Writing an Effective Cover Letter

As competition for jobs is fierce and very competitive, you have to do your best to stand out from the other job seekers. You have to ensure your CV/Resume gets noticed, and to do this you have to write and present a cover letter that gets results.

When it comes to writing a cover letter, more often than not people waffle on and end up boring the reader. A successful cover letter is one that states who you are, why you want the job, and why you would make a good candidate for the position. Of course, the length of the cover letter is also important, and successful cover letter tend to only be a couple of paragraphs long, and never any longer than one page, so, it is worth keeping this in mind.

In addition to the length the style and formatting of a cover letter is important. It is the first contact a potential employer will have with you, and to put it bluntly, it has to be good. It doesn't matter how good your CV or Resume is, as if the cover letter doesn't spark their interest you will have lost the battle before it has even begun.

Font is a very important consideration that is all too often overlooked. The right font says a lot about you, so bare this in mind when typing up and formatting your cover letter. Go with a font that is easy to read, simple, and not over the top, Arial and Times new roman are always popular fonts, and with good reason too.

Before writing out your cover letter, it is worth taking some time to draft out and gather your thoughts and ideas. Decide how you want to structure your cover letter before jumping in at the deep end. For example, your first paragraph might want to cover who you are and why you are applying for the position, and your second paragraph, might go into detail about why you think you would make a suitable candidate for the position on offer.

Of course, no two cover letters should every be the same, as no two jobs/positions are. So, with this in mind, it is important to personalise each cover letter you write. Find out beforehand who you will be sending your documents off to and then include their name at the start of the letter. Nothing looks worse than a standard cover letter, that hasn't been addressed to anyone.