1) Headquartered in Miami, our operations are comprised of a nationally chartered bank, SUB, a wealth management division, SB&T, and an international branch of our parent company, BS.
Okay, it’s composed of, never comprised of. The large thing (the operations) is composed of smaller things. The large thing comprises small things.
2) When we ran into issues with our hosting company, we realized we needed a tech partner for our rapidly-growing business.
Never hyphenate an –ly adverb.
3) This open source platform has become the standard on the web due to it’s easy-to-manage backend, plugin architecture, and extensive scalability.
Wow, the most common mistake in the English language, made by a company that is paid to write content. Really inexcusable. Lots of trendy buzzwords, too. Boo to buzzwords. Looking at it again, I’d also stick a hyphen in “open-source.”
4) Here at ABC, we emphasize the importance of water in your body and how it affects your every day life.
Here you needed everyday, with no space. “Everyday” means regular, commonplace; “every day” means, well, each day.
5) We have over 12 years experience in helping businesses get to the next level by providing quality strategic marketing services.
This is a common mistake, especially in biography-related, “About Us” material. You have to say either “12 years of experience” or “12 years’ experience” (plural possessive). And, typical of this horrible writing, this company uses my least favorite buzz phrase: “to the next level.” I’m so sick of that phrase I could scream.
6) Perfect for small to medium-sized companies who need to outsource their marketing department.
Suspended hyphen rule: small- to medium-sized companies. Plus, a company is never a “who”; a company is always an “it.” So this sentence should read: Perfect for small- to medium-sized companies that need to outsource their marketing departments. Kinda tricky, but that’s it.
7) With over 12 years of experience in building great looking, search engine optimized, business-class websites, we know the steps that it takes to get your web site up and running quickly.
Website is one word, my dears.
8) Clients who subscribe to the Monthly Marketing Packages enjoy knowing their clients are being strategically reached – while they go about doing their thing.
Here we have a little noun confusion: there are two “clients,” and “they” do “their” thing. Rewrite!
9) K*** Marketing + Media offers many mobile features designed specifically for small to mid-sized businesses.
Small- to midsized.
10) What you’d need to know for your first call is that they are on the third Monday of the month.
Since when is “your first call” a “they”? Oh, no! “It” is on the third Monday…
11) Don’t blow off the calls because you are ‘too busy’.
Wow, and these people get paid to write internet content? Dude, that just ’bout blows me away!
Don’t be trendy and sound like you’re 8; use double quotation marks; and quotation marks are always placed OUTSIDE periods and commas.
This sentence was on that company’s website; heaven knows what it is doing to its clients’ sites! (Assuming, of course, that it has any!)
12) During our recorded conference call, you’ll want to have an idea of what you’d like to focus on for the upcoming month (new services, new products, etc).
Got to have a period after “etc.”
13) Sure, we could. But for you to be successful – you have to make time in order to help us grow with you and get your voice captured with a writer. Carving out time from your busy schedule to look at what you have – what’s missing, what’s needed, and what you are and are not saying. Be prepared to clearly communicate – pass over some notes, have a phone call, let us know what is happening when things happen. Communicate to us your ideas, your concepts, your goals, your hopes, your dreams, your fears, etc. will result in better, more clearly focused marketing thank you’ve experienced in the past.
This is such lousy writing that I’m practically paralyzed. The second sentence is a fragment. So is the last. Need a comma after “etc.” Then there’s “thank” instead of “than.” “Clearly focused” my…eye.
I think this must rank as Top 10 on my “Lousy Writing Written By A Supposed Professional” list. I’ll have to check.
14) We get to know them – through you. We need to know about your target audience to make each connection with your audience successful. Who that person is, their age group, their demographic, any details that you can provide up front for us about that person makes for a better message to that person. What are they like? What don’t they like? What are they interested in?
Geez. “A person” can’t be plural; in other words, you must use a singular pronoun with a singular noun. This is awful. Awful.
15) Do you do things around specific holidays or seasonally or what do you have happening that needs to be highly focused and prepped for when that time comes we have that already in place when the event takes place.
Are these people on drugs???
16) Block hours can be used in situations where more print or product related artwork is desired as well.
Product-related artwork.
17) For Email Marketing (Constant Contact mailings): Three Constant Contact emails is included in your plan per month.
You must be consistent, people. You cannot write “e-mail” and “email,” especially in the same sentence.
18) Another fee would be the Constant Contact monthly fee that charges directly to your credit card from Constant Contact themselves.
“Constant Contact” is an it. It, itself.
19) There’s twelve different sizes that could be created, depending on your budget and the goals of the ad.
There are twelve different sizes…
20) Yes, it’s best to utilize the plan in it’s entirety.
And, we’ll end close to where we started: its entirety.
Lesson: put your content in Word before you publish. So much of this sloppiness could have been caught by Word.
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