Websites: fix typos to boost credibility
Writing
Spelling mistakes on your website could damage the credibility of your company. Web spell checker Spellr.us promises to help keep your site typo-free. We’ve been trying it out.
Janet uses Spellr.us to find a typo on the Polon website
Why do you need a web spell checker?
Typos are a fact of life (Spellr.us estimates 9/10 websites have spelling errors). In businesses where lots of different people publish information to the company website, and where that site is frequently updated, typos will always creep in. It doesn’t mean that people can't spell. Typos are often caused by things like slip-ups with cut and paste. They can crop up after text has already been checked. And they're often hard to spot once published.
How typos damage credibility
So what’s the problem with having the odd typo on your website? Research conducted by Dr BJ Fogg and his team at Stanford University identified perfect spelling as one of the top ten factors affecting the credibility of a website. In a study of over 4,500 people they found that ‘typographical errors and broken links hurt a site's credibility more than most people imagine’.
Websites have typos despite spell checkers in word processors and content management systems. Spelling errors crop up despite copy being reviewed. So if you want to help keep your website credible, you need to tackle the typos that get published.
Why use Spellr.us to find spelling mistakes?
Spotting mistakes online is difficult to do. You know what the word should say, and your brain fills in the gaps. So spell checking a whole website yourself is likely to be tedious and ineffective. When we wanted to check the Polon site we looked for an automated spell checker to help us out, and we found Spellr.us. There are other tools out there. We considered TextTrust. But we felt Spellr.us was easier to use and had pricing plans that suited us (prices start from just $10 for 5 scans). And we haven’t been disappointed.
Here are three reasons why we like Spellr.us:
- you get your whole website spell checked in just a few minutes
- you get the spelling mistakes highlighted on a screenshot of your website
- you can build a custom dictionary and ask Spellr.us to ignore names
In fact, we’re so pleased that we’ve signed up to the Spellr.us affiliate scheme to help spread the word. We can also manage your Spellr.us account for you and send you regular reports. Drop us a line for more details.