subject: Is a Creative Cover Letter the Best Cover Letter? – Or Why You Need One in the First Place [print this page] Is a Creative Cover Letter the Best Cover Letter? Or Why You Need One in the First Place
Arguably, a good cover letter is more important than the resume it covers. Although a great resume is no doubt an important tool in your job search, your cover letter, especially a creative cover letter, is probably even more important. But why is that?
First of all, the cover the letter is the first thing (usually) the reviewer sees. And first impressions count for a lot. This probably seems painfully obvious, but it is, nevertheless, often overlooked.
And keep in mind that the job of a resume is NOT to get you a job, but to get you an interview (something that's absolutely vital to remember at all times). The purpose of a resume, then, is to pre-sell to convince the resume reviewer to call you in for an interview where you can do the real selling. And if that's the case, then the purpose of a cover letter is to pre-pre-sell (another key consideration). It aims to pull the reviewer into the resume.
So the best cover letter is one that entices no, compels the reviewer to go further and take a careful look at your resume. A cover letter accomplishes this best by being (at least a little) a creative cover letter. Here's what I mean.
You need to be confident, but not impertinent walking that razor's edge between boldness and rudeness. Do you really think the person hired to make the first of review of those hundreds (maybe even thousands) of resumes looks forward to suffering through another bland, vapid, dry-as-dust cover letter? But neither does that person relish being slapped with affronting arrogance. It takes, then, a good measure of creativity to stay on the right side of the line (but maybe even touching it) that separates the two.
Also, a creative cover letter should be much more than a more in-depth list of two or three of your skills/abilities that are briefly given in your resume. You have towithout the reviewers knowing you are doing itdraw conclusions for them. Don't assume cover-letter readers will arrive where you want them to own their own. You have to lead them gently to the place you want them to go.
This means that after you have, for example, illustrated your ability to increase sales (by providing a well fleshed-out concrete example), you then need to subtly draw the conclusion for the reviewer. And that means just as with selling of any hue stating benefits. Answer this question: How can your ability to increase sales benefit this particular prospective employer? But the trick is to do this without being too obviously heavy handed which, of course, requires some creativity.
So you need a good cover letter to lead the reviewer to your killer resume so that you will be called in for an interview, at which point you have the opportunity to go into full-blown selling mode. But you simply cannot falter at any one of these crucial steps. And this is especially the case at the cover-letter stage.
