Simple Resume Tricks

Modern Resume Writing | The Best Keywords to List on your Resume

November 19, 2018 By Simple Resume Team

Performing keyword optimization for your simple resume is the key to receiving a call to interview. Keyword optimization is a detailed process that consists of thoroughly researching and selecting the top, best keywords to drive traffic from search engines. What is the importance of this in today’s modern resume writing?

The best resume examples that we’ve seen succeed by using keywords to show the employer the candidate is qualified for the role. In the job market today, qualifying for a job is no longer solely based on your skills and experience. Hiring managers are in search of a potential job candidates with optimized, quality, keyword-stuffed simple resumes. The majority of the quality within today’s modern resume writing now comes from the presence and quality of your keywords. This is due to the presence and use of applicant tracking system (ATS) software.

Applicant tracking system software is a software application that is implemented by employers to effectively screen job candidates in the hiring process. This software is utilized to prove whether or not they are qualified for the role. The candidate’s qualification for the role is based upon several factors such as job relevance and keyword usage. Due to this, today’s modern resume does not get a chance of being seen by a hiring manager. To be successful, we have included some of the best keywords you can insert into your resume writing format to better your chances of landing an interview.

Key Phrases In The Job Description

When you look at a job posting, take a very detailed look at the job description. Job descriptions contain extremely valuable information pertinent to the hiring process. Within their descriptions of the general tasks, responsibilities, and requirements of the role, they include specific keywords and key phrases such as “strong attention to detail” and “excellent verbal and written skills”.

The description will almost always be filled with important keywords and phrases. It is key to jot down the keywords and key phrases you see most frequently in the job description as they will be worthy to include in your pattern of resume writing. Failing to include this information will greatly diminish your chances of landing a job interview.

Soft Skills As Keywords

Nearly every job description you come across will contain soft skills. In the workplace, soft skills, also known as people skills, are becoming increasingly more important than ever. Contrary to hard skills, these skills are not easily developed and can be a hit-or-miss within the hiring of an employee.

Soft skills are acquired and developed through work experience and the desire for professional and self-development. Generally speaking, they can be seen as instrumental to success for the fact that they are key in establishing partnerships as well as developing key relationships. Many roles require a candidate to have developed sufficient soft skills in order to be a valuable asset to the organization as an employee.

Soft skills can be the difference maker in your job search. Some of the top soft skill keywords that are included in today’s modern resume writing are communication, teamwork, problem solving, critical thinking, and leadership. Be aware that although they are important, they are also expected. Be sure to include them, but be mindful not to focus heavily on them in your job resume.

Hard Skills As Keywords

Hard skills are skills that are more focused, teachable, and will show employers you have the exact experience needed for the specific role. Hard skills are more industry-specific and are acquired depending on the field in which the role exists.

Hard skills are developed from actual field experience in your career. For example, computer programming skills such as proficiency in SQL and Python are much more focused than soft skills. A candidate would have to have actual experience and proficiency in these areas for it to be considered a skill.

Top hard skills will vary based on industry. Some specific examples of hard skills come in the fields of computer programming, legal, accounting, finance, and marketing.

Simple Resume For Job Search Proficiency | Get Hired

October 23, 2018 By Simple Resume Team

In creating a simple resume for job search proficiency, there are both tricks and challenges a candidate can face. Let’s say you’ve started a job search. After you’ve made it through the initial phase of searching for the right role, your dream company posts a job opening in your field. Now is the time for you to utilize your skills and experience to capitalize on the dream opportunity. Here are some simple tips to better your chances of getting hired.

Input Keywords And Phrases Into Your Simple Resume For Job Search Proficiency

Within job postings, the position’s job description always will contain keywords and phrases that the hiring manager is looking for in a potential candidate. To better your chances at landing an interview, study this information and write down the main keywords. Be sure to add the keywords and key phrases into your resume simple and relevant enough to not only pass applicant tracking systems (ATS), but to catch the eye of the hiring manager.

For example, if the company wants someone with “B2C marketing experience” who is “a quick learner” and “highly attentive to detail”, be sure to include “quick learner”, “B2C marketing experience”, and “highly attentive to detail” in your simple resume as long as the skills are applicable to your skill set. This practice will assist you in two ways. Using keywords will help you create the best simple resume for job search proficiency by helping it pass through the ATS and helping tailor your simple resume to fit the specific position at hand.

Though it is important to use these keywords throughout your resume, be careful not to over-saturate your work resume with these keywords, as hiring managers will catch on to this. Implement your keywords where you see fit in your simple resume for job search effectiveness and a smooth flow.

Research The Company

First, begin by researching the company’s culture, mission, core values, and history. Take detailed notes and work this information into your memory. Research the company’s online presence to get a visual understanding of the company’s social efforts, events, philanthropy, and presence. Knowing all of this information will impress recruiters and hiring managers alike. However, your research does not culminate there as this is only the beginning.

If you are given the opportunity to interview, it is important to know who will be interviewing you. If you are provided with a name or job title of the interviewer, take it upon yourself to look the interviewer up on LinkedIn or a Google Search. Find out the interviewer’s background, tenure, interests, and academic experience. Knowing this information when it comes time for interview day will thoroughly impress your interviewer and not only show that you have researching skills, but also show that you have the ability to take initiative.

Reach Out

If you are able to identify who the hiring manager is, take full advantage and reach out personally. Inform the job poster that you applied to the position and confirm your interest in working for them. Email the job poster to schedule a call to speak about your qualifications for the role.

Research and find employees on LinkedIn who work in the same position or similar positions to the one that was posted. Reach out to these employees and offer to job shadow or ask if they can provide more detailed information on the role. This will help give you an idea of what it is like to work for your dream company. This could also possibly help in creating a buzz and getting your name around the company.

Ask Questions

At the end of the interview, the interviewer will ask you if you have any questions. Failing to ask any questions in an interview is a major red flag and will pull you out from the candidacy pool. Prepare a list of detailed questions based on your research and steer away from asking about salary as you may come off as uninterested in the actual work itself. Inquire about the company’s culture, core values, performance metrics, and whether or not the interviewer can see your skills and qualifications as a match for the position.

Being an employee of your company of choice is a rewarding experience. Workers tend to be happier and work better when working for a company they love. Incorporate these tips into your game plan to boost the probability of getting hired by your dream company.

Why Hiring Managers Prefer A Simple Resume

October 19, 2018 By Simple Resume Team

In the hiring world, writing a simple resume has become a widely accepted practice by recruiters and hiring managers alike. Before a resume can be seen by potential employers, they are required to go through a screening process for proper vetting.

Once resumes pass the initial screening that is implemented by the Applicant Tracking System (ATS) software, they are then left in the hands of hiring managers who will sort through the pile of resumes to uncover the top candidates for the position.

The process of bringing in a beneficial new hire to an organization can come with many challenges for hiring managers. Thus, working to create a simplified resume can prove to be beneficial for prospective candidates in the talent pool. We have compiled the top 3 reasons why hiring managers prefer a basic resume design that makes for a great resume.

Short & Sweet

Recruiters and hiring managers would prefer not to have to read through extensive, lengthy resumes. A complex resume can come off to a hiring manager as unappealing, boring, and difficult to read. If the first initial reaction to your resume from hiring managers is a negative one, chances are that you will be eliminated as a potential hire.

A short and concise basic resume design allows hiring managers to key in and focus on your keywords immediately upon obtaining your document. In fact, it makes it even easier for a hiring manager to locate your keywords and professional accomplishments, as they will not have to read and sort through a load of content.

Aiming to create a short resume that’s to the point will ultimately lead you to creating a work resume well-optimized to appeal to the eyes of the hiring managers who will be reading your document.

Quality Information

Too often, a work resume lacks enough substance and detail to make it stand out as a high quality resume. The proper resume for job searching will serve as a visual representation of “quality over quantity”, as the resume should communicate information about your career background that is valuable, meaningful, and beneficial to the hiring manager’s decision-making process.

The simplicity of a basic resume design will allow you to key in on implementing only pertinent information to the position at hand. In order to make a push for a high quality resume, you must scrutinize your own work and make an effort to determine the information that will serve to be most useful to your potential employer.

Time Saving

It has been said that the average recruiter takes approximately 6 seconds to look through a candidate’s information to determine if they are suitable for the open position.

Many hiring managers will typically spend a little more time in attempting to uncover the potential of a job candidate to aid hiring efforts. However, according a 2017 study conducted by Glassdoor, the average hiring process in the U.S. takes approximately 23.8 days. An effective hiring manager will aim to cut as much time as possible from the hiring process to ensure a quick hire.

A resume simple enough for readability works to eliminate the need for an extensive amount of content when writing a simple resume, which in turn allows hiring managers to save time.

Practicing writing a simple resume can create opportunities for job seekers, whereas complex, drawn-out resumes greatly diminish your chances of gaining employment. The goal of writing a simple resume is to keep the content short, simple, and to state your value. Some of the best basic resume examples portray a resume document that is short and packed with quality information so that it will save employers a lot of time. Click here for a downloadable simple resume template optimized for ATS and hiring managers.

Simple And Professional Resume Tricks

October 16, 2018 By Simple Resume Team

The biggest first step for any job seeker looking to enter the job market is to take the time to build, critique, and review their resume to create a simple and professional resume design. Besides the interview, the traditional resume is the single most important aspect of the hiring process. Considering that a basic resume design is what essentially lands candidates interviews, the lack of a great, simple resume format diminishes your chances of moving forward in the hiring process.

With an increasing number of job applicants in the market, for any desirable position a job seeker may seek, he/she will face a high level of competition. As the level of competition continuously increases, job seekers are constantly looking for ways to vastly improve their resumes in efforts to stand out from their competitors. Here are 3 simple and professional resume strategies to help create an elegant resume that will stand out and land you that dream position.

1. Plug In Keywords

One of the most simple and professional resume tricks is plugging in keywords. Keywords are necessary to successfully beat an applicant tracking system (ATS). Job descriptions typically include specific keywords to describe the nature of the job and type of individual the employer is looking to hire. It is important to take notice of these keywords and work to include them in your simple resume’s content. A lack of keywords within your simple resume can be detrimental to your chances of landing an interview.

Keep in mind that even though it is consequential to implement key terms and key phrases throughout your resume, it is also equally important to be mindful of how many times you plug in keywords in your writing. Attempting to include too many key terms is a tactic known as keyword stuffing. Keyword stuffing your resume can agitate an applicant tracking system and cause your writing to look spammy. Hiring managers will surely catch on to this method. Try to avoid over-saturating your simple resume with keywords and aim to make your writing flow, as it will surely be noticed (check out our services for a keyword-optimized resume).

2. Bold & Italicize

Another simple and professional resume trick is to enhance the font of your writing. In resume writing, you will immediately need to attract the attention of hiring managers with your content. You will want hiring managers to look at your accomplishments to give them a better idea of the work you have done in your previous places of employment. The simple trick to doing this is to italicize them.

Italicizing differentiates your accomplishments from other pieces of text and helps employers key in on some of your most important qualities when they initially look over your simple resume design. You have the leeway to choose to italicize specifics such as your job title, areas of expertise, and other pertinent information to the role that you desire.

You also have the options between choosing to bold or italicize your content. We recommend using italics to highlight your specific roles, areas of expertise, and accomplishments and using a bold font to highlight your roles or the companies you worked for.

3. Quantify Your Accomplishments

Adding numbers to the content of your writing has a dynamic effect on the overall structure and impact of your job responsibilities and accomplishments. Quantifying statements throughout your writing will help employers visualize the overall impact you’ve had on the position and the organization.

It is pretty common to find that not all positions involve hard performance metrics. Because of this, many job seekers may find it difficult to quantify their job responsibilities and highlight their accomplishments. However, it is still very feasible to add numbers to any position listed on a resume.

Compare “provided customer service to clients” to “engaged with 15-20 clients per day to find quick resolutions in order to effectively solve complex situations”. Same task, same number of clients, different sentence structure. Keep in mind that an employer would be more inclined to interview the job candidate who demonstrated in his writing that he was able to handle 15-20 clients a day than a candidate who failed to include quantifiable measurements.

The best resume writing examples find ways to impress employers to receive chances at getting an interview. Too often, a resume design lacks substance and detail to make it stand out as a high quality resume and hinders your chances at speaking about your experiences in person. Utilizing these three simple and professional resume tricks will help BOOST your chances of getting an interview.

Simple Job Resume Tricks For High School and College Grads

September 24, 2018 By Simple Resume Team

Graduating from high school and college is an exhilarating experience. The excitement of beginning a new life that doesn’t involve the constant all-nighters, tumultuous dining hall, and annoying group project members is definitely thrilling enough for a recent graduate. Though this sounds amazing, what excites recent graduates the most is the opportunity to finally follow their dreams and start a new career in their field of study. However, without an optimized, simple job resume, the chance of successfully landing a job right after graduating is much slimmer than you think.

Little do recent graduates know, the expectations of employers have increased tremendously in recent years. For college graduates, a false narrative has been created that a degree will ensure quick job placement in their career field of choice. Most college students end up with positions that have nothing to do with their respective majors. High school graduates are more likely to get quick job placements. However, most are employed in positions where the working conditions are not desirable.

When crafting your entry-level job resume for positions after high school and college, there are a few key tips and tricks that can prove to be advantageous in ensuring that your simple job resume format stands out from job competitors. When you’re so early in your career, you’re competing with a large pool of similar, unexperienced candidates. Because of this, it is extremely vital to attempt to leverage as many skills and accomplishments as possible. These skills and accomplishments will serve as the backbone for an exceptional simple resume.

For the majority of graduating high school and college students, a simple job resume is essentially the passport to job success. Studies show that the first job out of school typically dictates the trajectory of your career and potential earnings. Therefore, before you begin sending out your document left and right, it is best that you consider these three simple job resume tricks for graduating high school and college students.

1. Use Transferable Skills

When you’re just entering your career, highlighting your technical skills and experience you have obtained throughout the years can be tricky. This is where you have to look at your past positions and attempt to pull as many transferable skills out as you can. Did you lead a team and showcase leadership abilities? Did you take a look at an internal process and drive process improvements to greatly impact a company?

Transferable skills are the skills that have to be acquired through the workplace and life’s experiences. They are absolutely essential to any role and have been proven to be extremely useful. No matter how insignificant you feel your experience may be, you can always pull out a transferable skill or a learning lesson that you can use to your advantage.

2. Place Education High On Your Simple Job Resume

More often than not, entry-level candidates will almost always rely on their education as their most marketable attribute. This is always a good idea, especially when your degree choice and selected courses are relevant to the role you are pursuing.

When you are formatting your simple job resume, place your education section near the top – ideally, right underneath a professional summary. This is where you want to direct the hiring manager’s eyes. By placing the education section high up, you are calling importance to the content.

3. List Relevant Course Work Or Internships

In leveraging your experience as a high school or college student, most individuals will only have their course work and internships to lean on. This is why it is important to pursue these opportunities and be strategic about which courses you take. Make sure they add value to your candidacy.

Then, add them to your education section of your resume. List them clearly and use their course names so that your resume picks up points within applicant tracking systems.

Getting into the career of your dreams fresh out of school can be a challenging task. However, with the correct preparation and utilization of these tactics, you can increase your job prospects tremendously. If you’re lacking confidence and your ability and want to seek simple and professional resume writing services, our team consists of Certified Professional Resume Writers whom are trained to create a cost-effective resume to serve your needs. As a recent graduate, you probably haven’t built up enough sustainable income.

Gain the competitive advantage and get a cheap resume today with our payment plan option!

Resume Layout Tips To Impress A Hiring Manager

September 20, 2018 By Simple Resume Team

A professional resume layout can accomplish the goal of gaining a competitive advantage in the job market. Impressing hiring managers today is an arduous task. According to Glassdoor, each corporate job attracts nearly 250 resumes on average. Out of those 250 candidates, only 4 to 6 will be awarded an opportunity to interview. These statistics demonstrate the alarming increase in the number of job candidates applying to jobs today and the competitiveness of the hiring process.

Research has shown that recruiters and hiring managers will typically spend only 6-7 seconds looking at a simple resume before determining whether or not a job candidate should move forward to an interview. A job search website called TheLadders used eye tracking software and found that upon the initial 6-7 scan, recruiters search for criteria such as the name, current title, company, current position start and end dates, previous title and company, previous position start and end dates, and education of the job candidate.

For this specific reason, it is extremely important to make sure your content is punchy, relevant, and showcases all of your key accomplishments and experience quickly. First impressions in the job hiring process is everything. When attempting to impress a hiring manager, implement these simple resume layout tips in your writing to boost your chances of making a great first impression.

1. Use A Simple Resume Layout

There are very few recruiters and hiring managers who like to read through over-complicated text or disorganized formatting. Pertaining to the overall appeal, the ultimate goal in its creation is to keep things simple and focus on the content. Allow your accomplishments and content to speak for itself. Also, make sure you’re not using any graphics and icons, as these do not help applicant tracking systems (ATS) grab the right information from your simple work resume to put into their systems.

Creating a professional resume layout that can compete against job competitors and beat applicant tracking systems is a difficult task and requires one to be meticulous. Certified writers are experts in the field and will guarantee a layout that will perform adequately. To obtain a cost effective resume layout designed for optimal performance, contact our team or check out our professional services.

2. Use Bullet Points To Summarize Job History

The key to an extraordinary and effective resume is proper formatting of your work history and career accomplishments. Bullet points help maximize the impact of your writing by allowing hiring managers to immediately key in on your career accomplishments.

It is critically important to remember that in beating the applicant tracking system, a standard resume layout needs to be attractive and easy-to-read. Again, no recruiter or hiring manager likes to read through huge blocks of text. Therefore, you must utilize bullet points to summarize your job history and accomplishments. Finding a perfect balance to be descriptive without being overly long-winded and staying away from bullet points that are far too short can prove to be the difference maker in your job search.

In a study conducted by CareerBuilder, 25 percent of hiring managers will not even waste their time reading through a job resume that contains long paragraphs and text. As a job seeker, of that 25 percent of hiring managers, one could have potentially offered you an interview. Be sure to bold your headlines and create bulleted lists of your areas of expertise and your accomplishments.

3. Use Legible, Simple Resume Fonts

Statistics have shown that some fonts work better for long-form reading, and others work better for shorter, more punchy content. Your resume is a technical document with ideally around 400 words, so plan to use a font that is legible and not over-complicated. Depending on how much relatable content you have, use a font that responds well to the size of font you need to use.

Avoid using fonts such as Comic Sans, Lucida Console, Brush Script, and any other font that looks complicated or widely spaced out on paper. Studies show that some of the best simple fonts to use for simple and professional resume writing are Book Antiqua, Garamond, Cambria, and Calibri.

It is also a general rule of thumb to use a font size between 10-12 when writing for these two reasons; too small of a font can affect the readability of your document which in turn can create difficulty for hiring managers to look through your information. Too large of a font could be perceived as an attempt to hide a lack of content and information to share with the employer.

Simple Resume Layout Techniques To Beat The ATS

October 29, 2017 By Simple Resume Team

Understanding how to formulate a simple resume layout that can successfully beat applicant tracking systems (ATS) comes with one having intensive knowledge of ATS functions. It is of critical importance to not only have knowledge on how ATS works, but also how to design your content for optimization and performance.

ATS technology is used by most large organizations and a growing number of smaller operations to help hiring managers filter out unqualified candidates and make the hiring process more efficient.

Applicant tracking systems scan resumes for relevant keywords pertaining to the job description and will come up with a list of qualified candidates that internal hiring teams can reach out to. On record, applicant tracking systems eliminate 75 percent of them from the job candidacy pool. This stat alone is alarming to jobseekers as only 25 percent of job applicants are successfully able to get their documents in the hands of actual human eyes!

There are numerous techniques available that can strategically help you perform better against an ATS, such as getting a cost-effective resume by hiring a professional resume writer. Not only will you be getting a cheap resume from an affordable simple resume writing service: Our certified writers are skilled at making sure all best practices are followed and implemented. If you’re not confident in your ability to beat an ATS, we specialize in offering low cost services to ensure your writing reaches a hiring manager. Aside from a hiring a writer, here are a few tricks that you can use to BOOST the appeal of your simple resume layout right away.

Optimize Your Simple Resume Header

Applicant tracking systems are computers that are designed to strategically scrutinize and filter simple resume layouts. It is important to format your header in a clear manner so as not to confuse the ATS, which can result in your professional document being filtered out immediately. Take extra care in making sure that your header lists your first and last name followed by your address, phone number, and email.

We are often asked by clients on whether or not it is proper etiquette to include their entire addresses (street names, unit numbers, etc.). The answer is yes (unless you’re looking to relocate for a role. Click here to learn more)! Applicant tracking systems are designed to geo-filter resumes by location. Including your complete location allows these systems to see where you are located and determine whether or not the position is a fit for you. After all, there is very little point in interviewing for a position that is a 4-hour commute from your home, especially if you’re not looking to commute!

Include A Professional Summary

A key area to optimize for maximum performance against the ATS is the professional summary. A professional summary is the short paragraph at the beginning that briefly details your title, experience, and skills. Every simple resume layout at the very minimum should contain a professional summary for optimization. Lead in with two to three sentences describing yourself as a professional and include as many pertinent keywords from the job description as possible. This signals to the ATS that you possess all the requisite skills for the job.

Insert An Areas Of Expertise Section

Compiling a list of 9 to 12 areas of expertise that most closely align with your skillsets and the type of positions you are looking to pursue is a great idea for applicant tracking system optimization. Areas of expertise are specific skills that are needed in order for you to carry out the daily responsibilities of the role. Not only is it a great idea to have those keywords on hand, but by listing them neatly on the document itself, you are giving applicant tracking systems the chance to parse your resume for those words and pass it along in the ‘good’ pile!

Understanding how to write a document that beats applicant tracking systems is pivotal in today’s age of the computerized application process. Although the ATS can sometimes eliminate candidates that are indeed well qualified for the role, hiring managers have very little time to scan through hundreds of professional documents and are relying more and more on the feedback they receive from these systems to make informed hiring decisions.

Taking the time to ensure that your document has all the elements necessary to beat applicant tracking systems and impress hiring managers is key to landing interviews for the positions you wish to pursue. Download our simple resume layout to see our format that is optimized for both applicant tracking systems and hiring manager eye appeal!