Cut the Fluff is a weekly newsletter that will help you become a confident editor. If this was sent to you, subscribe here so you don't miss the next lesson.
Hey Reader,
“It’s good enough. I’ll hit publish.”
How many times have you said that to yourself?
I’d bet almost every day.
And that’s not a bad thing. Published is better than perfect, as they say.
But what if you could spend 10-20 more minutes on a draft and take it from good to great?
So instead of “good enough,” you say:
“It’s great. I’ll hit publish.”
How good would that feel?!
I won’t promise I can teach you my 7 years of editing experience in 2 minutes (so you can beat 99% of people) 🙄
But I will spend the next 2 minutes walking you through my social post editing checklist to help you build your confidence.
It’s quick to learn. The trick is actually to implement it with every post you write. If you’re willing to do that, you’re going to massively improve your results.
And let me be clear before naysayers come for me: Sometimes, good enough is good enough. Life gets in the way, time is short, and responsibilities abound.
I’m talking about when you’ve got the means to improve it and don’t know how.
To show you how this works, I’m going to share a post I wrote on social a few months ago.
I got meta and went through the checklist on the actual post as I wrote it, which is one of my favorite ways to teach because you get to see my thought process out loud.
Here we go:
This week, I challenge you to run your social content through this checklist and see how it feels.
Of course, a checklist is only as powerful as the skills you already have. If you don’t know how to write a scroll-stopping hook on social, checking yourself against that limited knowledge won’t do much. Same with following the "what" with the "why" and "how," making sure every sentence adds value, and everything else on that list.
Step 1 → Learn the skills.
Step 2 → Check the skills.
I’ll keep sharing ways to do both here. But if you want to accelerate your learning and get great right now, check out my hook writing and editing courses. I’ve set up parity pricing for both, so you pay based on where you are in the world.
Any questions about anything, just hit reply!
Cheers,
Erica
PS: I'm thinking about testing a new offer. I miss working 1:1 with people, but my time is limited, so I'm only opening up 3 spots. It'd be for entrepreneurs, founders, or content marketers who want to attract + convert more high-value clients through your online writing (social posts or blogs). I'll only do it if I get enough interest, so if you're keen, reply and say "NEW OFFER" and let's talk.
1. Grab Hooked on Writing Hooks. Join 642 students who've learned to write scroll-stopping hooks and finally get their content seen. This course teaches you the frameworks I used to grow from to ~80k followers on social and make multi-six figures on LinkedIn and Twitter/X (without resorting to clickbait or BS tactics). It's my first collaboration with Rob Lennon, and buyers say they use Rob's AI bots daily to write powerful hooks.
2. Grab Content Editing 101. 181 people have bought up my new collab with Rob Lennon and are loving it. This course teaches you how to edit your writing from a sentence-by-sentence and big-picture view. These frameworks allowed me to go from an underpaid freelance writer to a Head of Content and industry expert.
3. Join Power Your Platform. Over 5,500 people read Power Your Platform to embrace their unique point of view and build real authority on social. Subscribe to my free newsletter with Kasey Jones if you're keen to finally grow authentically on social.
What'd you think of today's issue? Reply and let me know :)
Erica Schneider
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Learn to edit words like a pro. I've edited 3M+ words and each week, I share a lesson to teach you what to cut, how to add value, and how to finally feel confident when editing. Every subscriber gets access to my Editing Library, a database of 62 edits broken down by the problem, my take on how to improve it, and my edited version.
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