your writing,so speak to your readers in a way they can easilyrelate to.Watch your grammarIf you were a good listener during your grammarclass, you might want to heave a sigh of relief.

A high premium is placed on good grammar and ifyou want to make copy good, make sure you avoidhideous grammatical and spelling mistakes.Be careful with subject-verb agreement,punctuation marks, tenses, sentence completionand clauses. Bad grammar is never viewed as goodcopy and is even dismissed as very amateurish andunreliable, even if it's an expert talking.Mind the headlineThe headline serves as the introductory statementto your write-up. Without a good headline,there's a good chance your target readers mightignore your article and look somewhere else. Thisis something you can't allow to happen. Imaginehaving to miss 7 out of 10 readers just becauseyour headline doesn 抰 work.Make sure your headline is effective, clear andconcise. It should interest the reader, make them

wonder, raise their curiosity, even intrigue themso that they have enough reasons to want to readmore.Make copy easy to readFinally, to make copy good, it has to be relatableand easy to read. If you're writing about plantingroses for beginner gardeners, for example, don'tmake it sound like an instructional material forproducing fossil fuel. Read your work out loud ?ifit sounds like normal speech, then you're on theright track.Mind your readers. They are, after all, the endusers of your work and they should be able to likewhat you offer them.