Clean It Up
UK Window Cleaning Forum => Window Cleaning Forum => Topic started by: Sseddon on August 17, 2010, 03:16:13 pm
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As you may know I started to build a round in July. My dad was a wc and so was his. I have another business www.audiobookbargains.co.uk but it has been hit by a series of issues that mean it is dwindling.
Anyway, clearly people here recognise the value of websites, but most I have seen have numerous typos/grammar problems that will certainly put off some customers. Especially commercial customers. If anybody wishes these things put right I'll happily do it for £25 a site. I'll send a Paypal invoice.
Background wise, I have an English degree plus 10 years developing & editing e-learning courses, so more than able to provide this.
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Hi AGleam,
How much to re-write the wording on a whole website.
I've had one built for me but did the wording myself and not very happy with it.
Can you give any examples of your past work?
Lance
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dont now wot you mean my spelling and gramer is word perfuct ;D
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Hi Sunshine, you can look at my website, but other than that, no. I can't give examples. But I can promise you a grammatically correct site. I will copy your text and all you have to do is paste it back.
If I were picky, there are 18 grammatical errors on your homepage.
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If I were picky, there are 18 grammatical errors on your homepage.
19 actually.
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As you may know I started to build a round in July. My dad was a wc and so was his. I have another business www.audiobookbargains.co.uk but it has been hit by a series of issues that mean it is dwindling.
Anyway, clearly people here recognise the value of websites, but most I have seen have numerous typos/grammar problems that will certainly put off some customers. Especially commercial customers. If anybody wishes these things put right I'll happily do it for £25 a site. I'll send a Paypal invoice.
Background wise, I have an English degree plus 10 years developing & editing e-learning courses, so more than able to provide this.
Shouldn't there be "I am" inserted between "so" and "more"?
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As you may know I started to build a round in July. My dad was a wc and so was his. I have another business www.audiobookbargains.co.uk but it has been hit by a series of issues that mean it is dwindling.
Anyway, clearly people here recognise the value of websites, but most I have seen have numerous typos/grammar problems that will certainly put off some customers. Especially commercial customers. If anybody wishes these things put right I'll happily do it for £25 a site. I'll send a Paypal invoice.
Background wise, I have an English degree plus 10 years developing & editing e-learning courses, so more than able to provide this.
Shouldn't there be "I am" inserted between "so" and "more"?
;D ;D ;D love it.
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Should background wise be one word - if it's any word at all? ;D .
Sorry Agleam. If you're new here, you've just walked into a lions' den. No offence.
Joking aside, you are correct in saying that many sites would look much better if grammar and spelling were improved.
I don't normally proof read my posts but I made an exception for this one ;D .
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defo be a better earner than cleening windows puting speling wright on ere
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defo be a better earner than cleening windows puting speling wright on ere
forgot to ad m8
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Give over, for one thing spelling and grammar is much more relaxed and pliable these days, and on a forum it's a case of mucking in with the lads.
For many, english isn't a first language, and what about those that have that LOL tics, or use emoticoms because they have a very small vocabulary.
But i must say, pendantic window cleaners, wnat next?
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Spelling and grammar on the forums isn't important,.. when trying to convey a professional image from your website it is essential though.
I would suggest that Agleam read a few books on the language of marketing & combine his spell-checking with a "re-wording to sell better" service. Both services have the potential to dramatically boost the effectiveness of a website.
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Give over, for one thing spelling and grammar is much more relaxed and pliable these days, and on a forum it's a case of mucking in with the lads.
For many, english isn't a first language, and what about those that have that LOL tics, or use emoticoms because they have a very small vocabulary.
But i must say, pendantic window cleaners, wnat next?
Very funny Slump.
Matt
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I finished early today and saw this post soon after it was posted. I just knew that people would try to find fault with the grammer & spelling of the post as well as trying to redicule the guy and generally shooting him down in flames.
He's just trying to make a few quid by helping others.
What's wrong with that?? :o
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there are 5 on my site, if you find them il pay you to change it, i can only see 3.
visit www.goldoakwindowcleaning.co.uk
cheers
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I'm interested in biz aglean, what are the issues with the audio book biz?
I'm a keen reader too, and these days that's mostly biz books.Someone on here started a thread and gave a free e version download of a book that was over seventy years old.i had a bit of a read and thought it dated- but because it's supposed to be the best selling book of all time- i had another peak.It turned out to be quite good, it was by a chap called napoleon hill and was called think and grow rich.
I'll have a look at your website and tell you what i think- if you want, you might not.One problem before i look, it's not targeting blind people is it?How can they see it?
See told you i was good.
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Hrrrmph, can't help some people, i must be the target market, educated ,affluent, big reader, AND , owner of an ipod nano.
The audio books seem a bit pricey.Videos are cheaper than audio books, and they have to be posted as CD's you can't download them.
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Mmm...always easy to pick holes in grammar and how a post might be worded, but if you can read it and understand it without having to continually re-read a sentence or paragraph, well, you can't be doing that much wrong....spelling notwithstanding though!
A mate of mine showed me a letter he had composed, it was absolutely flawless, correct in every grammatical detail...and utterly dead and lifeless as a result.
Recently I...er..sort of re-wrote and fleshed out some coursework my partner had done, some of which she wasn't at all happy with; however, in it stayed and with some reluctance was duly handed in...and got her top marks as a result! Yeah, yeah, bad of me I know, but it worked.
Websites don't have to be boring or look like they've been penned by a Victorian scribe, sat at a wooden desk using a quill and inkwell. :o
Bah! Got carried away there with my vision of a scribe, had about half a dozen lines of descriptive narrative to delete...sigh, see? I'm doing it again!
But if any of you have read this and smiled, even a little then you get my point; grammatical precision isn't always necessary, even when wishing to give the impression of professionalism.
Er...not that I was trying to with the above I might add!
Ian
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More to the point i'm trying to give the bloke a few pointers and he blanks me.
i got into a big row about this at school once.A girl let me copy her history homework fifteen minutes before the lesson.It was two and a half pages so i had to blast it down.The conditon had been that i should change it so the teacher wouldn't know it hab been copied.
Everything was fine untill i got an A+ and the girl only got a B.The girl was fuming, she told the teacher and never let me copy again.That's girls.
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there are 5 on my site, if you find them il pay you to change it, i can only see 3.
visit www.goldoakwindowcleaning.co.uk
cheers
I found five by the time I got to the fourth page ;) so there is probably more
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sorry to p on your chips, but can't the text in any web page be copy and pasted onto a word document and spell checked, corrected and pasted back?
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sorry to p on your chips, but can't the text in any web page be copy and pasted onto a word document and spell checked, corrected and pasted back?
Good point.
some phrases, although grammatically correct don't sit well either.And then, we dont actually clean windows, we wash them.We are for the most part window washers, the term window cleaner is incorrect, but it's used because it's one the customer is familiar with.
Here is a good example of over use.How many times is the word audio used?
Audio Books at Audio Book Bargains - Welcome
Welcome to Audio Books at Audio Book Bargains. Audio Books at Audio Book Bargains offer returning customers
But, my website is useless so what do i know.
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Mmm...always easy to pick holes in grammar and how a post might be worded, but if you can read it and understand it without having to continually re-read a sentence or paragraph, well, you can't be doing that much wrong....spelling notwithstanding though!
A mate of mine showed me a letter he had composed, it was absolutely flawless, correct in every grammatical detail...and utterly dead and lifeless as a result.
Recently I...er..sort of re-wrote and fleshed out some coursework my partner had done, some of which she wasn't at all happy with; however, in it stayed and with some reluctance was duly handed in...and got her top marks as a result! Yeah, yeah, bad of me I know, but it worked.
Websites don't have to be boring or look like they've been penned by a Victorian scribe, sat at a wooden desk using a quill and inkwell. :o
Bah! Got carried away there with my vision of a scribe, had about half a dozen lines of descriptive narrative to delete...sigh, see? I'm doing it again!
But if any of you have read this and smiled, even a little then you get my point; grammatical precision isn't always necessary, even when wishing to give the impression of professionalism.
Er...not that I was trying to with the above I might add!
Ian
I'm reading your post and remembering John Cleese correcting Brian's anti Roman graffiti in The Life of Brian :)
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there are 5 on my site, if you find them il pay you to change it, i can only see 3.
visit www.goldoakwindowcleaning.co.uk
cheers
I found five by the time I got to the fourth page ;) so there is probably more
are ;D
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;D
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I'm not overly bothered by the grammatical correctness of my site. However I would like the whole site reworded to help improve the chances of gaining business.
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sorry to p on your chips, but can't the text in any web page be copy and pasted onto a word document and spell checked, corrected and pasted back?
Here is a good example of over use.How many times is the word audio used?
Audio Books at Audio Book Bargains - Welcome
Welcome to Audio Books at Audio Book Bargains. Audio Books at Audio Book Bargains offer returning customers
But, my website is useless so what do i know.
SEO. Notice how the phrases contain links. I'm not brilliant at it, but the site is on page 1 in Google UK and page 2 of worldwide Google for the key word "audio books", which is the one I targeted. Obviously I'd prefer it was higher than that.
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Sorry, had an early night so just checking in this morning.
As one or two pointed out, messages typed on a forum aren’t subject to the same scrutiny that a website that wants to look professional is. I wasn’t worried about the grammar of my posts on this or any thread. I seriously was just trying to help. I have informally proof read friend’s websites for them, but pretty much every website I’ve looked at from CIU is full of poor grammar. I’ll bet if I said I’d do it for free the thread would have been full of look at mine please requests. And i wouldn’t have had the time.
The issue with the audio book industry is mainly downloads. They are much cheaper & much more convenient. I could look at selling other things online, but falling into the audio book industry came about as a result of my dad losing his eyesight and me sourcing unabridged audios for him. It just grew. So retail isn’t really my thing.
Anyway, if anyone would like some help, please email me. I’ll leave it at that.
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Sorry, had an early night so just checking in this morning.
As one or two pointed out, messages typed on a forum aren’t subject to the same scrutiny that a website that wants to look professional is. I wasn’t worried about the grammar of my posts on this or any thread. I seriously was just trying to help. I have informally proof read friend’s websites for them, but pretty much every website I’ve looked at from CIU is full of poor grammar. I’ll bet if I said I’d do it for free the thread would have been full of look at mine please requests. And i wouldn’t have had the time.
The issue with the audio book industry is mainly downloads. They are much cheaper & much more convenient. I could look at selling other things online, but falling into the audio book industry came about as a result of my dad losing his eyesight and me sourcing unabridged audios for him. It just grew. So retail isn’t really my thing.
Anyway, if anyone would like some help, please email me. I’ll leave it at that.
Although I've made light of it, I do agree with you really. Grammar/spelling on a forum is unimportant. However, on a website, I feel that it is very important. It is the electronic shop window of your business.
I suppose that offering to correct any errors for money is fair enough. Personally, I wouldn't feel comfortable charging for such a service though. I have no GCSEs etc as I left school at 15 (the world was about to end so there was no point pursuing qualifications) but I am pretty sound with literacy and numeracy.
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sorry to p on your chips, but can't the text in any web page be copy and pasted onto a word document and spell checked, corrected and pasted back?
Good point.
some phrases, although grammatically correct don't sit well either.And then, we dont actually clean windows, we wash them.We are for the most part window washers, the term window cleaner is incorrect, but it's used because it's one the customer is familiar with.
Here is a good example of over use.How many times is the word audio used?
Audio Books at Audio Book Bargains - Welcome
Welcome to Audio Books at Audio Book Bargains. Audio Books at Audio Book Bargains offer returning customers
But, my website is useless so what do i know.
Maybe, this is why your site doesn't do well. 'Audio' might be considered as spam text by search engines.
Try using variations, books for the blind, partially sighted etc.
I have a very close friend who lost his sight through diabetes a few years ago and prefers to get books from the library a couple at a time. He does this instead of buying them, because if he has a catalogue of books at home, at some point he will need to select a book to listen to and this proves diffucult considering he lives alone. I think making your books available for download is the way forward as they can be put to ipod and selected by listening to a short excerpt.
I hope this is grammatically correct. You've made me nervous about my literacy skills now :)
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Agleam - for me, I think it was the "I've got a degree in English" which had me reading your post with a magnifying glass! ;D
I'm insecure, see? I only acheived a CSE in English and I'm jealous you had the fortitude and stamina to acheive a degree. ;)
But if you are going to offer - for money - to proof read and sort out the grammar, spelling, paragraphs and random capitalisation of websites of the denizens of this forum then you'd better get the post accurate in the first place.
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As has bean men shunned, any won can ewes a spell checker, can they knot? ;D
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As has bean men shunned, any won can ewes a spell checker, can they knot? ;D
I don't think that's the point, Spitfire Boy - you're spelling is perfect, its the other stuff that the OP is talking about I believe.
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Very interesting agleam- about the audio business- and aj's comments.I'm glad you answered in a straight forward fashion and didn't think i was knocking you.A lot on this forum can't take any form of criticism.
As i've said i like books very much and am a huge reader.I was quite impressed with your business book titles but thought that audio books are expensive.If they were cheap i would get loads, but i would prefer to down load.
Are you saying that apples itunes platform and amazon are making this hard?
Some business models don't work so well when a couple of things change.It's gone the other way for us.Legislation, new technology, social changes have led to our job being very different from your dads.The main differences are:
* WFP- we can work quicker and one man bands can do huge buildings or factories on there own
*computers and the internet. Round scheduling software that runs your complete business means the houses needn't be compact and the frequencies can vary.Internet banking means no collecting which is a huge time saver.
*dual income syndrome, means many couples have a huge income but not much time, so takeaway pizzas, ironing services, and people like us thrive.
*lots of old people with big houses and good pensions
*more plastic windows and conservatories- more glass to clean than ever before.
Of course not everything is in our favour.There is lots of competition, and due to forums like this the comp is getting better informed.
I always wanted a degree, the best thing it gives you is the ability to think.The more 'thinking' you put into your window cleaning the better you'll do.As a general rule forget add ons such as proof reading, your hourly rate as a wc'er
should be matchless.If you ever end up in nick, writing letters for some of the lags can be quite a good game- but you'd have to introduce a few errors or the recipient would know it wasn't genuine.
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You need a lot more spaces between your sentences. ::)
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Leights, why do you move the drainage holes in the window frame when you repaint the cill?
Do you take away the drainpipes too ???
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dave wills aint got a clue what rubbish ur talking about?????? inlighten me ?????????
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AGleam, Your email address is hidden. I would like to take you up on your offer.
Maybe if you could spruce up my home page for me to have a look at. If I like what you've done then i'll more than happlily pay you to change the whole site.
Regards,
Lance
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As has bean men shunned, any won can ewes a spell checker, can they knot? ;D
I don't think that's the point, Spitfire Boy - you're spelling is perfect, its the other stuff that the OP is talking about I believe.
What - like missing apostrophes in "its"and "you're" for "your"? ;D
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sorry to p on your chips, but can't the text in any web page be copy and pasted onto a word document and spell checked, corrected and pasted back?
Here is a good example of over use.How many times is the word audio used?
Audio Books at Audio Book Bargains - Welcome
Welcome to Audio Books at Audio Book Bargains. Audio Books at Audio Book Bargains offer returning customers
But, my website is useless so what do i know.
SEO. Notice how the phrases contain links. I'm not brilliant at it, but the site is on page 1 in Google UK and page 2 of worldwide Google for the key word "audio books", which is the one I targeted. Obviously I'd prefer it was higher than that.
The meta tags might have something to do with it.