How to Choose Your Resume Language to Get Interviews

How Do You Choose the Right Words for Your Resume and Cover Letter?

Your primary resource for resume vocabulary comes from the job posting. Let's examine a snippet from an actual job posting, taken from Indeed.com, from a company seeking a pharmaceutical sales representative*:

Representatives are responsible for all sales activity within their individual territories. This includes (but is not limited to) sales calls to physicians, pharmacies, wholesales and any medical professional (or organization), which may influence FPI promoted product sales.

Candidates should possess 1-2 years medical and/or sales experience with proven track record.

How to Choose Your Resume Language to Get Interviews

Now let's look at what the job description is actually requesting. The critical phrases are:

By examining the words that the hiring manager believes are critical to the position, you can increase your chance of being selected for an interview.

How Can You Use these Words in Your Resume to Get More Interviews?

Think about the Hiring Manager (Human Readers)

By reflecting the language that a job posting uses, you can incorporate the language that the hiring manager expects to read, demonstrating that you're attentive, sharp, and aware of what the hiring manager wants. You're reflecting corporate culture, and you're plugging into exactly what the hiring manager needs.

Additionally, when you use these phrases in your resume and cover letter, you're addressing the exact experience that you've had that will be necessary in the job to come. If you're not a sales professional, the likelihood of your being able to come up with relevant experience to amplify these topics is slender. However, if you're a sales leader extraordinaire, these phrases will naturally become a part of your resume, because your track record will reflect them time and again.

Think about the Applicant Tracking Systems (Machine Readers)

In large companies, hiring managers can one step removed from the process of selecting the initial stack of resumes to review. The team that accomplishes this first step will be in Human Resources; they'll take phrases from the job description and plug them into the ATS to get a good reasonable start. By using the exact phrases in your resume and cover letter, you'll have a better chance of coming strongly in the searches.

* Full job posting here: http://www.pharmadiversityjobboard.com/view_job.php?post_id=514777&tag=indeed&r=447620

I'm Amy L. Adler, MBA, MA, CARW, Career Search Strategist. Visit me at http://olympusresumes.com/about-us/ to learn how you can propel your job search with a resume package that gets interviews without breaking the bank.