As a professional career marketer and coach, I have always reminded clients to market themselves into both the published and “unpublished” segments of the job market. The most effective part of reaching the unpublished segment is normally contacting potential employers with a well-crafted marketing letter.

We recently sent out 1100 mailings for a well-qualified mid-level manager, and got about the expected 2% response, with several phone calls, emails and letters. And what did half of the responses say? Basically, “Please go to our website and fill out the forms there.”

We all dread the drudgery of filling out a long list of forms on multiple websites. Here are two tricks that you can use to decrease your time in emailing resumes and cover letters in response to published openings. The best part is that both are absolutely free and one is probably already on your computer.

Responding to published openings on websites is a boring, repetitive task. But with so many openings listed, you can’t ignore this part of the job market. These tricks will speed your form-filling and emailing to a few minutes each so that you can get the coverage you need.

Write a Cover Letter with Just a Few Clicks:

Microsoft Outlook can create a cover letter for those openings that request that you send a cover letter and resume to an email address. Most of the job postings on CraigsList use this approach, so simplifying the process will allow you to respond to openings there at a rate of about one per minute. If you aren’t using CraigsList, you are missing out on a great source of immediate, local opportunities.

The exact steps will depend on what version of Outlook you are using, but the fundamentals are the same. Go to Tools/Options and click on the Mail Format tab. Click on the Signatures button to open the Create Signature dialog. Click on the “New…” button.

Enter an identifying name for the new signature, like “Employer Letter”. In the Signature Text box, write a good, basic cover letter (you can always edit it when you use it). My clients can cut-and-paste from their Published Opening cover letter into the box. You can include basic formatting here like typeface and font size, but HTML will need to be entered via the Advanced Edit button, which will open your HTML editor of choice.

Don’t let the formatting get in the way of your message though.

To use what you have created:

1. Click on the Mailto link in the job posting. This should open a new message window in Outlook with the “To:” and “Subject:” fields already filled in.
2. Click on Insert/Signature and select the signature you created in the steps above. Make any editing changes you need to make.
3. Click Insert/File (or the paper clip icon) and select the resume you want to attach. Don’t forget to attach the resume!
4. Click “Send” and you are done!

If you are targeting a specific type of job, you may only need to change “Dear Sirs” to “Dear Mr. Jones”.

Use Roboform to Auto-Fill Your Resume into Web Forms:

We have recommended the free Roboform password and form-filling software for several months. Beyond the fact that you can (and should) use different login/password combinations on different boards to avoid your personal information being stolen, you can create custom form fields and have Roboform fill them in for you. Here is how we get Roboform to automatically fill your resume into websites:

1. In Roboform, edit the Identity you are using for your job search. In the free version, you may want to have an identity called “Personal” and another called “job search”. If you have the Roboform toolbar in your browser, left-click the first icon and select Identities/Edit. This will open a tabbed window in the Identity Editor.
2. Fill out as many of the fields as you can. Phone, address, email, position, salary, etc., using the information you want to submit for job applications. This may be very different from your personal information. For example the “Business” tab will typically populate fields asking for your current position information, so change them as needed. On the “Authentication” tab, be sure to leave the “Favorite Password” field blank.
3. Select the “Custom” tab. This tab should show fields for “Field Name”, “Field Value” and “Other Match Strings”.
4. In the Field Name box, type “resume”.
5. In the Field Value box, cut and paste the text version of your resume. It may look a little strange, since the box will stretch to show the entire resume.
6. In the Other Match Strings Box, type “paste”. Since most web forms indicate “Paste your resume here”, Roboform will paste your resume into any boxes it finds asking for either “resume” or “paste”.
7. When filling out an application on Monster, CareerBuilder or employer website, Roboform should automatically populate much of the application when you select the “Job Search” identity. If it doesn’t right-click an empty part of the page, and select “Fill Forms” from the menu.

Finally, be sure to use the services on the big boards. Set search agents and post profiles/resumes on SimplyHired, Indeed, Monster, CareerBuilder, and others related to your profession, like Dice.com and JobsInTheMoney.com as appropriate. Be sure to use a separate email address when publishing your credentials publicly so you won’t have to live with the inevitable spam forever. Your ISP offers multiple email addresses, so use them. Yahoo and Hotmail email addresses are not recommended.

Websites made recruiting fast and easy for employers and search firms. There is no reason is should be any more boring and difficult for you than necessary!

Peter Dunn publishes www.Career-Hunter.info, a collection of websites and blogs aimed at providing the best career marketing techniques available to seasoned professionals.

This entry was posted on Sunday, March 30th, 2008 at 1:48 pm and is filed under Cover Letter Writing, Job Search Tips. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.