Ann Handley

Misplaced modifiers and odd word order are among the most

common errors I see made by marketers—and by most writers,

for that matter. They are also the easiest to correct.

Here’s another example:

Original: Though often misunderstood, scholars know that anar-

chy does not mean chaos.

Corrected: Though often misunderstood, anarchy does not mean

chaos, as scholars well know.

Once you start paying attention to misplaced modifiers and con-

fusing word order, you’ll notice it everywhere. One word you’ll see

frequently misplaced is only.

So it’s not: Only publish good content.

It’s actually: Publish only good content.

Why? Because the idea isn’t that you should only publish—and not,

say, also create and distribute—good content; the idea is that the

content you publish should be good.

In other words, only needs to modify good content, not publish. (A

handy writing hack is to think twice about placing only immediately

before a verb.)