THE BILINGUAL JOB FAIR BLOG

Cover Letter Tips: The Three Biggest Cover Letter Mistakes

October 2, 2009

Whether you are writing a formal cover letter or a cover letter e-mail, take care to avoid these three common mistakes job applicants make:

1. The first paragraph is not impactful enough to make the reader go to the next paragraph. Don’t start a cover letter with something like “I am currently looking for a position…”.  So is everybody else who applies for the job. Instead, think long and hard about your individual traits, experience and attributes.  Present your uniqueness to the company right away, in a memorable and professional first paragraph.  For example, you can start with something like this: “Out of all of the job openings in the Los Angeles area, the position for marketing manager appealed the most to me because I can create advertising and marketing campaigns and use my experience in both fields. Plus, the opportunity to use my bilingual skills while providing customer service to the Latino community is the most attractive part of the job to me.” Doesn’t that sound more interesting than making a statement that you are ‘looking for a position’?

2. The candidate does not present who they are in the cover letter. This is the most important aspect of the cover letter; to accurately portray who you are to the company, to discuss what sets you apart from the rest of the stack of resumes the company gets each day and to showcase your abilities to the employer.  We see a trend these days, in applicants concentrating on applying for many jobs in one day (volume) rather than on individual quality applications to specific companies.  As such, many job candidates have ‘generic cover letters’ that they send out for every position, rather than specifically addressing the person they are writing to and tailoring the letter to the specific job opening.  The same format and words do not apply to every job opening, and applicants need to take the time to tailor their cover letters to make a good first impression.  To learn more about introducing yourself to a company, take a look at the Bilingual Job Search Tips: How to Write an Inquiry E-Mail and ‘Cover Letter Tips: How to Write a Cover Letter E-mail’.

3. The cover letter has incorrect grammar or several words are misspelled in the letter. Simply stated, these days there is no excuse for misspelled words in an inquiry e-mail or in a cover letter, especially when we have spell check on our computers.  To be honest, when I receive an e-mail or a cover letter with several misspelled words, I assume that the applicant does not have enough pride in checking his or her work prior to sending it to me, or enough drive to do what’s right.  I conclude that I do not want him or her representing my company with the same lack of pride and drive. So before you send it, spell-check it, because it could cost you great opportunities if you don’t.

Filed under: Resumes & Letters

Tags: bilingual skills, cover letter, cover letter tips, Job Hunting, job search