what-makes-a-good-qa-team

Here is another article dedicated to content. This time, I will focus on how to properly review a ready content and possibly improve it. My fellow blogger, Teo, talked about the importance of detailed proofreading and you can see her blog for more information about that. Keep reading my blog to see what the 411Writers’ QA magicians do and a few tips on how to properly revise your content.

Know your future readers!

Always start with some research…

Knowing your audience is equally important for both the content writing and the quality assurance processes. Understanding your readers will help you determine the details that need specific attention in order to create the foundation of your content. Answering questions such as “Why would people want to read my content?” and “How do these people look?” will definitely give you valuable information.

Also, it is really important to understand whether your audience is reading for leisure or work, if they are just looking for shareable material, and where they will most likely read this article (you can aim for short articles people tend to read while waiting for something or longer, but interesting, content while having their coffee). Determining the number of pictures and videos needed on the page is also important. With the results from this research, you will have a clear idea of what this content will look like.

Divide and conquer

Or tear to pieces and improve…

Breaking your content into pieces is a challenging task. Sometimes, it’s a must, at least if you are looking for detailed proofreading that gives results. What I can offer you is to grade your content according to certain criteria and give it an overall score. At least this is what the QAs at 411Writers do. And I really trust those QAs….

Here’s an example of the categories that need to be evaluated

  • Spelling & Grammar
  • Headlines & Subtitles
  • Images
  • Tone
  • Emphasis & Bolding

When proofreading, our QAs use a 10-grade system for each one of these, with 1 being the worst score and 10 being the best. When the overall result is below 5, the content should be rewritten.

Evaluate your evaluation…

Keep in mind that, during the editing process, you (or whoever is revising your content) may deviate from your initial strategy. Experience shows that this is not a bad thing every time, but you should really monitor the changes and ensure you are on the right track.

How to evaluate your evaluation..?

There are several questions you should ask yourself (or the person revising) on 3 stages of the revision process. In the middle, nearly before finishing, and after finishing. The questions should be something like:

  • Are you still addressing the same targeted audience?
  • Are the keywords properly used?
  • Are the tone and language still right?
  • Does the information look properly structured?

The QA Team of 411Writers follows these rules to the letter. Of course, we won’t share everything that we know about content writing and quality assurance, I mean, as much as I want to, our QAs won’t tell me everything… Anyway, if you have any questions or thoughts about this, you can leave us a comment, and I’ll do my best to give you the answer you’re expecting.