Cover Letter Tips

You’ve developed a search strategy, updated your resume and have now found an opening you believe you’re well qualified to fill. It’s a position you found online and you’re tempted to submit your resume without taking the time to complete the cover letter or just putting in a short note about seeing the attachment in the cover letter box.

Don’t do it.

The cover letter is another opportunity for you to sell yourself to the prospective employer. It is one of the best ways to target specific aspects of your resume (utilizing keywords) to draw attention to the areas you want seen by the employer.

Think of the cover letter as an elevator pitch. You have a brief period of time to highlight your qualifications and why you’d be the best candidate for the position. You want to match your cover letter to the requirements or skill sets needed in the position and make the person reading the cover letter want to contact you for a follow up or an interview.

The cover letter should be brief but compelling to the reader. If the hiring person’s name isn’t included in the advertisement, be proactive and try to find out who that person is and address your letter to that individual. Also, many companies encourage you to apply online so that their software can scan the resumes to search out keywords. Consider mailing your resume and cover letter in addition to submitting the information online. This will give you another chance to stand out and be noticed.

As mentioned earlier, it’s important your cover letter highlights why you’re the ideal person for the position without being too boastful. But it’s not enough to just to write the letter and push send; it’s also important that you follow up any submission with a phone contact. At the end of your letter you want to thank them for their time and consideration; tell them you’ll be following up in a certain timeframe and then do so.

The cover letter serves as your entry to the next step in the process, the application followed by the interview. In some instances, the application is part of the process in submitting your resume/cover letter. In other instances, it’s a separate step that often time occurs on the day of the interview.