Mignon Fogarty (@MignonFogarty) is the founder of Quick and Dirty Tips, the multi-faceted publishing website that produces dozens of topic-specific podcasts based on several characters, the most famous of which is Grammar Girl.
Since creating the Grammar Girl Podcast, Mignon has authored 7 books, collected a host of podcasting awards, and recently assumed the Donald W. Reynolds Chair in Media Entrepreneurship at the University of Nevada Reno.
Our conversation follows Mignon’s origins in online business, how she leveraged her early podcast success and existing personal relationships to create a broader network, and how she still prefers to do certain production elements herself.
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Show Notes & Links
- Mignon Fogarty is a professor — not a doctor — but her students call her by her first name
- Britons will call Professors as such, whereas the Americans favour Doctor, when that’s available. e.g. Professor Alice Roberts (@DrAliceRoberts), a medical doctor and professor at the University of Birmingham
“There's a lot of power in networks”
—Mignon Fogarty
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- Grammar Girl (podcast) began as a hobby project whilst Mignon worked as a technical writer. Her clients kept making the same mistakes.
- Grammar Girl reach #2 in iTunes within 6 weeks
- Modern Manners Guy, Mighty Mommy, Money Girl, et al. were Mignon’s friends/neighbours whom she recruited for spin-off shows
- The Wall St. Journal picked Grammar Girl as the Web Pick of the Day - 4 Nov. 2006
- “New York Publishers” (a synecdoche, of sorts; a toponym, more specifically)
- MacMillan Publishing wanted a digital initiative; they partnered
- Mignon chose podcasting over blogging alone because she “really loved it”
- SEO-friendly blog posts helped folks discover episodes and the show in general
- A post on Reddit, in the ELI5 subreddit, regarding colours as last names
- “Redheads vs. Orangeheads” a post on Grammar Girl regarding origins of the colour orange in English
- Gretchen McCollugh, PhD
- Mignon was always “an entrepreneur at heart”; she and a college roommate sold hair accessories
- Prescott misses Aardvark and Squiggly, characters from her show
- Grammar Girl now has segments — Intro, Quick and Dirty Tip, The Meaty Middle, Tidbits, Announcements, Ads
- Mignon uses content from her books and newsletter for podcast content
- Many English phrases originate from train talk
- Idioms
- Fast and Loose derives from an old carnival game
- Mr. Adolphe Sax, inventor of the Saxophone
- Tall Poppy Syndrome, an Australian phrase
- Malapropism
“People write in different ways for different media.”
—Mignon Fogarty
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“What texting is, despite the fact that it involves the brute mechanics of something that we call writing, is fingered speech.”
—John McWhorter
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- “u” has replaced “you” as a pronoun, even in written schoolwork
- Andrea Lunsford, of The Writing Center at Stanford, concludes there aren’t more errors because of teh Internet
- Affect/Effect or They’re/Their/There
- Google trends allows you to search for phrases like “on accident”
- The New York Times could find Haikus within the stories
- Google Ngrams to find first appearances
- Google News Archive
- The Teddy Bear, inspired by Theodore Roosevelt
“The Internet is (still) mostly a written medium.”
—Prescott Perez-Fox
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- The link between language & design: language → grammar → punctuation → typography → design
- The Oxford Comma
- “Visual Language” or “Brand Voice” are types of designer personifications
Professor FogartyMignon teaches Media Entrepreneurship & Social Journalism- Grammar Girl's Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing by Mignon Fogarty on Amazon and on Audible
- Grammar Girl's Quick and Dirty Tips to Clean Up Your Writing by Mignon Fogarty on Amazon and on Audible
- 101 Misused Words by Mignon Fogarty on Amazon
- 101 Words to Sound Smart by Mignon Fogarty on Amazon
- 101 Troublesome Words You'll Master in No Time by Mignon Fogarty on Amazon
- Words Every High School Graduate Needs to Know by Mignon Fogarty on Amazon
- “Applesaucing“, Prescott’s term for re-purposing and re-publishing your content
- How Mignon organises and plans a book. Very cool
- Mignon has written 7 books in 6 years — in your face, Todd Henry!
- Fellini
- Information Diets
- When recording from her home, Mignon uses a walk-in closet with a snowball mic
- Mignon Fogarty on Twitter
- Mignon Fogarty on Instagram
- Mignon Fogarty on Google+
- Grammar Girl on Twitter
- Grammar Girl on Facebook
- Grammar Girl on SoundCloud
Mignon Fogarty tells her story to Leo Laporte on Triangulation, episode 117
Tools
- Snowball Mic
- Trello
- Freedcamp
- Slack
- MacBook Air
- Large Apple Monitor
- iPod Touch (for social media)
- Boomerang for Gmail
- Clammr
- Audacity
Techniques
- Use the script from your podcast as a blog post
- Use guest writers for narrow subject matters, especially if they have a PhD in that topic
- Assign content and schedule shows about 6-7 weeks in advance
- Edit your script for pronunciation — some things are hard to say out loud
- Use Pinterest to promote a podcast
- Set deadlines for yourself
- Hire help to manage you (especially for writing)
- Keep two separate phones for your separate social media accounts
Habits
- Delegate, especially social media
- Uses content from her books and newsletter for podcast content
- Workout every morning, before lunch rather than first thing
- Make sure to drink caffeine with lunch
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Prescott Perez-Fox is a graphic designer, brand developer, and educator with 18+ years experience in branding, packaging, graphic design, and web design. He runs The Busy Creator.
