Before You Read Another Cover Letter How To, Discover Little Known Tips For Great Cover Letters

Cover letters are only as good as the advice that helps you create them. The problem is that most cover letter how to’s were written thirty years ago when people stayed with companies for years and job interviewing was very formal. Now everyone is linked and who you know can make a big difference. How do you get inside?

Here are just a couple of the 28 techniques for making covers letters that make our phone ring.

1. The hiring manager is just like you. And she’ll feel closer to you if you point it out. “Last year, we were so overcrowded, four teachers left in one term. How about your teachers? Do they have the same concerns?”

Then, when you’ve established some identification with the hiring manager, show her how you can help her. “Well, while we couldn’t stop them from leaving, I could do this… and you wouldn’t believe the results. Of course we’d need to talk about how that would translate to your environment.” Now you’re advising the hiring manager instead of coming hat in hand. And there’s a natural reason for you to get together.

That’s what you need to accomplish in you cover letter. How to find the name of the recruiter you need to contact? Read on.

2. You’ve got to have the name for the recruiter and hiring manager. Gone are the days you can address your cover letter to whom it may concern. For contacts, leverage LinkedIn. It’s the largest networking site for professionals on the planet. It has over 45 million members in over 200 countries. You can identify executives from every major company, but more importantly, you can find the names of the people who hire.

Simply search on the name of a company and then click on it for more information. Popular profiles are automatically displayed for HR, staffing, and recruiters. If you don’t know who to contact pick one and ask who the recruiter is for the position you’re interested in. While you’re at it, join industry groups. You often get to send emails straight to people in your LinkedIn group that you might not otherwise be able to reach.

With the fierce competition in this job market, having 113 applications on the street does you no good at all if each of them is mediocre. There are so many candidates, just one or two of them will create great packets and beat you every time.

That leads to three axioms:

1. You can make yourself the obvious choice for the job and attract many offers, but to do it, you must be the candidate who maximizes every portion of your job packet to attract the recruiter’s attention, so

2. You must have a system that enables you to write a cover letter that is optimized to get you calls, and

3. Your system needs to be automated so it creates cover letters very rapidly and very easily so you actually do it every time (and don’t simply intend to do it).