I do editing work and I don’t use Microsoft Word’s Markup system. I started out—way back when—using my own system. It works for me and it seems to work for my clients, so I have not changed.
I like to get personal with my clients’ work. In other words, I write messages throughout their text—telling them, “Good job. I like the way you handled this,” or “This is confusing, can you clarify?” or “Earlier in this section, you said it was noon and now you indicate that it is early morning. Please fix.” or “Is the horse brown or white? Be consistent.”
I put my messages and my suggested corrections/changes in red.
This morning, I wrote some text and demonstrated my editing techniques using red print. But when I copied it over into my blog, the red all turned to black. It appears that I am unable to give you a demonstration. Bummer.
Let me just say that this process works for most of my clients. However, I had one who is colorblind and can’t see red. After I used red throughout the entire manuscript, she told me this. I found a way to change the red to blue, which saved me a whole lot of time. Now, I sometimes ask clients if they have any problems with my using red as I edit. One client said, “Could you use blue or green. Red is so in your face, like it’s yelling at you.” Funny.
Learn more about Patricia Fry at her websites:
http://www.matilijapress.com
http://www.patriciafry.com
If you would like a demonstration of my editing style on something you wrote, send a few pages to me at PLFry620@yahoo.com and I’ll show you my technique.