Tailored Cover Letter, Yes -- But You Can Make Tailoring Easier

Cover letters should always be tailored to the individual job and employer. Generic cover letter are pointless. But, as Meiers suggests, you can make the job of tailoring your letters easier by developing boilerplate letters for various kinds of jobs. Then, it’s a simple matter to pick the right boilerplate for a given job posting and tailor the boilerplate to that posting:

I would suggest a short investment of time — probably less than an hour, to write 3 or 4 cover letter templates based on the types of jobs you are looking for. For example, one for inside sales, one for outside sales/new business development, one for pre-sales, one for account management, etc. This way when you see a job you like, it is just a matter of a couple of small tweaks to personalize it and you are on your way.

Future entries will look at more of Meiers’s thoughts on cover letters — as well as some of the comments his blog posting got from other recruiters.