Creating and Distributing an Effective Resume

Are you looking for work? Wanting to change your current job? Looking for your dream job? Your resume is the key to getting your ideal position. The things that affect this:

• Creating a resume and cover letter that will capture the attention of the employer. Your choices here:
  • Write your own resume
    + Pros: It's free.
    - Cons: The majority of people applying for jobs write their own resumes. This makes it harder to make your resume stand out from others. Also, it's much easier to make mistakes without assistance.
  • Get a professionally written resume
    + Pros: You can get a professionally written resume for virtually ANY field or industry, anywhere in the country. It can be done very quickly. Once you submit all relevant information, the work is out of your hands. This makes this your easiest choice. Having a professionally written resume can often make the difference between an interview and the trash can, since they tend to stand apart from home-made resumes.
    - Cons: It's the most expensive of the choices for getting help with your resume.
  • Get assistance writing your resume
    + Pros: This can make writing your resume much easier, save time, and it doesn't cost as much as a professional resume team. You'll find tools, templates, and other help here. You can get personal assistance putting your resume together.
    - Cons: It still does cost some money, although less than a professionally written resume. The bulk of the content of your resume is still left in your hands, so there's more work involved than hiring a professional.
• Getting the resume distributed to all the employers you are qualified for.

The quality of your resume will affect how many employers you have contact you. It can also affect the position you are offered, and what kind of pay rate you'll be offered.

Writing Your Own Resume:

The first step to find work is creating the resume. The resume needs to be well written, capture the attention of the employer reviewing it. Otherwise they'll discard it quickly, never giving it a second look. Be careful about making these common mistakes:

1. Using pronouns: Avoid using "I", "me", or "my". It personalizes the resume, and this is not usually a good thing.
2. Writing "RESUME" on top of your resume: Do NOT do this. Enough said.
3. Starting with an "objective": This is done very commonly, and is considered old fashioned. It is really only acceptable for new graduates beginning their career.
4. Using a Microsoft template: They are templates - realize how many people have Microsoft Word and use these. If the hiring manager has 500 resumes to look at and 480 of these use a Microsoft template, how will you get yours noticed if you use one, too?
5. Listing "duties and responsibilities": Does your resume list these for your old positions? It's boring! You need to sell yourself; list quality accomplishments, like saving a company $500,000 a year. Boosting sales by 50%. This shows achievement, and makes you more attractive.
6. Giving personal information: In this age, with nondiscrimination laws, an employer being able to put a face on the employee before hiring can be awkward. Be careful about listing personal interests, number of children, spouse's name, height, weight, nationality, etc.
7. Limiting your resume to one page: This does not work. Especially with several years of experience. The employer wants information - write two, three, even four pages if you need to.
8. The little things: Check for typos! A resume with typos shows someone who does NOT put much effort into their work.

Have you made any of these mistakes? Have you made ALL of these mistakes? There are thousands of job seekers, only a handful of them will make it past the initial review. If you haven't had as much success as you were expecting with your resume, you may consider getting help with your resume. Professional resumes are one of your choices. They do cost some money. However, the cost is usually considered worthwhile, since submitting a professionally written resume can often land multiple interviews within a week of submission. And since this is to help you find employment, the cost of it can be tax deductible. Here are some places to look.

Professionally written resumes:

e-resume.net

e-resume.net takes your information, assigns it to a team of up to five. One of these will be your primary contact, who will contact you to get detailed information and points of interest. You'll receive rough drafts of your resume until you approve it, then you get the final copy through e-mail, and original and hard copies in the mail.

The costs vary. A college grad or entry level resume is $119. Executive resumes cost $245. Most resumes will cost $155, and an update for previous customers is $99. They also offer cover letters ($50), thank you letters ($15), and references ($10).

Professional Resumes

If you're in a hurry, Professional Resumes works quickly. They will take your information and put together a professional resume from between 24-48 hours. They keep in contact with you during editing to make sure you are happy with your resume. They e-mail it to you, send you 10 laser print copies, a backup CD (or floppy) with everything, and several e-books with relevant information on finding employment.

The cost is $119 for up to 3 years experience, $149 for 3-10 years, and $179 for over 10 years experience. They also offer cover letters ($29), thank you letters ($19), an ASCII resume to post to job sites ($39), a webpage resume that they post on their website ($39), and a scannable resume readable by optical character recognition (OCR) software ($39).

Assistance writing resumes:

If the cost is a bit too much for you to hire a professional resume service, there are also companies that offer you assistance in writing your own resume.

Pongo Resume

Pongo is an online resume builder and publisher. You get tools to create, print, e-mail, and fax your resume, all online. They offer personal guidance on writing your resume, specific to your industry.

The cost for Pongo is $9.95/month, or $59.95/year. They also offer a free trial, to try them out.

The Resume Builder

The Resume Builder uses a Resume Wizard to quickly create a resume, based on your information. It breaks it apart into components. These can be each edited independently.

The cost is $18.95/year. You can create a resume using the wizard for free to see if it's something you'd like, and then sign up for membership if you decide you want to use it.

Freelance Work Exchange

Freelance Work Exchange is focused on people who work more independently. They list work-at-home and freelance job opportunities and projects. Membership is free, and with it you'll receive several documents to help you start freelance work, plus a regular newsletter and updates through e-mail.

As a professional member, you get discounts off of their services (including a resume writing service and professional web design); you get access to their regularly updated jobs database; and you get several bonuses too numerous to list here. You can get a 7-day trial for the professional membership for $2.95. Full membership costs $29.95/month.

Distributing your resume:

Once you have a quality resume put together, the next step is having it seen by all your potential employers. Here are some of major places to post your resume. These are usually free, and it's a very good idea to get your resume on as many of them as possible.

Monster

If your resume isn't on Monster yet, it NEEDS to be. This is one of the most widely used employment tools online. You can post your resume where it will be searched by employers, based on your specialization and industry. You can also search through thousands of employers and current job offers. Application to any of these jobs can be done through Monster. This is a good first step to getting your resume seen.

CareerBuilder

Almost as well known as Monster, CareerBuilder also will allow you to post your resume. It's scanned for keywords to match with job descriptions. This gives you information about all positions you are matched with. Each time you apply to a job, it uses a matching engine to find similar jobs to send to you.

Beyond.com

Beyond.com has a network of over 11,000 connected web sites and online communities. Like Monster and CareerBuilder, you can post your resume for free to seek jobs with any of the members on their network. They have a few extra resources for job seekers that can be very helpful.

Resume Rabbit

Resume Rabbit is very effective for distributing your resume - but will cost you some money (a $59.95 one time fee). For the cost, Resume Rabbit will post your resume on all the major employment sites. These are customizable to your choice. This includes posting to Monster and CareerBuilder, in addition to several other locations. The benefit is that all the hassle of posting to each location is taken care of in one place. If you want to save time and effort and are willing to spend a little for it, Resume Rabbit is an effective tool.

Become Employed!

Hopefully, once you've taken care of creating an effective resume and have it distributed to be seen, you'll be contacted and interviewed quickly. Remember, most hiring managers see hundreds of resumes for each position. Do what you can to make yours stand out! Although it may cost some money to do so, it can potentially save you thousands by landing you a position much earlier than you could have otherwise. If the resume is well-written enough, you may also see a large pay increase from your last position.

If any of the tools included here were particularly effective, let us know! Here's to your success.