Whether you like it or not, people will judge your blog by the quality of your writing. The first thing you should do is to avoid the most common spelling mistakes, as they can turn off first-time visitors to your site. Below you’ll find 10 such mistakes to get you started.
1. accept / except
INCORRECT: Please except this gift.
CORRECT: Please accept this gift.
Except, as a verb, means to exclude or leave out. As a preposition it means “with the exception of.” Accept means “to receive willingly.” For example: We visited every landmark except the Eiffel Tower. The school is accepting only those students who have had their shots; all others are excepted.
2. advice / advise
INCORRECT: He refused to take my advise.
CORRECT: He refused to take my advice.
Advise is a verb. The s has the sound of “z.” Advice is a noun. The c has the sound of “s.”
3. all right / alright
INCORRECT: He’s alright after his fall.
CORRECT: He’s all right after his fall.
Although arguments are advanced for the acceptance of the spelling, alright is still widely regarded as nonstandard. Careful writers avoid it.
4. effect / affect
INCORRECT: His death really effected me.
CORRECT: His death really affected me.
The most common use of effect is as a noun meaning “something produced by a cause.” The most common use of affect is as a transitive verb meaning “to act upon.” For example: The disease had a lasting effect on the child. The family’s lack of money affected his plans.
5. every day / everyday
INCORRECT: Dan walks the dog everyday at six p.m.
CORRECT: Dan walks the dog every day at six p.m.
Everyday is an adjective that means “daily.” Every day is a phrase that combines the adjective every with the noun day. For example: Walking the dog is an everyday occurrence. I practice the flute every day.
6. its / it’s
INCORRECT: Put the saw back in it’s place.
CORRECT: Put the saw back in its place.
It’s is a contraction that represents two words: it is. Its is a one-word third-person singular possessive adjective, like his. For example: The man lost his hat. The dog wagged its tail.
7. passed / past
INCORRECT: The car past the train.
CORRECT: The car passed the train.
Past is used as an adverb of place, or as a preposition. Passed is the past tense of the verb to pass. For example: The past few days have been hectic. The deadline has passed. He passed her the biscuits. The boys ran past the gate. As we stood in the doorway, the cat ran past.
8. quiet / quite
INCORRECT: We spent a quite evening reading.
CORRECT: We spent a quiet evening reading.
Quiet is an adjective meaning “marked by little or no activity.” Quite is an adverb meaning “to a considerable extent.” For example: The children are quite amiable today. Quiet can also be used as a noun. For example: We enjoyed the quiet by the lake. (The suffix “ness” should never be added to the abstract nouns quiet and calm.)
9. then / than
INCORRECT: I have more eggs then you.
CORRECT: I have more eggs than you.
Then is an adverb that indicates time. It can go anywhere in a sentence. For example: The man paused by the door and then entered. Then the noise started. As conjunction or preposition, than will always be followed by a noun or a pronoun. For example: I like Melville better than Hawthorne.
10. who’s / whose
INCORRECT: I don’t know who’s dog you’re talking about.
CORRECT: I don’t know whose dog you’re talking about.
Who’s is the contracted form of “who is.” Whose is the possessive adjective form of who. For example: Who’s your daddy? Whose car are we going in?
Maeve Maddox holds a Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from the University of Arkansas, and she is the editor of DailyWritingTips.com. The mistakes mentioned in this post come from her latest book, 100 Writing Mistakes to Avoid.
I’m a bit of a grammar fanatic, but 5 and 3 made me say, hmmm. I’ll be watching those more closely. Thanks for this!
It is always good to be reminded of those common mistakes and thank you for introducing a great resource!
guilty with number six. i know the difference between the two. guess my fingers are just used to typing that word with an apostrophe. but i’ve already improved on that about months ago :)
Thanks for this! I always make the “everyday” and “every day” mistake. Now I know how it works!
Are you serious? These are common mistakes for bloggers who post in English?
I don’t believe it.
Regards
thanks for this! i’m a total snob and if i see too many spelling mistakes i’ll close the page and go somewhere else. but i’m sure i’ve made my fair share of them in my short blogging time. especially “all right” and “every day” – didn’t really know about those!
So well said all about the grammar mistakes that each one us some times had made . In my earlier days the commonest mistake was about the affect /effect stuff.. but hope so now it has been good.
Thanks
The usage of every day and everyday is still confusing for me. Thanks for sharing this useful info. We all do mistakes, hope will not repeat these.
Must be a slow blogging day when you rehash these again. Every site puts up the common mistakes. How about something new and fresh?
Great advice and great examples. I would add: Your and You’re, as well as Chose and Choose, and to and too. :)
Here’s one that gets under my skin:
Could’ve (could have)/ could of
Could “of”? That makes zero sense and yet I see its use rising. Doesn’t have to be “could”. Anything with the contraction ‘ve.
If you make more than 2 of these mistakes you should read an English book prior to ever publicly writing again.
That’s why it’s important to proof read your work.
No matter how many spelling plug-ins you use they will still miss some basic grammar and spelling issues that arise when blogging.
Here’s another one people often get wrong:
their
there
they’re
their = belongs to them
there = that place
they’re = the contract of they are
contraction
duh
Is the next lesson on proof reading before publication?
I hate to do this, but this caught my eye:
Alright versus all right
I’m not sure if you meant to say that American writers avoid it versus careful writers, because “all right” is an American spelling – “alright” is widely accepted in Canada.
And we’re pretty careful, even witih the beer, moose and beavers. :)
All common mistakes, but the real problem is when you see more than one in the same post. That denotes serious issues.
Very true, no matter how many times I proof my work, I always find a couple of mistakes down the road when I notice that I’m ranked for a keyword like “Internet Marrketing”
Funny enough is that even that sends me traffic! :)
Have a good one Darren!
Great advice, I am just starting out and I’m part of the BlogFrog/SITS group completing the 31DBBB – every time I look at my blog I see some kind of spelling mistake or type, this is something I really need to work on. Great to have a refresher on some of the more common mistakes. Thank you.
Hmm
well i think that would not be a big problem as long as the reader not aware it :-)
I struggle with the contractions. I proofread as much as I can and use spell check.
English is not my first language nor is it my second, plenty of room for improvement still.
Thanks for the post.
Although I’ve been writing for decades, I’m still grateful for this instruction. I feel I have learned something. (I hope I haven’t made a mistake here, or you’ll correct me).
Hi Darren,
I’m really guilty with some of the words here. Now, I always read my article twice and minimize the mistakes before I post my post.
Thanks for this information.
You missed the one that I see far too often….”your” instead of “you’re”
I keep a txt file called spelling tips I refer to, when writing to help avoid common mistakes like:
They’re, their, there
They’re = they are.
Their= possessive. Their house, their coat, their deep emotional problems.
There= something in a place. The car is parked over there, there is a problem with offering a woman solutions when she just needs to vent.
Your, you’re
You’re= you are
Your= possessive. Your house, your coat, your girlfriend, your problem communicating with a girl you’re into
Great list. I’d add their, there, and they’re…as in, “There misuse of their drives me batty.”
Ahem —
here = this place
hear = audible reception — you hear with your ear
(Check your comment above.)
;)
Yes, I see a lot of these mistakes. “Alot” would have been a good one too! See that one quite a bit. Thanks for bringing light to this. Fortunately, my spelling is pretty cool. Except when I wanna pull out my Mark Twain card! :-)
LS
Thank you for this reminder to always check and recheck for spelling. I’m guilty of the its/it’s confusion when typing in a hurry. It’s such a small little symbol to catch when editing, but makes quite the difference!
I’m also guilty of making spelling mistakes without realizing it. Here is my common list:
1. travelling (should be one ‘l’)
2. affiliate (how many ‘i’ should there be)
3. compliment vs. complement
4. millennium (how many “l” and “n” in there)
5. maintenance vs. maintainance ??
6. committed vs commited
7. license vs licence
I must thanks the person who had invented spelling checker. My spelling could get worse without it.
Seriously wtf!
I’m not a native english speaker and reading those mistakes i thought ‘what’s the big deal?’. I learned that years ago in school and wouldn’t come up with those mistakes.
Nice post but poor guys who needed it to be pointed out. I expected bigger mistakes than just first grade spelling exercises. Without being offensive.
I wouldn’t say that these are common errors for a blogger or any other professional writer, but they’re mistakes that you frequently see on forums, blog comments and reviews. Although I wouldn’t accept basic grammatical mistakes from a professional writer, I’ve come to expect it in user generated content (although I still hate to see people write your instead of you’re or quite instead of quiet).
Your list surprised me. A blogger making these mistakes is operating at a very elementary level.
Consider doing a post on how to avoid typos.
Rita blogging at The Survive and Thrive Boomer Guide
I must protest!
#3 alright / all right – they do NOT mean the same thing. For example, “The children are alright” means they’re healthy or unhurt (perhaps after an accident). Or it can mean, “Hmmm, they’re reasonably well behaved; I like them a little bit but I’m not crazy about them.” “The children are all right” means that every child answered a question correctly.
#5 every day / everyday – “everyday” does not necessarily mean “daily”. It can mean that something has become so common as to be boring, predictable and barely worth commenting on.
there are some typos, but some are because we are not the english native speakers.
@Rita,
I’m sorry, but elementary level is far behind me – consider that a lot of bloggers originate from non-english countries. I, for example, was born and I live in Poland – English isn’t my native language, I would never think about difference between advice and advise.
This is a great post here. I thank God for my teachers in kindergarten who put in place a great foundation in me for correct spelling. So important for your image and credibility.
#5 – thank you!!! As a former editor, I see this everywhere – even professional advertisements. Drives me batty.
These are great.
Ensure/insure is another big one. Use insure only when speaking of insurance, as in a policy.
Words–so innocent and powerless as they are, as standing in a dictionary, how potent for good and evil they become in the hands of one who knows how to combine them.
-Nathaniel Hawthorne
I need to work on this – i dont spend enough time checking through it
My pet peeve is when people don’t know when to use Their/There/They’re. I’ve even seen professors and CEOs unable to use it correctly. It’s very annoying…
Good grief, I forgot my PET PEEVE: using an apostrophe when making something plural! I’ve even seen this in the text scrolls on the local news. Idiots.
Here is another one. Your/You’re How many times have you seen this? “Your invited to attend.” That one always gets me.
I’m with everyone else who has cited “their-there-they’re”, “your-you’re” and “two-to-too” as their peeves!
Yep these annoy me along with ‘aswell’ and ‘as well’.
Applause all around!
I am forever guilty of typos but a grammar mistake is enough to send me into a tizzy. There is nothing worse on a blog post (or email, for that matter)!
I agree that most of these are not spelling errors, but usage errors.
“Could “of”? That makes zero sense and yet I see its use rising. Doesn’t have to be “could”. Anything with the contraction ‘ve.” Gideon, I’ve seen this one too, and I think what happens is that the spoken contraction “could’ve” sounds like “could of.”
Other mistakes I see on blogs are:
1. “a large amount of people” instead of “a large number of people. Since people can be counted individually, one should use “a large number….” A large amount is used when referring to uncountable stuff, such as “sand.”
2. Using pronouns incorrectly, e.g., using “myself” as the subject of a sentence.
3. And “lie” versus “lay” as another commenter mentioned or is Lie the new Lay?
Only 10? :) There are at least 30 others that drive me crazy every day – I listed 19 worst offenders on my post and I even see the errors here in problogger from time to time…..Reading the posts at least twice will take care of most oversights. Thank you for writing this post!
This is a good resource. I am one that has issues with effect and affect, but the explanation helped. Thank you.
Blessings & Giggles to you and yours,
Jeanie
Good advice, it’s often the simple things that are missed. I am often conscious of spelling differences between my UK spelling and what my US readers expect but I am sticking to my guns and having ‘favourites’ (Despite what most of the spell checks tell me!)
Thanks
Tony