I’ve gotten it down to a pattern, and I’m seeing fewer rejections. It’s always hard to tell just what affects acceptance rates, but submitting articles with fewer typos and clumsy formulations certainly has to help. It’s a simple three-step process after I’ve finished the article and think it may be OK.
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Proofreading is vital to a writer. If you leave a out, it can kill your chances with an an otherwise good article. (Yes, that was intentional.) Last time I talked about the benefits and limitations of Grammarly and mentioned the need to put your own judgment first. Just remember to give your judgment all the help you can.
One technique is to read a piece aloud when you’re done with it. You can catch errors that slip past your eyes this way. But I find that when I do this, I tend to mumble as fast as I can, so it’s not always as helpful as it might be. Recently a colleague on a writers’ forum suggested having your computer read your post back. (That person didn’t give a full name, so I can’t give credit here.) This struck me as an excellent idea, and I’ve started using it.
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