After reading many fantastic devotions, our judges have chosen a winner of the Next Step Coaching Services’ Devotion Contest. Congratulations to Leslie McLeod! Our judges lauded her devotion’s format, biblical foundation, relatable tone, and especially her creative wording. Enjoy reading! Setting Your Hopes Free “Return to your stronghold, O prisoners of hope; today I declare that I…
We’re so excited to announce Next Step Coaching Services’ Devotion Contest is starting today! Here are the rules: Submit: now through July 30th, 2021 Deadline: July 30th, 2021 Required word count: 400 to 500 words (will not be considered if outside this) Theme: A universal theme, as explained in our How to Write a Devotion: Workbook…
There’s nothing like the thrill of seeing your writing published! Devotion writing is a great way to dip your toe in the publishing world. Last year we held our first Next Step Coaching Services Devotion Writing Contest, and we’ll hold our second in a week. We’ll announce all the contest details next week! In the…
Amy Carroll, the speaking coach at Next Step Coaching Services, and I, Melanie Chitwood, the writing coach/editor, talk in this video about how the writing process is crucial to producing good writing. Listen in and learn: What are the five stages of the of the writing process? What’s prewriting? How can the ugly rough…
I’m putting my English teacher hat on today, one of my favorite things as a writing coach and editor. Certain errors can make your writing look amateurish and unprofessional. Here are a few common errors to avoid. Run-on sentence Incorrect: We’re heading to the mountains this weekend, we’re hoping to ski. That’s technically called a…
Readers usually read your title first thing. So how can you capture their attention with your title and keep them reading, especially if you’re publishing online? A great tool will help you do that! We love coschedule’s headline analyzer. This tool gives you an immediate analysis of your title. Aim for a score of 70%…
We need to think about our readers while writing. After all, we’re writing a book to be read, right? Let’s look at the number one mistake writers sometimes make about their audience. When working with a client, I asked, “Who do you want to read your book?” She said, “Everyone.” Well, that’s an audacious goal….
Formatting anything to do with Scripture references in the correct way is important when you’re writing a manuscript. Let’s look at how to handle formatting the Bible translation of your Scripture references. For your manuscript, choose a translation of the Bible that you’ll use the most frequently, your primary or main version. The first time…
When you’re writing a devotion for publication, whether online or in print, there’s a correct format to use for including your devotion’s Scripture theme verse(s). Here’s how to include the Scripture verse(s) at the beginning of your devotion. Notice I have my title, my name as the author (you may or may not include this…
Welcome to Next Step Coaching Services’ Year of Simple. This year we’re offering tips to simplify your life when it comes to writing, speaking, and ministry. The writing tip I’ll share with you today is about documentation. What’s documentation? It’s also called citation and means telling your reader where you got your Scripture quotation. Here’s…
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