How to write a brilliant cover letter

Once you have supercharged your CV you are 50% closer to increasing your applications to interview invitations ratio. With the first hurdle cleared, your next challenge is to prepare a covering letter that is irresistible to the potential hirer.

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Remember this is the first insight the reader will get, so it has to grab attention and create an instant impact. It also has to be to the point and punchy.

With these thoughts in mind, the following are ten tips that you should follow if you really want to increase your chance of receiving more interview invitations.

Always address the letter or email to the decision maker by name. Many applicants don’t bother to do the initial research and find out which hiring manager is hoping to fill a vacancy, and on many occasions the job advert doesn’t give the hiring manager’s name. If no-one’s name is given, simply phone the office to find out the name, otherwise your letter and CV will end up in a large pile being vetted by an administrator or recruiter. Unfortunately, these individuals don’t normally have a full understanding of the job, the department, or the role, so are not best placed to critique your letter and CV. To combat these problems, always send your letter to either the hiring manger, or the person to whom the successful candidate will report. If necessary, consider sending two letters: one to the hiring manager and one to the administrator or recruiter.
Always personalise each letter and align it to the job advert. Once you have constructed your CV, it’s not a good idea to constantly change it to suit the different positions for which you apply. One of the reasons to use a cover letter is that you can link what you say in it to the vacancy advertised. This will increase your chances of being invited to an interview. Start the letter by addressing it to a named individual rather than Sir or Madam. Make sure you align your achievements and attributes to the role and use the advert to help you build your compelling statement. A good example of this is as follows: “You mentioned in your advert a need for C++ programming skills, and with my three years’ experience of writing code in C++ I felt that I was well placed for the role.”
Make your cover letter brief and to the point. Remember that the interviewer or recruiter will have a pile of CVs to get through, so make your comments relevant to the vacancy, and ensure that they go straight to the point. Where possible, highlight key information to make it stand out, or use bullet points to draw attention to the most important messages. Always use ‘selling’ words, and remember that you have just 10 – 20 seconds to grab the attention of the reader. And finally, don’t extend your letter beyond one page, because a second page is rarely read.
Name-dropping is beneficial. This rule applies only when writing a cover letter, due to the fact that you don’t have much space or time to prove to the reader that you are the best person for the job. So if it seems relevant and legitimate to name-drop, do so, because this will immediately help the reader to gauge you and your background. If you went to a top university, mention it. If you have experience of working for one of the leading or most successful companies in the industry, say so. If you have worked on a cutting-edge project or had been involved with innovative new products then tell the reader. They are likely to link these attributes to the role and imagine the benefits your capabilities could bring to their organisation.
Remember, you’re FAB. FAB is an acronym for Feature Accomplishment and Benefit. This is a brilliant format to use when selling your achievements to the reader, because it communicates exactly what you are capable of. Simply select your most relevant achievement from your history and pinpoint how the skills it illustrates align with the job description. Using the FAB format will help you to keep the letter short while getting across compelling points that will attract an invitation for interview. For example, try taking an extract from the advert and following it with a paragraph about an appropriate achievement. This will immediately grab the attention of the reader, and help them to quickly decide that you are worth short-listing for interview.
Boasting is bad, but expressing confidence is good. Many people feel uncomfortable about ‘selling’ their own capabilities, either when speaking or writing. The secret of successfully promoting yourself without embarrassment is to mention your abilities, but support them with facts and figures. Information presented in this way is not regarded as boasting, but as the confidence gained from making tangible achievements. Hirers are keen to hear how you may have made a difference, so don’t be shy about presenting facts that they genuinely want to be told about. Once they realise that you are capable of making an impact on your environment, they will begin to believe that you can meet the requirements of the vacancy.
Get a grip on grammar – or your letter may go straight into the bin. It’s a sad indictment of our educational system that many intelligent people are leaving full-time education with a poor understanding of grammar. This means that many applicants fall at the first hurdle because their covering letters are full of grammatical errors. Using grammar and spelling checkers can help, but even with these, there are grey areas where errors can slip through unnoticed. If your grammar is less than perfect, I can’t express how important it is to get someone with a good command of English to check your letter before you send it to the hiring company. When a letter full of errors is read by a hiring manager, the first point in their mind is that if this is how they present themselves in an important application, why would they be any different working in our organisation? So even if you write an excellent covering letter, full of compelling content, bad grammar will mean the end of the road for your application.
Give yourself an advantage by carrying out some background research. So far we’ve covered a number of ways to help promote yourself, but it’s equally important to use background research to identify synergies between the company and your application. A little research should enable you to identify and briefly explain ways in which your career aspirations align with the company’s staffing needs and position in the market place. It’s well worth taking the time to find out facts about the company that will help you to add value to your cover letter, because this approach will make your application seem much more sincere, valid and relevant.
Keep a database of all your applications. Like most graduates, at some point you will probably find yourself in an ongoing job-hunting process in which you are applying for a number of different roles with various companies. To remain professional throughout the recruitment process, it’s important to maintain a clear, regularly updated database of all correspondence and other contacts between you and the hiring companies. And because you never know when a company will approach you, keeping that information to hand will help you to respond efficiently if and when you are contacted. Try to keep a separate file for each application, including the job advert, your covering letter and CV, plus any subsequent correspondence, notes of any telephone conversations and relevant contact details. This does all take time, but if you don’t keep on top of it, you will become increasingly confused about different applications.
End your cover letter on a high note.After writing a strong, positive opening and then selling yourself with powerful FABs, it’s important to finish your cover letter on a high note. Perhaps you could reinforce your application by drawing the reader’s attention to relevant information in your CV, or you could mention some particularly relevant experience you’ve had. And as well as concluding constructively, it’s also important that towards the end of your cover letter, you actually ask to be invited for an interview. You may even want to suggest some times and dates when you are available.

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