The Writing Process, Deconstructed – (Part 2)
By Heather Robson

In last week’s featured article, I introduced the five-part writing process. This is a process writers use to accomplish several things, including:

• Overcoming writer’s block
• Getting more easily into the creative “flow” of writing
• Identifying weak points in a draft and finding ways to shore them up
• Removing stumbling blocks that break up the flow of writing
• Polishing each piece of work so it is as strong and error-free as possible

If you’re new to the world of freelance writing, this process might seem a little strange. Lots of people come to writing with the idea that writing is all that’s involved — that words just pour forth in a coherent, logical, and moving way. For the rare few that may be true.

For me — and for many others — it’s not. But that’s where the writing process comes to the rescue. When you use this process, you can create powerful sales copy, gripping articles, even brilliant fiction. You can be a better writer than you imagined … as long as you recognize and accept that it doesn’t always work out that way on the first pass.

So, just to recap, the writing process involves five steps: Pre-Writing, Drafting, Revision, Editing, and Proofing. Last week, we dug into Pre-Writing (the secret to beating writer’s block every time) and Drafting (everyone’s favorite step), and I gave you several tips to help you make the most of each of those steps.

Today, we’re going to take an in-depth look at the remaining three steps: Revision, Editing, and Proofing. Lots of people lump these three together into a single step. If you do that too, it’s okay. But I want to challenge you to try separating them out during your next two or three projects. See if it makes a difference. I know it does for me.

Revision, editing, and proofing get lumped together because they all have to do with improving your writing and fixing errors.

The difference between each step is the breadth of your focus. First up …

Step 3. Revision

Revision is just what it sounds like — a chance for you to take a new view of what you’ve written. During the revision process, you want to review what you’ve written as a whole piece and section-by-section.

During revision, look for:

• Unanswered questions: Is there anything in what you’ve written that raises questions you don’t answer? If so, would answering those questions add strength to your piece? (Usually the answer is yes, but not always.) If that’s the case, then you need to review the research you did during pre-writing to see if you have the answer. If the answer isn’t in your existing notes, you’ll do a little more research to flesh it out.
• Lapses in logic: Do you have any sections that don’t flow in a logical order or that are built on assumptions rather than facts and experience? If yes, those sections need some reworking.
• New possibilities: If you follow the writing process and allow your words and ideas to flow during the drafting process without censorship, then you may very well discover some new ideas that deserve to be emphasized. Giving them the spotlight might mean tweaking the way your work is ordered.
• Stray thoughts: Keep in mind the Power of One. If you have sections or paragraphs that are not adding strength to your Big Idea, those may need to be rewritten to show a clearer link to your main point. Or they may need to be cut.
• Consistent voice: Does your work sound like the same person talking all the way through? If not, give some thought to the voice of the piece and rework the sections that don’t fit.

During revision, you address two things: (1) major problems or areas of weakness, and (2) missed opportunities — ideas that developed during drafting that can be refined and used to make the end result even more powerful.

The revision step is actually the ideal time to have someone else read your work and provide feedback, telling you where they were most engaged, where they were confused, and what questions they had.

Once you’ve gone through the revision process, the next step is to edit your work.

Step 4. Editing

While revision happens at the top-level — either your whole piece or section-by-section — editing brings your critical eye in closer, looking at the piece paragraph-by-paragraph.

During the editing process, you want to look for ways to:

• Eliminate clichés
• Strengthen weak phrasing
• Smooth transitions
• Improve clarity
• Reduce wordiness

This is your chance to identify those paragraphs that are wordy, bumpy, or boring and change your phrasing to be concise, clear, and engaging.

For clichés, look for ways to give them a twist that will make them fresh again. For boring sentences, take a moment to get excited about what you’re trying to say and then reword it while in that mindset. Make sure moving from one paragraph to the next is easy and seamless for the reader. (Hint: Read it out loud to make sure.) And identify any ideas you can express more simply.

After the editing process, it’s time to proof.

Step 5. Proofing

This is what many writers mistake for editing. It’s an important step, no doubt, but if you skip the revision and editing steps, you’ll miss many opportunities to push your writing from good to great.

During the proofing step, your goal is to find errors and fix them. Proofing is much more than running spell check, although be sure to do that, too. You want to make the document as clean as possible. By now, it should already be well organized, well written, and a pleasure to read.

Proofing puts the frosting on the cake and makes you look like the professional you are.

To make your proofing step as productive as possible:

• Go through the piece word-by-word from front to back, correcting errors as you find them.
• Next, proof backwards. Go through the document sentence-by-sentence from the last to the first. You’ll catch many errors doing this that you might otherwise miss.
• Then, read the work aloud. Reading aloud during revision and editing is also not a bad idea. Doing this reveals things that aren’t obvious when you read silently.

If you deliberately go through each step of the five-part writing process, you’ll find that you’re writing stronger, more credible, and more professional copy in no time.

This article, The Writing Process, Deconstructed (Part 2), was originally published by Wealthy Web Writer.