How to be an editor when you are an experienced writer

If you want to understand how to be an editor, here are 10 steps that will help you if you know how to write and communicate well.

me standing above a beach in GoaHere I am standing above a cool beach in Goa - a famous Indian city. There is no way to reach this beach by land. You can only touch the beach sand if you hire a boat and come here.

By Raza Hasnain Naqvi

Learning how to be an editor can be an exciting and rewarding career choice. It offers the opportunity to shape and refine written content into a polished form that looks professional. 

But there’s one important question: how do you start on this path? 

If you have been freelancing for some time as a professional writer, or you are part of a team of writers in an established publication, that’s a good start. 

I will assume that you have a sharp eye for detail. Plus, I will also go ahead and say that you can spot grammatical errors in written text anywhere. 

In this article, let me share with you ten essential tips that can help you become a good book editor if you are an experienced writer. 

With practice and dedication, you can build your editing knowledge and skills that will finally result in your unique personal editing style.

Steps That Guide You On How To Be An Editor

1. Build your knowledge:

I have been a freelance writer for more than eight years. I have written byline feature articles for six magazines. Plus, my writings have helped my freelancing clients both in online and offline mediums. In other words, I have built my knowledge of the written word. I understand different writing styles and have knowledge of important book editing tools. 

As you understand by now, it is important to build your knowledge of the written word if you want to know how to be an editor. You need to write as much as you can professionally whenever you get an opportunity. Receiving money from a client after your writing has satisfied that client is a good touchstone of the quality of your writing. 

2. Hone your skills:

How do you improve your editing skills? You need to start editing different kinds of content. It can be fiction or nonfiction. As long as you continue to work on your skill on a daily level, yes, daily level, then you have a chance to be a good editor. 

Now, whenever you read any article or blogpost or social media caption online, be ready with your editor eyes. Try and spot the errors that may crop up. The errors are there. They will come to light in your awareness once you train your eyes and mind well with practice.

3. Learn the basics:

Let me remind you again about the importance of book reading. Once you read good books, you read chapters, passages and sentences in those books that make so much sense. They make sense because a good book editor went through that manuscript and took out everything that was senseless or wrong in it. 

S/he polished it until the manuscript shone like a diamond. That book now shines beautifully as you hold it in your hand or see the ebook version of it on your mobile or laptop. This happened when that editor was earlier a writer who understood the basics of grammar and kept putting it into practice.

4. Develop your style:

Every person is unique in nature. Similarly, every editor on the editing path has his/her own editing style. I have my way of how I prefer to edit a manuscript. I have edited and proofread six nonfiction books so far. As I go through this editing process, I continue to develop my editing style. 

The way I edit may be a bit different to any other editor. But the final objective each book editor like me has, is to bring out a good manuscript. Our paths may be a bit different, but the final destination is the same: get the best edited manuscript for the author.

5. Network:

The biggest advantage that you have as an experienced professional writer is that you can convey your messages in a fruitful manner. You can edit your written thoughts and make it relevant to other people in your field, who may be other book editors and authors. 

This helps you form connections and relationships with them that are mutually beneficial. Such networking can bring out multiple opportunities for you in terms of new editing projects.

illustration of two men surrounded by books

6. Seek feedback:

It is a good strategy to seek honest feedback about your writing quality from your friends, colleagues and clients (for whom you have done paid writing work). This will help you to understand how good your writing style is and whether it can transform into an editing skill set. 

Being an editor is really about having the confidence that your writing is good and that you can catch errors when you read someone else’s writing. If someone asks me: how to be an editor? My reply is: learn how to be a good writer.

7. Stay organized:

Another important factor in being an editor is being able to track ‘lifelines’ (I avoid using the word ‘deadlines’). Knowing that you have to submit the edited chapter, section or full manuscript by a specific date to your client means having to successfully handle multiple tasks. 

There is also the probable chance that you may be in a situation where you need to work on two editing projects simultaneously. Your ability to stay organized and use your time efficiently will be a great help in being a result-oriented editor.

Whenever I have done editing projects, I have kept track of how many pages I have edited in how much time in a day. This gives me a fair idea of the time I will be taking to complete the whole manuscript.

illustration of juggling work by a man

8. Be a juggler:

Being an editor means being a juggler. You have to juggle tasks like editing, proofreading, writing and managing authors. Accomplishing these tasks efficiently helps you learn how to be an editor.

This is different from being a book editor. As a book editor, there is more focus on the work at hand. Once I start editing a manuscript, I do a quick read of the manuscript to get an overview of the work that I need to do. Then I start working on the ‘Table of Contents’ section, which I consider as a crucial step.

9. Develop patience:

Being an editor means being patient with the process. You cannot rush it. If you do so, you will miss catching mistakes. You will regret your action when the book is published that has the mistakes that you should have corrected in the first place as a book editor. 

Maintain a calm, steady approach and turtle-speed your way to a well-edited manuscript. In other words, you need to explain the value of patience to your book author too when you ask for a reasonable time to edit the whole manuscript.

10. Never stop learning:

A good editor is a good reader. A good reader has the potential to be a good writer and editor. Reading good books in your chosen genre means you get to read well-edited sentences and chapters. Every book that gets published - whether self-published or traditionally published - is expected to have the weight and effort of a good book editor behind it.

This way you get to learn from the top editors in a second-hand manner how they chose to phrase sentences, paragraphs, dialogues and chapters when they edited the manuscript.  

As you grow your skills and share them on social media, you begin to attract a steady stream of authors who would like to work with you. 

If you would like to work with me, check out my nonfiction book editing gig on Fiverr. You will also find many book editors there who can take care of your fiction manuscript.