In their piece they’ve tested free versions of both tools, and outlined that “Linguix is no match for ProWritingAid when it comes to understanding your writing.”

This was a nice take, but the outline seemed a bit unreliable to us, so we decided to conduct our own side-by-side test. Here is what we’ve found.

Step #1: Analyzing the UX

Folks from PWA have tested the web apps, so we would do the same. Linguix web editor has several important features its competitor could not offer, including:

• Document storage. In Linguix, you can create as many documents as you need, and keep them in your storage.
• Folders and search. Once you’ve created dozens of documents, the navigation issue arises. We solve this by offering easy-to-use search and folders that allow you to organize and browse your content easily.
• Secret mode. Need to edit sensitive content? No worries, just use our Secret mode, get your writing checked, and then the text will vanish forever. It works like secret chat in a messaging app.

What about ProWritingAid? We’ve tried, but failed to find any way to store more than one document, any privacy-related features. Not talking about folders! 

Note: maybe, all these features are in place, but we’ve failed to find them, which tells a lot about the UX.

Step #2: What about the grammar check?

Again, let’s quote folks from PWA:

[..] ProWritingAid went deeper, highlighting issues with commas, capitalization, overly complex language, and confused words. Furthermore, you can use the ProWritingAid reports to visualize key document stats like sentence length to make sure you’re including enough variety.

Alright, let’s test and verify or bust this claim. Here is the test sample we’ve used to run through both Linguix and ProWritingAid (unlike competitors, we’re posting it here, so everyone could run their own test):

Excel has been a goto solution for financial planning for decades. This is a potent tools; however, it allows building linear models only, which may not be good enough in the modern business environment. In addition, such models are limited in their flexibility and could not be easily optimized for higher performance.

Here is an example. A US-based trucking company decided to boost its operations by implemented a more advanced solution for shipping optimization. The goal was to optimized the truck loading and shipment processes ​so that the weight and the axles load are always within the street legal restrictions. If the truck was overloaded, the company can get a fine.

Obviously, there are some mistakes in this sample content. Let’s paste it to both free Linguix and PWA to see what we will be able to get from them.

Here goes Linguix:

We can see nine (9) alerts, some of which are premium.

What about ProWritingAid? Here you go:

We see seven (7) highlighted words and phrases. But what assistant did its job better?

Although Linguix offers some Premium alerts, which do not contain explanations for free users, the tool still highlights the issues. So, the user can in fact understand what to fix to improve the text. For example, here is the sentence: 

In addition, such models are limited in their flexibility and could not be easily optimized for higher performance.

Here you should switch the word could with can to make the sentence grammatically correct. PWA does not see an issue here, while Linguix highlights it to let you improve your content. 

Wait, you may say, but there are some corrections that ProWritingAid shows and Linguix does not. A closer look at these purple underlines tells us that all of them are passive voice, which the PWA’s algorithm does not like:

However, as you can easily read on the web, the passive voice is not grammatically incorrect, and you are not “wrong” if you use it. This is an idea we support here at Linguix. And as so, we do not highlight things that are not actual mistakes. 

Another correction that was not highlighted by Linguix is the “decided to boost” phrase within the second sentence in the last paragraph:

‘

PWA thinks that this affects readability, whatever it may mean. Again, this is not an actual mistake! In turn, Linguix’s Paraphrasing Engine allows you to see how you can change the sentence to make it sound native, all on demand. This makes the whole sentence more readable, not the part of it!

So, Linguix showed more mistakes, it showed actual mistakes, and it offered the way to make any sentence in the text more native, not a part of it.

Step #3: Free app’s functionality

At this point, the PWA’s research was finished, and folks switched to promoting their premium features. What about features that might be useful for a retail customer? Colleagues have mentioned:

• Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Edge extensions
• Microsoft Word
• Scrivener and Final Draft (we do not have that)
• Google Docs
• Open Office, Rich Text, HTML, Markdown (we do not have that)

Sounds great. Until you know that almost all these features (and even more) are free in Linguix! 

• Browser extensions for Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Edge
• Desktop applications
• MS office add-ins (including Outlook!)
• Mobile keyboards for iOS and Android (PWA does not have them!)
• Writing Coach and Content Templates (no alternatives!)
• Paraphrasing Engine (again, PWA does not offer it)
• Intelligent shortcuts for faster typing
• Vocabulary enhancement features

You can use all these applications and features at no cost! Also, while testing, we’ve found out that a free ProWritingAid is limited to 500 words…At that point we felt that this was enough and stopped calculating points.

Final thoughts: we would never build this without you

Here at Linguix we are actively working on the product, constantly pushing new features, and always talking to customers via email (for e.g., you can reach our founder Alex here) or in our Facebook Community.

This unbelievable connection between the whole team at Linguix and our users and customers makes the whole thing work. As a result, the simple test that follows the methodology of side-by-side comparison of two writing assistants leads to Linguix’s win. We could never achieve this without your support, so thank you!

P. S. And in the meantime I’ve searched for letters from PWA in my inbox, and guess what I’ve found? 

Asking for feedback using a noreply email address..

P. P. S. I still think Chris Banks and his team are doing a great job at PWA. However, we at Linguix do even more.

The post ProWritingAid vs Linguix: A Side-by-Side Comparison appeared first on Linguix Blog.

Somewhere along the line, someone will need to be convinced why investment in writing actually matters. Here are just some of the reasons it does. And it really does.

Provide Consistent Quality in Your Teams’ Business Writing

Poor writing, whether a multitude of grammatical and spelling mistakes, or the wrong choice of words, reflects badly on your business. Poor content on your business site increases bounce rate (the number of visitors who leave your site immediately upon arrival).

In fact, a recent study revealed that a website littered with typos and other obvious written mistakes will immediately lose almost twice as many potential customers as a site free from errors. 

Likewise, blog articles, advertising copy of whatever it may be will fail to deliver if it contains the kinds of mistakes that a smart grammar and spell checking tool would easily take care of.

Provide Consistency in Your Business Message

The next step in providing quality content is to ensure you have a consistency in your business message. This isn’t just what you are selling, but how you are selling it. Does your business writing have an identifiable and consistent style that all of your team aim for? Have you even established what that is? And if you have, are you able to manage and measure that?

An inconsistent message in your teams’ business writing will only result in confusing potential customers. Then you’ll lose them.

An intuitive writing tool, such as Linguix Business, provides, in essence, a living style guide that adds consistency to your teams’ writing. Set the goals you wish to obtain from your writing and watch as the Linguix tool assesses written extracts to that level. That’s a smart business assistant.

Save Money by Automating Written Messages and Consistency

Did you know that office workers spend around 28% of the working day managing emails? That’s a significant amount of time, and is surely something any business would want to cut down on if possible. And it is.

Imagine being able to simply click to produce automated written snippets that have been previously produced to convey the exact message you are aiming for. Not only can this reduce on time spent typing, but also adds to consistency in message.

This is exactly what the Linguix snippets feature, which comes as part of Linguix Business, can provide. Simply allocate shortcodes to the text that you wish to save and reuse, and then the whole team can click to paste that text wherever required. With such a smart tool, save up to $18 per hour or $10,600 annually.

Improve Writing Quality Across Sales, Marketing, and Customer Service Channels

Using an intuitive writing tool to improve the quality and effectiveness of your teams’ writing adds value across the boards. From internal employee comms to external sales and marketing drives, better writing ensures better results.  

The last word here is that achieving consistency in writing quality across a team doesn’t need to involve a significant financial investment. Linguix Business is a writing tool designed, as the name would suggest, specifically for businesses. As well as ensuring consistent quality in your teams’ writing performance, you can also ensure consistency of message and style by configuring the insights and goals that you set in your teams’ writing.

As well as getting access to all the Linguix Premium features, such as grammar and spelling checks, vocabulary enhancement and synonym suggestions, personalized language learning features and a wide variety of writing templates, Linguix Business offers statistics and monitoring systems, integrations with established business tools and document storage space.

At as little as $10 per month per employee, and with 24-hour support, Linguix Business is an incredibly efficient and cost-effective means by which to attain consistent excellence in the quality and content of your teams’ writing. Who still needs convincing?

The post Why Good Writing Matters in Business, and How it Can Be Achieved appeared first on Linguix Blog.

Indeed, if you’re not quite sure exactly what it is, then how do you know if it could be useful to you or not? 

Which then raises the question, could it be something you are missing out on? This article should answer all these questions for you, and more besides.

What is a writing assistant?

A writing assistant, as the name would suggest, is a tool that can help you with your writing. 

But what does that actually mean?

Well, we can all have issues writing something, whether we are writing in our native tongue (English for example) or are expressing ourselves in a language that is not our first.

There are so many things that can go wrong with our writing. For example:

• spelling mistakes
• incorrect use of grammar
• bad punctuation
• sentences that are too long
• ideas that are poorly communicated
• wrong words
• wrong formality
• wrong feeling to the writing

Did you know that a digital writing assistant, such as Linguix, can assist you in all of these aspects of your writing? The AI-powered assistant scans work and highlights all elements of the text that need to be, or could be, amended and improved upon. Not only this, but it categorises the mistakes so you can fully understand what the issue is.

In this way, a high-powered writing assistant such as Linguix is not just a tool that enables you to improve your writing, but it also educates as well in terms of how your writing can be improved. 

A quality writing assistant is also a writer’s toolkit

A quality writing assistant will not just guide you in your mistakes, it will also provide the tools by which you can continue to improve and grow your writing skills. 

We have already spoken about how Linguix is far more than just a simple spellchecker software, but the tool doesn’t just highlight your mistakes, it also offers workable solutions that have been included in Linguix’s sophisticated corrections database. This database has been built by experts to provide the types of practical alternatives that a writer is searching for.

Get synonyms and definitions of words. Get suggested structural alternatives. Get recommendations in changes in style and format.

With this type of assistance, you now have the tools at your disposal to produce not only the caliber of writing that you are aiming for, but you can also create the kind of text that is perfect for your intended audience.

With Linguix, for example, you can avail of statistics which guide you in various aspects of the content you have already produced. You get word count and sentence count, as well as the average reading time of your text. These are important metrics to have access to.

You also receive statistics pertaining to the average word and sentence length, and then a numerical grade based upon the highly respected and ubiquitously used Flesch-Kincaid readability score.

On the ‘audience’ tab you can then select your target readability, your ultimate goal, and even the emotion you wish to project within your writing. The Linguix tool then offers suggestions based on these parameters you have selected. 

We have exited the function of assistant, which suggests a passive role, and are now in the realms of active participation in bettering your writing. That is what a great writing assistant can now do.

Get editing suggestions as you need them

The free Linguix extension for Chrome, Firefox and Microsoft Edge allows you to avail of the tool wherever it may be you write on the web. What does this mean?

It means that instead of having to formulate all of your text in the Linguix editor, you can enter your written text wherever it is you intend to use it (let’s say on social media, for example), and you immediately get the same writing assistance you would from the Linguix site itself. 

That means instant corrections and suggestions to take your writing to a higher level. It’s even available on Google Documents, meaning collaborative teams can avail of all the benefits a sophisticated tool such as Linguix provides.

Writing assistants have come a long way. Now you know what an assistant can do for you. 

The post What Is a Writing Assistant, and What Can It Do For My Writing? appeared first on Linguix Blog.