Junk Cover Letters Kill Good Resumes - Quintessential Resumes ...

We continue our series of cover-letter articles by Teena Rose, a certified and published resume writer and author of The 20-Minute Cover Letter Fixer and Cracking the Code to Pharmaceutical Sales. Use Resume to Referral for a high-end, high-quality resume and cover-letter package.

Too many unprofessional, unfocused, and canned cover letters are floating around the job-seeking population. So are you surprised when I tell you that a fair number of hiring managers don?t bother reading them?

Although I?ve seen no official survey on cover-letter readership, it?s rumored that approximately 40 percent of cover letters aren?t read. A number of reasons could be to blame; and frankly, who wants to spend valuable time reading a cover letter that sounds like it was written for the company next door too? Stock cover letters can kill your job-search efforts, making the task of finding a new position nothing but a treacherous expedition.

Adding to the anxiety for jobseekers comes the question: who?s reading them and who is not? You could take the chance of not sending one, but then you?ll stroke out with those who are expecting a cover letter. The only option is to send one every time to ensure that your resume is always properly represented.

Writing a great letter takes time. Time that jobseekers often don?t want to allocate after spending hours tooling their resumes to perfection. Much like the resume, however, your cover letter must ?sing? to the recipient. If it doesn?t, you?re soliciting employment on deaf ears. The best way to avoid sending a junk cover letter is to ask yourself the series of thought-provoking questions in the continuation of this entry.

Does Your Cover Letter Use a Personable Approach? Since you were an infant, hearing your name encouraged some reaction from you. Everyone loves to hear their name from time to time, so don?t be afraid of intertwining the contact?s name into the content in one or two key areas.

Does Your Cover Letter Include Specifics? How often do you incorporate company-specific details, such as a problem the company?s facing that you intend to resolve, or maybe to congratulate them on a newly received contract or recent merger? Keep an eye on target companies by reading daily, weekly, and monthly newspaper publications available in your area. To monitor the pulse of your industry, read everything about the industry that you can get your hands on. Think of it as private investigating. Make notations of specific details you want to mention in your next piece of job-search correspondence.

Does Your Cover Letter use layperson?s terms? Write your cover letter using conversational tone: a writing technique that utilizes sentences similar to those spoken. Have you ever noticed that we sometimes write with a very structured tone and utilize words that we would rarely use in everyday conversation? With a conversational tone, the content should attract readers because it?s immediately different from the dozens, hundreds, or thousands that the company has previously received.

Does Your Cover Letter Use Select Keywords/Key Phrases Too? Much as you designed the resume, weave select keywords and key phrases pertinent to the position into your letter as well. The sole purpose of the cover letter is to reflect that you are a ringer for the position. The hiring company is looking for a good marriage between the open position and potential candidate, so pulling out key points from the resume and placing them prominently in the letter can help introduce the broader skill set contained in the resume.

Does Your Computer House 50 Cover Letter Versions? If 50 cover letters are what you?ll need to get the job done, then the magic number is 50. Focus your energies on the company?s wants and needs, not on your own. With a less than favorable job market, we?re definitely in a company market versus a jobseeker?s market from the 1990s. Hunted down and offered high salaries, IT professionals reaped great positions with limited or no working experience. Sometimes it didn?t seem to matter if their resume was written in crayon. The days of job-seekers being in high demand (I?m not referring to all industries, of course) are gone because employers can now sit back and ?cherry pick? candidates of their choosing, while placing the need for great cover letters in higher demand.

Don?t be intimidated by the depth of work involved in designing a great cover letter. Think about your job search in terms of quality not quantity. Sending countless cover letters and resumes is a very time-consuming process that has proven repeatedly to be a waste of valuable time and money. Job-seekers could find employment quicker if they took a consolidated and thorough approach to their search rather than blanketing their efforts with diluted methods (i.e., mass emailing).

Job-seekers sometimes become desperate when jobs seem scarce, and they resort to quick and ineffective techniques to securing a job. Writing cover letters that you would want to receive, if you were on the other end of the spectrum, is a good rule of thumb to follow. Outline all the core elements that are pertinent to each specific company, using language and specifics that speak directly to the reader and ensuring it displays you as a perfect match for the opening. With these select techniques, you?re destined to secure more interviews and more job opportunities.

Learn how to write and design an amazing cover letter.

Need help with your resume, cover letter, or other career-marketing document? Order today from Quintessential Resumes and Cover Letters.

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Source: http://www.resumesandcoverletters.com/tips_blog/2012/07/junk-cover-letters-kill-good-r.html

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