Resume Tips

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Resume Tips and Strong Words

A common weakness I find when customers ask me ‘to make their resume strong’ is the words. Words are powerful and you need to get over your humbleness and sell yourself with powerful words.

resume tips

Unlock your resume block

Some simple resume tips:

  • Delete all weak words or phrases e.g. ‘interpersonal skills’ or ‘increased sales’. It’s better to use power words and show what your interpersonal skills have achieved in the workforce or how you increased sales and added to the productivity of your company. This adds context and is telling those culling that you actually know what you do and they need to get you into an interview.
  • Don’t use excess words – put a lid on it. Every word has to add value to your resume so make them all work.
  • Don’t repeat the same thing using different words. Your words are taking up space and your prospective employer will get the message with fewer stronger words.
  • Highlight specific skills and make them relevant to the job you are applying for.
  • Dot points are great. Put your strong words first to make them stand out.
  • Use a business font and one font only.
  • Don’t bury key information in the hope it will get spotted.
  • Don’t bother telling your potential employer what a nice person and how hard working you are – they want you for your skills and experience and what value you can add to their business. They will work the rest out in your interview or your reference checks. To me this says you really aren’t comfortable with your skills.

What your future employer wants

What your future employer wants to see is that you can achieve results, transfer your skills and can work with other staff members, both above your position and below it. It will help if you find out as much about your future company as possible. Google them and spend some time researching online, including their own website. The ‘About Us’ page is usually very insightful of the culture of the organisation and it’s members. If the Company name is not mentioned in the advertisement, quickly ring the recruitment agent and ask. Mostly they will tell you or give you a pretty good indication. Take care with jargon. Jargon can be tricky. On one hand it shows you understand the industry but on the other hand jargon quickly becomes redundant and can be seen as a cover-up for lack of in-depth knowledge. A clever alternative is to use words that concisely explain the point you want to make and adds further context. Some other helpful resume tips

How to brief a content writer

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Brief a content writer inefficiently and no-one will be happy

Brief a content writer

Brief a content writer

So … You want The Writing Shed to do some content writing for you but you are unsure how to proceed with directives.

How to brief a content writer is simple – once you know how.

  • You will need to supply us with as much information on your product as is available. This may be in the form of product information, information you already have used or printed, information your customers get and information your sales people use. If possible, we do prefer to sit in a meeting with you or your sales people and write. We do find that sometimes this is the best way to drill down to deep information that perhaps you may not have considered before. We need to understand your product and your service – otherwise your readers won’t be able to understand it either.
  • Know who your target group is. Know as much about the population you want to target as is available – how do they perceive your product, what difference does your product make to them, their locality, their socio-economical status and importantly, the age group of your target group. This does matter.
  • What is it you want to achieve with your content? Do you want to just educate or inform them on your product and services or are you wanting to be ‘salesy’ with your pitch.
  • Who is your competitor and what is their sales pitch? How are your services different to your competitor? In other words, what is your point of difference?
  • What voice would you like us to use? This also relates to the age group of your target audience and the purpose of your written content. If you want us to do a blog, we might perhaps be more chatty than if we were writing up your Policy and Procedures and different again if we were writing your webcopy.
  • It is a good idea to have an idea of your budget. Some things cost more than others, so best to get this out of the way so we can get the job done for you.
  • A bad idea is to decide to brief a content writer at the eleventh hour your project is due in your In Box – and believe me, it does happen. Content writers aren’t mind readers, if you haven’t told us, we assume it doesn’t exist.

What happens then

After our talk, we will retreat to our Shed and come up with the goods. We will send you a Draft 1 for comment and a further phone meeting before the final sign off. Easy all done.

Contact us to discuss your project. Chatter is free.

Call us or sent an email and we will call you. We are in the pretty Sutherland Shire of Sydney but work across all States. If possible we can visit or we can discuss via phone. Content Writing – articles for publication, blogs, webcopy, policy and procedures, business letters.

M: 0407487495

E: info@thewritingshed.com.au

You may find this information interesting as well. Content Writing – Essential for Business

Brief a content writer efficiently and all will be happy.

Email Research – overkill or an essential communication strategy

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Email research says proofread your emails

The Email Research-scary statistics

The majority of email senders and email receivers believe that their email information is interpreted correctly.  In fact, only half of emails received are interpreted correctly and half of email recipients have a lot of  trouble interpreting emotion in emails[i].

There is a suggestion that this overconfidence in emails links to a difficulty  detaching oneself from your own environment. This theory is supported by the rapid emergence of social media where the communication is fast, “off the cuff” and not always thoughtful. Furthermore, three quarters of email is opened within 6 seconds of its arrival in the Inbox and there is a significant  recovery time for the worker to return to their previous task because the email task is prioritised over the planned task[ii] [Read more…]

Content writing errors

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Content writing for business

Yes great content writing

Common content writing errors in business documentation.

Content writing is the coalface of your business and online presence. There are some errors in content writing that keep presenting themselves. It is useful to keep reminding ourselves of these – after all it makes good writing sense. [Read more…]

Business writing is Plain English style. Easy

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Modern business writing is powerful.

‘How did you find your steak?’

‘I moved all that lettuce and there it was. What! You asked how I found my steak. Well, say what you mean.’

We get away with a lot in conversational language as environmental context, body language and eye contact are there to support our intended meaning.

However, in written communication, there is only the words, tone and the context created in that document.

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A perfect resume gets the nod

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The writing Shed

A good resume is just a feather away. Contact now.

But there is a catch.

Your resume needs to stand out from the crowd. It needs to say ‘I care about the position you have on offer and I am the person you want’.

Your resume therefore needs to be professional, constructed with a logical and well balanced framework, demonstrate attention to detail and be word perfect.

Too hard?   Well then, perhaps you don’t really want a job that requires a professional resume.

But you have the skills and qualifications I hear you say. Well why are you hiding them? Let them shine and shout out loud that this advertised position belongs to you. All you need is that interview, and you can tell your potential new boss.

[Read more…]

Business documents need to look great too!

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Business documents are part of your branding and style. Look after them and give them some time.

Creative design in business documents is much overlooked and it does impact on your business profile and professional branding. You can have the greatest content, but if it is not easy to read, it will be a waste.

You have the resources at your fingertips – all you need is a little extra time to make that document shine. It makes that much difference.

Modern technology has given us the resources to develop great design in our documents.  This means you have to lift your game and make your reader’s experience easy with no interruptions or distractions. The key is consistency.

Here is a quick checklist for great business documents.

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Formatting – the shine your document needs

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Formatting – the final touch

 

Formatting your document is like dressing it before it goes out (or published).

Formatting is creative design and is much overlooked. But it will say heaps about your business, your branding and your committment to your product.

The resources are right there at your finger tips. All you need is time and knowing what your computer can do.

Some quick formatting tips:

  • If your document is a business document use business fonts.
  • Use a font size that can be easily read, e.g. 11 pt or 12 pt.
  • Check the space inbetween each line. If you are using a 11 pt, make your line spacing 14 pt or 15 pt.
  • Make sure your letters don’t run into each other.
  • The length of your lines should be about 40 – 70 characters.
  • Avoid block bold or block italic. Either one used individually is fine for highlighting a word or phrase, but never both together.
  • If using dot points, try and get some logic or hierarchy into them.
  • Don’t let your text go over images. This can be successful in the hands of a professional, but often it hides the text and looks sloppy.
  • Keep the alignment to the left and unjustified is best for business document. Some businesses choose to have right and left alignments with your computer program adjusting the space inbetween letters and this can create a clean look.  However, do not use central alignment in business documents. It is hard to read and looks messy.
  • Keep your headings relevant to your body text and use a heading format, not just bold.
  • White space is always nice, but use it wisely to create an overall feeling of calm.

Your document must be pleasant to the eye, be easy to read and give the reader your information without it feeling like a hard task just to read it.

 

Good formatting – great creative design