Tailoring your resume to a specific job description

The best weapon you can have in your job search battle is one well-written resume. But this one resume must be tailored for every single job you apply for.

The age of sending the same old resume to three different types of jobs and still getting shortlisted for an interview is long gone. In this competitive job market, your resume needs to be strongly tailored for a job description for you to be even considered as an option by a hiring manager.

What is a tailored resume?

A tailored resume is a keyword-optimized resume that will get picked up by the ATS in no time. Professional resume writers always create tailored resumes for their clients. These resumes are results-driven and achievement-oriented. They bring your best accomplishments and skills under the spotlight in a way that hiring managers cannot refuse.

What are the keywords in a resume?

Most of the time, the bulk of keywords in a resume would be found in the skills section. Before you even start writing your resume, you need to start organizing your skills. The best way to identify your keywords is to make a list of your hard skills and soft skills on paper or in a digital document. The hard skills comprise measurable skills that you develop through education and experience. Some good examples of hard skills are technical skills, marketing, and project management. Soft skills are certain character traits that help you perform well in your job. Leadership, teamwork, communication, and empathy are some common soft skills.

Identify your skills that align with the job description

After you make a list of all your skills, you should start analyzing the job description. Highlight the skills the employer has mentioned in the job listing. The skills will be scattered across the job description, so be careful.

Then, you can compare your list of skills with the highlighted skills from the job description to find the ones that overlap. These common skills will be your keywords. You can arrange these keywords in order of priority by noticing the importance they have been given in the job description. Employers almost always first list the high-priority skills.

Copying and pasting a list of skills won’t do the trick

A tailored resume will mention keywords throughout, not only in the skills section. Avoid pasting the entire list of skills you prepared in the skills section. Instead, try to creatively emphasize these skills using the work experience section of your resume.

You can write bullet points to describe each job using the formula [“Skill” + “Context” + “Result”]. This will allow you to show the employer how you have practically used your wide array of skills to contribute to the success of the previous workplace.

You have created a resume. But how do you know if it is properly tailored?

You should talk to an expert to find the answer to this question. Fortunately for you, the best place to do it is right at your fingertips! Talk to a professional resume writer of the Resume Mansion writing team to get a resume critique. It’s free, fast, and friendly!