By Julia Sullivan, Creative Director
Proofing can be a painstaking process. Every mistake you miss
comes back to bite you. In the Trigard marketing department, we review proofs
many times a day. No matter what we're reviewing, we use the same diligence and
checklist. Sure, errors still happen, even after a dozen people look at
something. But following these guidelines help us keep those errors to a
minimum:
- Print
it out.
Proofing tends to be more accurate when you're looking at a printout
versus on the screen.
- Check
phone numbers and websites. Even if you look at them all of the
time, give these extra attention.
- Run
spell-check.
It seems obvious, but you'd be surprised how many times this step gets
skipped.
- Look
at dates on a calendar. Is Tuesday really the 6th?
- Lots
of text? Read it backwards. Yes, you read it right. If you're
editing a long story or newsletter, read the whole thing backwards, one
sentence at a time. That lets you check each sentence for grammar errors
without getting caught up in the flow of the story. When you read the
flow, your brain skips over the little errors.
- Check
alignment.
Since you're working from a printout, get our your ruler or even the edge
of a piece of paper to check that things are all in the right rows. Don't
trust your eyes!
- Get
another opinion. Even if you're sure it's great, have someone else
look at it.
So how does good proofing pay off? The better
you proof, the fewer reprints you'll have. And that's real cost-savings.
