Turn Your Resume Into A Recruiter Magnet

When a company decides to invest thousands of dollars into finding the perfect employee for a high paying position, they expect to interview the best of the best candidates – and only the best. A recruiter’s job is to filter through and present those applicants to the employer.

With stronger and more developed technology, and an increase in population, the amount of job seekers out there are likely to continue exceeding the number of job opportunities for many more years. Technology has not only reduced the number of job opportunities greatly, and as time goes on this will continue, but it also plays a major role in the process of hiring.

It’s not out of the ordinary for recruiters to receive hundreds of resumes for one position, and as a result more than 70% of employers and recruiters have decided to use Applicant Tracking System (ATS) software to sift through and locate the most qualified hopefuls.

Despite all this, job-seekers frequently seem to underestimate the importance of their resume. Many job seekers seem to believe that because their unfocused, default resume worked for them 5 or 10 years ago, it will work for them now. Unfortunately for them they could not be more wrong.

Make sure you avoid these mistakes:

1.   Many of the old resume templates were designed within tables. These tables may make the resume look great when it’s printed, but all the content disappears when it’s uploaded into the employer’s database.

2.   Never put your contact information in the header of your resume. Headers can’t be uploaded and as a result you may never be contacted for an interview.

3.   Your resume must be specific for each job (i.e. sales, accounting, HR, etc.). Each resume needs to include the most searched keywords for that particular industry. In this case you’ll need more than one resume if you are applying for more than one type of job.

4.   Don’t create a bullet point list of daily tasks as recruiters will already know what the general responsibilities are. Instead, try to use numbers when presenting your accomplishments (i.e. dollar amounts and percentages). This shows both your level of responsibility, as well as the level of success that you had in that position.

5.   Don’t send your resume in a .pdf, .gif, .jpg or .odt file. A lot of the older ATS systems can’t read them. It’s best to use a .doc or .txt file.

6.   Nowadays you can’t afford to have anything less than a fantastic resume. If you aren’t proud of it then don’t bother to send it off. No matter how qualified you are, recruiters aren’t going to risk their reputation with an employer over a poor resume.

Furthermore, recruiters judge candidates based on their education, work experience, and the length of time spend in unemployment. So employed candidates would be considered “A-level” candidates; “B-level” candidates have been unemployed for less than 90 days, “C- and D-level” candidates are much less sought after and a lot less likely to have their resume sent to employers at all.

If you’re not seeing any results with your resume then you need to seek professional help, and the longer you stay unemployed, the harder it will be for you to find a similar job (compared to your last) with a similar salary in your field.