Writing a Great Cover Letter For a Resume - Little Known Secrets

So you have just finished creating the perfect resume and now need an effective cover letter to go with it. Everyone knows that writing a great cover letter for a resume is extremely important. In fact, the entire purpose of the cover letter is to sell your qualifications enough to get you an interview, but there are a lot of little tricks that you can use to increase the chances of the employer actually calling you.

A cover letter is essentially a marketing ad designed to sell your qualifications to an employer. So where can we go to learn more about what works in a marketing advertisement? We actually get an endless stream of highly refined marketing ads sent right to our mailbox. Yes, we can actually learn something from the junk mail that we get every day. A lot of research goes into crafting the messages in junk mail, so why shouldn't we take advantage of some of this research and put it to some good use?

If you take some time and study your junk mail, you will see several things in common. Don't worry, others have studied it for you so you don't have to worry about doing this yourself. One thing you will notice about junk mail is that the vast majority have some sort of postscript (PS) at the end. This is because research has shown that people will more likely read the PS at the end of a letter than any other part of it. Clearly we can apply this technique to a cover letter.

Now that we know that a cover letter should have a postscript at the end, what should we put in it? Again, we can gain some insights on this by looking at marketing ads. Effective marketing ads always tell the reader what action they should take. Many cover letters are weak on the "call to action" statement. A cover letter should be specific on the action you want the reader to take. So for your cover letter, you can briefly reiterate your qualifications and politely request that the reader call you for an interview to further discuss employment opportunities. You can also state that you will follow-up in a few days with a phone call. This will demonstrate that you are motivated and on top of things.

There is one other really simple, yet effective thing we can learn from the marketing experts. Studies have shown that a signature signed with blue ink gets more responses from the reader than any other color. So instead of signing your expertly crafted cover letter with whatever pen you have lying around, you should look for your blue pen to maximize the effectiveness of your message.

You can find many more proven tips for writing an effective cover letter at Guerrilla Resumes.

Creative Job Search Strategies - Finding a Job Online

Searching for a job online has become the method of choice for many job seekers.  But with so many ways of finding a job online, which ones work the best?  Some of the best techniques are not very obvious.  Below are some of the more creative ways of finding a job online.

Google
You can find just about anything on Google, including a job.  To start your job search on Google, you should first type the field you are interested in (such as marketing or engineering) followed by the city and the word "conference" and/or "directory".

If you are lucky, you will find an upcoming conference with all the major players in your field present.  You can then do some research on these individuals and prepare a resume and cover letter for each one of them.  If there are no upcoming conferences, you can at least get some directories containing key employers in your field.  The search results will often include contact information, which is invaluable for determining where to send your resume.

LinkedIn
LinkedIn is one of the best places on the internet to network.  You should join this site and make contacts with people in your field.  Make sure to update your profile with your latest information.  You can get many job leads through LinkedIn as well as meet people who are looking to hire new employees.  The contacts you make here are also a good resource for those times when you can't find who to send your resume to.  You can often make contacts at that company who will be willing to help you.

Blogs, Forums, and Amazon
If you are in a very specialized field, you should find the places on the internet where the people in your field hang out.  Go to these blogs or forums and share your expertise on these sites.  People will begin to recognize you as an expert in the field.  When they find out that you are available, the job offers should start coming in.

One unlikely place you can use this technique is Amazon.com.  Find a product or book for sale on Amazon that relates to your field.  Then go to the product review section to write some really insightful comments about the product that clearly demonstrate your expertise.  There is at least one recruiter that I have heard say that he reads the reviews in Amazon to recruit people for jobs.

There are many more creative ways for finding a job online.  The above are just a few examples to help you get started.

According the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average job search now lasts 33 weeks. Using unconventional tactics in your job search can dramatically reduce this time and increase your chances for success. You can find many more proven job search techniques at Creative Job Search.

How To Do A Cover Letter For a Resume - Think Dollars

A well written cover letter is a very important tool for landing a job interview.  A cover letter, along with the resume, should be used to sell yourself enough to get an interview.  It should contain persuasive reasons for why you are the best candidate for the position.  So what kinds of things should  you put in a cover letter?

Most cover letters will talk about how previous work experience and qualifications will make the candidate a perfect fit for the position.  What most people don't do well enough though is sell their qualifications in a way that companies can relate to.  Companies these days are very focused on the bottom line.  The more effective you are at demonstrating how you will make or save the company money, the better your chances of getting hired.

To increase your chances of standing out, you should be specific and talk in terms of dollars.  If you are in sales, talk about how much money you made in sales.  If you make it clear that you can make the company more money than it will spend on you, they will see you as a good investment.

If you are not in sales, you can still talk about how much money you helped save.  Talk about how much you saved your company by improving a process.  If efficiency went up, that means you saved money by not having to hire additional people.  If you found a cheaper supplier for materials, that will translate directly into a savings for the company.  I'm sure you can come up with many other ways you saved money if you just think about it.

If you are currently in a similar line of sales as the target company, you can take things one step further by providing some viable sales leads in your cover letter.  This will prove to them that you can help them make money.  If you aren't in sales, you can do some research in your field that you think the company will find useful and include that in the cover letter.  This will save them the time (and money) of doing the research themselves.

When you are trying to find a job during a recession, it is even more important to show a company that you will have a net positive impact on their bottom line.  These tactics can even work to get a job at a company that is not currently hiring.  If you can convince them that you will have a net positive impact on their earnings, they just might hire you anyway.