Guest Author - Kristen Welcome
If you’ve been job-hunting for any length of time, you’ve probably tried your hand at one or more online job searches, and you probably discovered that it was trickier than you might think to locate the jobs that interest you by using an online search. It may come as a surprise, but many employers also use similar searches to locate potential employees on job search web sites…and many of them have encountered the same frustrations with online searches that you have. For this reason, it’s a good idea to make sure that your resume is easy to find in an online resume search.
Just like the job searches you’ve tried, employers search for applicable resumes using keywords. This can be tricky if the employer is using keywords that are industry jargon or extremely specific. The first way to make sure your resume is search-friendly is to make sure that you haven’t been too “creative” with the language included in your resume. Although it’s important to stand out, you also need to make sure that you haven’t used descriptive language that a potential employer would never think of; if this is the case, employers will never find your resume online.
The best way to ensure that your resume will be found in online searches is to make sure that your resume includes the same keywords that a potential employer would use. The best way to determine this is to examine job postings from multiple employers for the sort of position you’re looking for. Review these job postings with a highlighter in hand and note the words and phrases that are common to all or most of them. There is a very good chance that these are the keywords that potential employers are using when they search for resumes, so these should all be included in your resume to make sure your resume turns up in searches.
Also pay attention to the keywords that you have used in the past to locate jobs that you would be interested in applying for. Chances are, it took a few tries to refine your keyword search to find the jobs that truly interest you. These keywords are also likely to be used by those employers looking for you, so be sure they are in your resume.
Finally, remember that after your resume turns up in response to a search, a human being will be reviewing your resume to make sure that you are sufficiently qualified to be contacted about the position. For this reason, the same keywords that helped get your resume noticed by an online search may help your resume stand out to the hiring manager reviewing it. Since it is likely that many resumes turned up in an online search, and each resume may only get a quick initial look, you should make sure that important keywords are located in a prominent and visible place in your resume, such as a “Qualifications” paragraph at the top. This way, when your resume is finally viewed by human eyes, it will be immediately clear that you are worth a second look…and possibly an interview.
