Cover Letter Templates - Should I Use Them?

Almost every new client that comes into my office that already has a job application prepared has included a cover letter that is a modified version of a cover letter template they found somewhere, usually on the internet or in a book.

Using a cover letter template does have the advantage of being able to easily and quickly create a cover letter than sounds professional. It also has the advantage of showing you a format that looks professional.

However, is sounding and looking professional enough to make the right impression?

Short answer: No, definitely not. You should not use cover letter templates in my opinion which is based on my experience helping my clients... let me explain...

Early on working in a job center, I found an obvious trend that remained a mystery to me (and my colleagues) for a long while but I finally figured it out....

The trend I was seeing was that for many jobs, candidates that were obviously LESS qualified were getting called for interviews over candidates who were obviously MORE qualified... and... they the obviously less qualified candidates were often getting hired over the obviously more qualified candidates. I just did not make sense at first and it happened so often I became very determined to find out why. In fact, it was such a mystery to me I started following up and calling the hiring managers at the various companies and I reviewed and re-reviewed the applications of both the successful and unsuccessful candidates. I also interviewed again many of the job applicants to determine if I could find any factors that might not show up on the applications.

In general, here is what I found....

First, I had initially suspected that this apparent mystery might be explained by who knew who, i.e. perhaps less qualified candidates were getting the interviews and jobs because of who they knew or perhaps who their family and/or friends knew. Surprisingly, this seemed to matter in only a very few cases so it was definitely not what was causing the general trend.

Second, other factors that you might think would be the top factors on who got called in for the interview: the quality of the resumes, the amount of work experience, education and special training, the quality of references, etc did NOT seem to matter as much as you might think. I don't mean to say they don't matter at all because of course they do to some degree but they don't seem to matter anywhere near as much as the conventional wisdom would indicate. I say this because I saw a large number of exceptions where the very best candidate that would shine above all the others in all or most of the factors listed above would not even get called in for an interview where another candidate who was obviously less qualified based on the factors listed above would get called in for an interview and even often get hired.

Third, after a while I finally figured out that the factor that actually seemed to be making the biggest difference was the lowly cover letter that most people didn't put much thought into except to make it sound and look professional (i.e. a modified template).... AND FURTHERMORE... it was NOT necessarily the most "professional" sounding cover letter that that was winning the most interviews. It tended to be cover letters that were totally unique and were not modeled after a template - totally different. It tended to be cover letters that did a good job in somehow "marketing" the candidate and enticing those that were reviewing the applications to want to meet them in a person. Of course, actually getting invited in for an interview is more than 90% of the battle most of the time! You essentially get your foot in the door and it's not all that difficult to get hired at that point.

Here's the key to what I found: Hiring managers and others reviewing these applications are often so inundated with applications, especially now is this incredibly tight job market, they simply don't have time to review carefully each and every resume, call all the references, etc for every candidate. Most of the time, they reduce narrow down the applications by reading the cover letters. If they are really intrigued by the cover letter, then they often just pick up the phone and invite you in immediately (sometimes even unofficially BEFORE the formal interviews), or at the least, they will review the rest of your application more carefully if they like your cover letter.

I have used this software to help many of my clients create a totally unique cover letter that also contains the marketing language needed to entice the hiring manager to call them in for an interview.  Almost no one can write in a style that will produce a more effective cover letter than what this software can produce in a matter of minutes. Sometimes we customize these letters a bit more but we get the "magical" marketing language by using this software. I should note that the software is designed to incorporate the appropriate "buzz words" for each major job industry. I also like how easy it is to use this software. I have tried other software but I've found this to produce the highest quality and most effective cover letters. You can check out this software for yourself by clicking here. My "mini-review" is found at the top of this page.

Good luck to you. I know how tough it can be but just you just need to persevere!