How to Start a Cover Letter to Impress Employers According to Career Builder, 40% of recruiters look for a cover letter when they're considering job applicants. But if you had to flip through a hundred cover letters a day, and each one began, "To whom it may concern, I am applying for the digital marketing position at your company ...", how important would you rank them? Your cover letter is an opportunity to showcase your personality, display your interest in the job, and include relevant information that otherwise wouldn't be surfaced in your application. An ideal cover letter leaves the hiring manager with a positive and memorable impression of you, something a resume alone won't always do. To help you overcome writer's block and hook your reader right away, take a look at some sharp opening sentences you can use for inspiration. Read on to find out 14 ways to grab an employer's attention with an exceptional cover letter introduction. Featured Resource: 5 Free Cover Letter Templates Download the Templates Start off your cover letter (and finish it) with a bang with 5 Free Cover Letter Templates. The templates are professional and completely customizable to help you get your dream job.  How to Start a Cover Letter 1. Start with humor. Employers are humans too, and they'll often appreciate a good joke, pun, or funny opening line as much as the next person. If done tastefully and respectfully, starting your cover letter off with a joke can be...

The Ultimate Guide to Writing a Cover Letter Nowadays, companies have a computerized system that puts resumes through an online scanner which will automatically reject some applicants and push other applicants through depending on their qualifications. So, What does this mean for you as a job seeker? Well, the cover letter attached to your application is more important than ever. Have you been asked to attach a cover letter to your job application? Perhaps you're struggling to write one that lands an interview or have no clue what one is at all. Whichever situation you're in, we've crafted this ultimate guide to cover letters. You'll find out how to write one that gets read, what to include, and browse tons of templates to gain inspiration. Are you ready to land the job of your dreams through a perfectly crafted cover letter? Awesome! You can dive straight in, or jump to the section you'd like to read. How Long Should a Cover Letter Be? Okay, so you're all fired up and ready to craft the cover letter of the hiring manager's dream. That's great! But how do you manage the fine balance between in-depth and overwhelming? A good cover letter is long enough to communicate why the recruiter should pick you … but not long enough to bore them to the point where they'll need a strong coffee. One page is usually enough to cover everything you'll need to include, without losing the recruiter's attention and...

How to Write a Letter of Interest in 2021 It's one of the worst feelings in the world. You've spent weeks perfecting your resume and crafting the perfect cover letter, and you're finally ready to submit your application for your dream job. But when you scan the company's careers page, panic starts pouring over you. The job you wanted to apply for is no longer open. It's gone. And as you stare at your laptop screen in shock, you can't help but think you'll never be able to join your dream company. What should you do in this situation? You can't just put your job search on pause until the company opens the position again. How do you express interest in joining a company when the position you want isn't currently available? One of the most effective ways to grab a hiring manager's attention and get your foot in the door is by writing a letter of interest to the company. What is a letter of interest? A letter of interest lets a company know that you want to work for them in a role for which they're currently not hiring. In hopes that the company will contact you when they do open this position or another relevant position, your letter of interest focuses on how your skills can benefit the company, not how the company can benefit you. You can send a letter of interest at any time, regardless of whether the company is actively...

The 11 Best Cover Letter Examples: What They Got Right Let’s face it: A job search is, typically, anything but fun. It’s almost as if it carries its own five stages of grief. At first, there’s denial of its demoralizing nature. Then comes the anger over either radio silence or rejection from prospective employers. Of course, there’s bargaining -- “I promise to never complain about work again, if I can find a new job!” That’s often followed by depression and the idea that one is simply just unhireable. Then, there’s acceptance: “This is awful, but I have to keep trying, anyway.” But we have good news. It is possible to have a little fun with your job search -- and maybe even make yourself a better candidate in the process. The magic, it turns out, could be in your cover letter. It may be true that only 35% of recruiters admit that cover letters do not materially influence the hiring process for them, but that doesn't mean yours has to contribute to that statistic. In fact, it might be that cover letters are deemed insignificant because so few of them stand out. Here's an opportunity for you to exercise your creativity at the earliest stage of the recruitment process. Personalization, after all, goes beyond replacing the title and company name in each letter you send to recruiters. What does that look like in practice, and how can you make your cover letter stand out? We found six examples...

11 Cover Letter Templates to Perfect Your Next Job Application No one seems to agree on cover letters. How much time do you need to spend perfecting them? Do hiring managers even read them? Is it better to just send in your resume and call it a day? I'm not in HR, but I've been approached by applicants who wondered whether their cover letter would actually be read. My answer is one not many of them wanted to hear: "sometimes." Sometimes it will be read. Other times, you can get away with just sending in your resume -- like when you network your way into applying for a position. The truth is, you can't really predict on a case-by-case basis -- and you're better safe than sorry. For the most part, having a cover letter will give you an upper hand in ways your resume doesn't. It allows you to show off your writing skills, provide details that you couldn't fit on your resume, demonstrate your passion, and show your willingness to put in as much time and effort as possible. Seems fairly basic, right? Cover letters can hold different levels of importance to an employer depending on the industry you're in and the job you're applying for. If you do plan to write a cover letter, keep in mind there are certain qualities it should have that are not included in the definition above. What to Include in a Cover Letter So, what should you include? We'll let...