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Use your keywords to stand out in a crowd!
Photo Credit: Andrea Vascellari Flickr CC license

If you find yourself job hunting in this challenging economy – hopefully, you are aware how important “keywords” are on your resume and even on your cover letter are.

If it has been more than 5 years since you applied for a job – you need to educate yourself quickly on the new way to apply for a job and the first step is understanding keywords! Oh by the way – you will most likely have to match keywords for every job you apply for – gone are the days of one-size-fits-all resumes.

For most of the jobs you will apply for the keywords are not for the human eyes – at least not initially – they are for a computer to scan and the computer will decide if the candidate is then presented for a human being to read.  Why?  Just ask any recruiter or HR representative and they will tell you they receive hundreds of resumes for one job.  A computer can scan the resumes and cover letters much quicker than a human can and makes decisions based solely on “does this resume/cover letter match the job description” – if yes – goes to human resources, if not – process stops.

I am going to walk you step-by-step through the process of matching keywords in the description to your resume and cover letter.

Step 1 – So you have found a job you are interested in applying for – congratulations! Print off a copy of the job description. Read it, then go back and highlight each of the keywords for that job. If you are doing all of this on an ipad – great do the highlights there instead of printing. Review those keywords you have just selected – make a decision on which set of keywords are the most important, and those that are important but secondary. Just a suggestion – use a spreadsheet tool to put the keywords in order and then match your keywords to theirs. I have created a spreadsheet for you to download – click here.  There are 3 examples in the spreadsheet.

Step 2 – Create your resume for that job – using your skill sets. Don’t embellish – be honest.  Also if you find yourself using the same word over and over – try a Thesaurus

Here is an example:

Job Requirement:

• Collaborate with website manager, internal marketing teams, and business units to maintain and develop websites and business-to-business collateral materials (print and electronic).

What your resume might say:

• Assisted website manager to develop and maintain department website.
• Worked with internal cross-functional teams to co-create marketing collateral and electronic information for business-to-business and business-to-customer customers.

Now your resume matches the job requirements, with “your skill set” applied to the wants and needs of the employer.

Step 3 – Prepare your cover letter with some of the same keywords and phrases from the job description.  Note if you notice that the same keywords are in the description, required and preferred or repeated at any time – make sure you address that in you cover letter and resume.

Step 4 – Print out a copy of your resume and cover letter -double check that all of the keywords/phrases are in your documents.  On the spreadsheet linked above – you might notice that there is a column for check off – use it – make sure you have covered all of the job keywords/phrases.  Mark up – fix as needed and then send to your potential employer.