You are about to find out how to make a resume stand out with some guerrilla type marketing.

Think about it…

When you want get yourself to stand out above the crowd you do things that get attention. You wave your arms…Throw things into the air…start a fire…

All of these get attention, the problem is we can’t do that in 2-D on a resume…or can we.

Start with your cover letter. Drive home the points that make you who you are and that make you stand out. What is your USP? What is unique about you that makes this employer want you.

Everyone probably has a degree or has worked X amount of time in the field…blah…blah…blah…

What have you done that would make you want to work for you?

If you were hiring yourself what would you want to see and what unique traits do you have?

Have you worked for any high profile companies that would make your future employer say “WOW”?

Maybe you took survival training…dropped in the wilderness for 5 days…and had to live off of the land.

How does that relate to your job…well let me tell you.

It shows drive, motivation, follow through, and perseverance. If you were out with a team it could show team work…big picture thinking while maintain detail oriented tasks like finding the right berries to eat.

OK, it doesn’t have to be that drastic but you get my point. What is your uniqueness that you bring to the team? How can that company leverage who you are, what you know, or anything else worth mentioning…

Now, you should have done some research on the company and position to find out more information. You need to leverage that information and merge it with your unique traits.

How can the compliment each other.

When you are writing your resume and cover letter you need this information in the back of your mind…You are going to strike with precision and accuracy. You will know that you have the skills for this job because you have done all the research and now you are selling yourself.

…
Many people say that they are not salespeople and that they hate sales. Well, let me tell you…you need to sell yourself every time you get a job or every time you pitch a new idea to anyone. If you are trying to get your significant other to go to a movie or …you name it you are selling…

Get over yourself and realize that you must learn salesmanship
…

Ok, I am off of my soap box.

Your next task is to take the pen and paper and begin writing down - this is a first draft - your unique characteristics as they relate to the position and information you gathered.

We are going to put all of this together a little bit later, but first we need to get it down on paper. Write it all down, I don’t care what it looks like. We will shape it later on…

Do it now and we will come back to learning how to make a resume and cover letter get you that job.

There I was laying on the beach thinking about how to make my resume work for me and not against me…

The sun was beating down on me putting me into that warm, can’t concentrate on anything, feeling. I started to drift into my own world where I had the ultimate job making six figures. I started to go back into the past to figure out how I did it.

It all started with the cover letter. It is what got the HR person to forward my resume to the hiring manager.

They started reading and couldn’t put it down. It was strong but not forceful, persuasive but not sales’y, and it grabbed this persons attention faster than a bullet train leaving Hong Kong.

Was it my experience that got me the job of course it was but it was the way I portrayed my experience and how it was written that got everyone’s attention. I used the language that everyone wants to hear…

YOU language…

When I was researching the position on Google and other search engines (you do research each position you apply for don’t you…) I found out a lot about the company.

I dug deeper…

I tried to find out how I could equate my experience to what this company was going through. I tried to put myself into the shoes of the hiring manager for this position and thought about what I would want to see in a candidate.

Even still I had to target the position like a well trained sniper. Research movements…Know when to strike…Aim with precision…Fire…

I was the best because I caught the attention of the reader using the content I knew they wanted.

We will touch on marketing next but do this before you go on…

Grab a pen or pencil and begin researching the position you are about to apply for…writing everything down. You are the CIA at this point. You are information gather in stealth mode. You are about to write the most powerful cover letter ever.

When you need to know how to make a resume and cover letter…you know where to stop.

Here is a great piece of software that can help make it easier.

How to make a resume land you the job you want is always at the forefront when you start looking for a new job.

Just a quick tip…

You should be updating your resume with information as you go through your current job or through college. You can always rip information out.

So the 3 secrets…Here they are…

• Specificity
• Money
• Time

Specific

When you want to make your resume hot you should use specifics. Employers don’t want to see general theory and ideas. If they wanted that they could read a physics book. Think about all of the things you have done in your career and write them down in detail. That detail is what is going to help you land that job.

Money

Have you saved your company money? That is another idea that you need to be very specific about and how you accomplished it. When you have either saved or made your company money other employers want to know that. They will see potential of what you could help them do. Remember that much of this is self gratification. Your new boss wants to bring someone on board that is going to make him shine.

Time

As you have always heard time is money. How have you improved efficiencies? Have you doubled your production while lessening your hours worked? List all of the detail you can about how you have helped your company become more efficient…

Cause time is money.

These three secrets should be on everyone’s resume. If you can’t be specific, show how you have saved or made the company money, or that you have improved efficiencies…then I ask what have you done?

Any position can show one or multiple examples of theses tasks. You can too. If you need help post a comment and maybe we can draw something out of it.

So remember if you want to know how to make a resume hot…use time, money, and efficiency to do.

Later.

When you want to know how to make a resume knock the socks of your next employer just use one word.

Action…

Yep, that’s right. Action….

The reason I say action is because students tend to be timid when writing their resume. They tend to feel intimidated and weak because the don’t have “experience”. Well, who says…

Every student out there has had experience at something. What have you done in your life, during college, or after class?

Did you do anything worth noting? Did you work at a grocery store or a mall and make any suggestions that were taken?

Are you part of any organizations? If you are a president of student council, that is worth noting…

What if you didn’t do much except for the convenient store around the corner…?

Guess, what you have still done something. So you were on time for the entire period you worked there. What does that translate to? You improved time and budget forecasting for that store by 25% or more depending on actual values.

How did I get that from being on time. People who are on time can be accounted for and depended on. When the schedule is made up you were able to contribute to accurate forecasting and budgeting because of it. They knew how long you worked and they knew you were going to be there.

Be creative but truthful. Ask your employers what made you stand out above the rest. All it takes is a little thinking.

Did you mow the lawn during the summer times? You ran your own business if you did. Did you budget and do the banking? Really think hard about all of the things you have done.

Remember to think about everything when you are deciding how to make a resume great. Those actions just might land you that interview.

Okay…do you want to know how to make a resume blow up the competition like 40lbs of C-4?

I know you would…I should probably slow down my writing and spoon feed this  stuff to you but i just can’t help it.  I know what I look for when I am conducting interviews and reading resumes and I want to share it with you.

I have said it in other posts…USE ACTION WORDS…

• I drove the compacy’s IT shop to a whopping 99.999% uptime.
• The xyz company was able to save 10 % maintenance of the $10,000,000 annual maintenance fees due to my brilliant negotiations.
• The tax man wishes I was  not around when I help clients save an average of $10,000 per year in personal taxes.

Ok, are these a little far fetched?  Maybe… but they get your attention.  My point is that you want to get your future employer’s attention.

You want to stand out above the crowd.  Make yourself known with truthful statistics…but use action words to describe them.  You don’t have to be subtle when they are accurate and true.  If you built a team from scratch that improved efficiencies by more than 80% and saved the comapny money in the mean time…you deserve to gloat about it.  Don’t be shy tell them what you have done.

Tell your future employer what you have done as if they are a buddy standing next to you.  You wouldn’t hold back with your friend…so don’t hold back when you are creating your resume.

Just use words that fit appropriately.  Be professional, accurate, and polite…but blow their socks off with action words and all the things you have done to improve your current employer.

When you want to learn how to make a resume you know you can come here and get what you need.

Do you want to know how to make a resume that will blow past your competitors and land on the top of the pile…?

One thing you can do is leverage your network.  Who do you know in the field or type of job that you are applying?  Do you know someone who works where you are applying?

Leverage that person’s knowledge by asking them to see what they can do to find out about the position and the hiring manager.

How about…do you know the hiring managers name?  Do a Google search on their name and learn as much as you can about that person…it just might give you a little bit of leverage.  Besides, my bet is that they are doing the same thing for you.

When you can laser target your resume to the job type and to what the hiring manager wants…as long as you qualify of course…you will have guided your resume to their desk with precision.

Finding a job and learning how to make a resume is not a game.  You should use everything that is in your arsenal that is ethical and true.

Something else you can do is call the company’s HR department and find out everything you can about that position.  Shoot…it is only research you are doing, you don’t want to waste your time working on a resume if the position doesn’t even fit you or vice versa.

Get every detail you can and even find out if you can speak with the hiring manager.  I am not sure if this will work every time but it does show your interest and motivation to getting the position.  You will be remembered.

Leverage what you can and  when you can…and you may have found out how to make a resume skyrocket to the top

Good luck.

I can’t tell you how to make your resume work fit for each and every job you apply for but I can give you some decent tips that I have found over the years. As I have said before you need to use your resume to put your best foot forward.

We have already covered the things you shouldn’t be doing…

Now we are going to cover some of the things that you should be doing in your resume.

The first thing you should include in your resume are your skills and the results you have gotten. No matter what you should list out your job responsibilities. You want to give your prospective employer the meat and potatoes of what skills you have that you can bring to the table and what results you have received directly from those skills.

They want to know that you can make things happen and that you understand your related field.

Allow me to give you an example:

Don’t do it this way - My duties as financial consultant included working with clients, dealing with people, and guiding them to retirement.

This way - I have consulted clients overseeing over $1,000,000, yielding them a 20% return on their investments. I have saved $500,000 in taxes for my clients over 2 years.

You get the picture.

Next I would include keywords that your prospective employer may be looking for. You see if they don’t get the warm and fuzzy because you haven’t used the keywords they are looking for they may pass you over. How do you do this….

Read the job description. Pull keywords from the job description and use them in your resume…as long as it is true of course.

Finally I would suggest that you would include soft skills in your resume. In many jobs you have to deal with people, clients, executives, managers… you name it. You want to present your potential employer with skills that they know they can use

Can you document very well? Tell them.

Are you an outstanding public speaker and do well in presentations and meetings? Tell them in your resume.

This is your time to shine. This isn’t water cooler talk with your neighbor about how good you think you are. This resume may be the catalyst that gets you that new job paying $10,000 more per year.

Get it done and do it proud. You have worked for it.

Good luck discovering the best of how to make a resume.

When you are looking for help on how to make a resume the first place many typically turn to is the internet. When you find information on your cover letter you will see that their are varying opinions about how it should be handled.

I am going to give you my opinion. They should be written for what you want. Does that sound obvious or what?

I know. I know. What are you talking about.

Well, many people don’t want to be direct and ask for the job in the cover letter but that is what you are writing it for.

Let me give you two examples of what I am talking about:

1. I would like to be considered for the job of Senior Pharmacist.

This one is saying please hire me. I don’t know if I have the qualifications, I am going to try and persuade, but please hire me.

2. Consider me for the position of Senior Pharmacist while you discover below that my qualifications exceed your requirements.

Now this has more confidence built into it. Which one would you rater see if you are hiring someone. Someone with confidence in their abilities or someone hoping? I would go with #2 and it hasn’t failed me yet.

To many people like to use soft language in their cover letter and not use action and adjectives to describe who they are and what they have done. You could have the most boring job in the world but you will need to spruce it up for your next potential employer.

Don’t lie but you can take normal everyday ho hum words and really make them pop. Make the word find into “discover” or “uncover”. You may find my experience matches your requirements…You will uncover the fact that my experience exceeds your minimum requirements.

Make your cover letter pop.

Employers are looking for someone that stands out so be that person and stand out.

Good luck.

Learn how to make a resume so that you can get the job of your dreams.

When you are in a pinch and you need to know how to make a resume there are three things you really need to avoid or it could cost you the job.

You obviously want to put your best foot forward because your resume is what is going to get you in the door for an interview. The interview is where the fun really begins but we have to take one step at a time.

The first thing you should never do when writing your resume is have spelling mistakes. That has got to be the very first thing that a possible employer will shoot you down for. If you can’t have the attention to detail to do spell check your resume then how do you think you will approach their work? It is too easy to hit the spell check on your word processor or to get someone else to read over your resume before you send it.

Better to be safe than sorry…

The second thing you should avoid is using to many big words and fluffing your resume with “clutter”. Yes you want to make sure you use action words and language that makes you look appealing…but you don’t want to use words that the average person may not understand.

Making yourself look “good” by using big words may get you in a worse situation than if you don’t. Simple is powerful when it comes to resumes. Easy to read and understand your work history is what your employer is looking for…not how good at English you are.

The last and deadliest of all resume blunders is making up things you didn’t do or work that you never did. How many stories have you heard in the news lately about people getting fired because they lied on their resume. They will find out.

This is a small world we live and it is too easy for an employer to run across someone who may have known you in a past job and BAM you are found out.

Just don’t lie on your resume.

Those are my top 3 things that you should avoid on your resume.

I wish you luck learning how to make a resume.