Copyediting is an often-overlooked service, and people frequently confuse it with proofreading. But they’re both extremely important steps before you publish your manuscript. Basically, copyediting happens during the draft stage, before you format your book. Proofreading happens after your book has been formatted—it’s the last step before the book goes to print.

You worked very hard on your manuscript. Now it’s time to let a professional editing service make sure it’s pristine before you start formatting and printing.

Rely on our copyediting services for authors.

Congratulations on your finished masterpiece! You’ve poured your heart and soul into your work. Although you’re excited about sending it off to be published, there is a crucial next step: copyediting!

You understand that copyediting is important for basic spelling and grammatical errors. But do you know how vital copyediting is—or even what copyediting is? It’s a failsafe to make sure that everything is ready to be published. Without copyediting, you risk embarrassing typos, misspelled words, and grammatical errors.

Copyediting can be a scary process. Your work is going under a microscope and is vulnerable to criticism. But when you hire the right professional editing service, you’re hiring a partner that will offer suggestions to make your work the best it can possibly be. A professional copy editor is the cornerstone of your book’s success.

How much copyediting experience does Elite Authors offer to authors?

Elite Authors comprises a team of experienced professionals. They work on manuscripts every day to make sure each one is thoroughly edited and ready to publish. They’re passionate about words, language, and storytelling. That means they pour their hearts and souls into your work!

Elite Authors can assist you through the entire prepublishing process. Did you know there are multiple stages of editing before you even get to the copyedit? Here are a couple of the additional editing phases:

• Developmental editing is a big-picture review of your manuscript. A developmental edit will examine the structure and style of your work. For works of fiction, developmental editors will make sure that the plot flows well and doesn’t contain holes. For nonfiction books, developmental editing will address the organization of the information in your book.
• Line editing is pretty self-explanatory. During the line edit, the editor goes through your book line by line looking for grammatical or spelling errors. This phase of editing might include suggestions on how to improve or upgrade your use of words. Since this phase of editing might lead to changes to your manuscript, you’ll need a copy editor to go over your work after the line edit.

The Elite Authors team knows how hard you worked on your manuscript. Remember the sense of pride and fulfillment that you felt when you finished your book? The Elite Authors staff puts that same investment into every piece of writing that they copyedit.

Why should you choose Elite Authors for your copyediting service?

Elite Authors are thought leaders in the field of copyediting. They understand the ins and outs of the publishing industry and will read your manuscript with a keen eye focused on making you successful.

All authors—new and established—need a strong copy editor on their team. You put a lot of yourself into writing your book. Let the experts take you the rest of the way.

Why does your manuscript need copyediting?

A manuscript takes a long time to create. You’ve probably read it a hundred times and are now blind to any grammatical and spelling errors. Or maybe there’s a plot hole that you’ve overlooked since you’ve spent so much time buried in your book. You need a fresh set of eyes: a professional editing service.

Most published works have to go through an average of six to eight rounds of editing. This sounds daunting, but each of these rounds is a crucial component of your success. If you’re self-publishing and don’t hire a professional copy editor, you are risking sending fixable mistakes to all of your potential readers. If you’re working with a traditional publisher, they might not read past the first few errors. Your manuscript deserves the very best. Hire a professional copy editor to take great care of your work.

How to find your perfect match

Your manuscript is just that: yours. In order to keep it yours, you have to find the right copy editor to fit your needs and exceed your expectations. In researching your options, you should look for a flexible editing service whose editors understand that your book is unique and can’t just fit into a boilerplate package.

What does a copy editor correct?

A copy editor will correct everything that you and the larger-scale editors might miss. Your copy editor will focus in on each word to make sure it’s spelled and used correctly. The last thing you want to do is to send off your masterpiece with typos!

It’s extremely important to pick an editing service that has a strong history and track record—and that understands that your work is your pride and joy. In addition, you’ll want to choose an editing service whose editors pride themselves on keeping up with the ever-changing trends in the writing and publishing industries.

Why should you work with an experienced copy editor?

Your manuscript is the fruit of your labor. Writing a book isn’t easy, but you did it! Now you need professional assistance to make sure it’s ready for publishing. Sure, you can ask your friends and family to proofread it for spelling errors. But you also need an experienced editor to view it through the professional lens of copyediting.

A professional copy editor will be able to identify and help you correct any issues that will raise a red flag to your publisher. After all of the time and resources that you poured into your manuscript, you deserve to have an expert put it through the copyediting process.

What are the risks of publishing without using a copy editor service?

Whether you’re self-publishing or working with a traditional publisher, there are major risks if you don’t hire a professional copyediting service. And although spellcheck software will remove some of the margin of error, it won’t catch everything. Here are a few of the dangerous mistakes that you might not catch without personal and professional assistance:

• Spelling. Are all of your words spelled correctly? What about commonly misused words like “your” and “you’re”?
• Word choice errors. Spellcheck software also won’t flag a word that is accurately spelled but incorrectly used. Do you mean “pour” or “pore”? “Definitely” or “defiantly”?
• Grammatical errors. “Your” and “you’re” also fit into this category. But keep in mind that spellcheck will not catch most errors with apostrophes, commas, semicolons, and other punctuation.

These are embarrassing, but they happen to everyone! All manuscripts—regardless of their length—will almost certainly have an error here or there. Don’t leave yourself vulnerable to easily fixed mistakes. Hire a professional editor to guide you to success.

Why should you choose Elite Authors for your copyediting?

In order to give your manuscript the best chance of success, your work needs to be clean, understandable, and free of errors. The best way to achieve this is to partner with a professional copy editor who will closely study your book.

And since every author is unique, Elite Authors offers multiple packages and custom services to ensure that you get the best service available. They understand that writing isn’t a “one size fits all” profession, and they are set up to provide custom options for each author.

How can Elite Authors protect your reputation as an author?

Everyone has experienced typos. They’re bad enough in text messages and emails. But they’re even worse in professional and published manuscripts! Elite Authors understands that your credibility is on the line and that even small mistakes will have a negative impact on your work.

Typos, misspellings, and grammatical errors are embarrassing and sometimes difficult to overcome. In the case of published literary works, they can be detrimental.

Consumers and readers might not take you seriously as an author if they see mistakes that you missed. And traditional publishing companies might toss your manuscript out if they see too many errors.

Elite Authors understands that your reputation and credibility are at risk. Their team of specialized copy editors is available to protect you from these mistakes and set you up for success.

How do Elite Authors’ copy editors work with authors?

Elite Authors understands that copyediting needs to be a cooperative process. Multiple revisions and proactive communication are part of this process.

Elite Authors will use Microsoft Word’s Track Changes feature so that you can review each and every suggestion they make and comment they write. They will be a full-fledged partner to help your book succeed.

What manuscript editing services does Elite Authors offer?

Elite Authors knows that helping you succeed has multiple phases. That’s why they offer several manuscript editing services:

• Developmental editing
• Line editing
• Copyediting
• Proofreading

Each of these phases is as important as the next. You need a trusted partner to help you on your way. And you deserve to be successful! Elite Authors will work to make sure that you achieve the highest level of success at the best price available. Copyediting is an investment in your book. Don’t leave this to chance—hire the esteemed professionals!

Common copyediting questions

Most authors want to focus on the substance of their manuscript. You have a story to tell or information to share. You have enough on your plate developing the characters and organizing the plot.

For many writers, copyediting is the last thing on their list—if it’s even on their radar at all! But that doesn’t mean that copyediting is unimportant. In fact, it’s a vital part of fully finishing a book.

What is copyediting?

Copyediting is the crucial step between finishing your manuscript and having it published. Without copyediting, you are opening yourself up to simple errors like spelling and grammatical mistakes. You’re also vulnerable to larger gaffs like using the wrong word.

A professional copy editor will capture all of these errors. And the best editing service will offer you multiple phases of editing. You’ll need help with big-picture edits like developmental editing all the way down to the nitty-gritty aspects of line editing.

What is the difference between copyediting and proofreading?

Copyediting happens in the draft stage, before you have fully formatted your book. Since the formatting process generally involves typesetting instead of simply copying from a word processing document and pasting into a book template, mistakes can happen when you format.

The proofreader is the final set of eyes on your formatted book before you send it to publish and print. Your proofreader is your last line of defense against simple mistakes.

So hire a professional editing service! Their expertise will help pave the way for your book’s success.

Why does a manuscript need multiple rounds of editing?

Your manuscript wasn’t written in a day. It took a lot of time to perfect, and you had to read it and reorganize aspects of the plot multiple times. Your work is complex and deserves a complex team to ensure that it’s ready for your readers.

Every book needs a few experts to put their lens to different aspects of the work. A developmental editor will make sure that the plot flows smoothly and the characters make sense or the information is organized in a cohesive, impactful way.

And a line editor will put each sentence under a microscope. Your copy editor will check for grammatical and spelling errors.

Once your manuscript has been formatted into your book, a proofreader will review it for any remaining errors or errors introduced in formatting. Each team member will offer suggestions or recommendations if they see anything that can be improved.

Although it can be difficult to accept constructive criticism, this is an absolutely vital part of the writing process. Your editing team is here to help you ring up book sales once you’ve published your work. Let them provide suggestions to improve your manuscript.

Get ready to publish everywhere.

You’ve finished your book and are ready to prepare it for publishing. Whether you’re an established author or a newcomer to the writing field, this is quite an accomplishment! Now it’s time to get ready to publish your work everywhere.

How does copyediting prepare your manuscript for online publication?

Copyediting will ensure that your manuscript is ready to publish. If you’re planning to publish your work as an e-book, your copy editor can even help you prepare your work accordingly. The best copyediting services even have tips and tricks to publish with huge companies like Amazon and Barnes & Noble, so you know you’re in good hands!

How do the publishing requirements of online media houses differ?

Each online media house has different publishing requirements. If you’re publishing an e-book, you’ll need to reformat your manuscript to comply with each house’s template. Additionally, the various print-on-demand companies will have differing requirements for page counts and formatting.

Your professional editing team can help you with all sorts of formatting, so just be sure to inform them of your publishing goals.

Why is copyediting recommended for traditional publishing as well as self-publishing?

The editing process is an anxious one for many authors. You’re putting your raw work into a professional’s hands so that they can put it under a microscope and identify problems that you need to fix.

Sometimes the relationship between an editor and an author can be strained because of this anxiety. But it’s important to remember that your copy editor is a teammate who is trying to help you.

If you’re sending your manuscript to a traditional publisher, you’ll need the aid of a professional copy editor to ensure that there are no errors.

Traditional publishers receive a lot of book proposals, and the slightest mistake might make them toss your work in the trash. And if you’re self-publishing, you could unknowingly release an error-riddled manuscript into the world. Hiring a professional copy editor saves you from these disasters.

Hire a copy editor to ensure your success.

You gave your best effort to your manuscript. Now it’s time to partner with a professional copy editor so that they can give their best effort to making it ready to publish.

When you rely on an expert copyediting and proofreading service, you are setting yourself up for success. And when you partner with Elite Authors, you are hiring the cream of the crop. Let Elite Authors start copyediting your masterpiece today!

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