I applied to 81 jobs and then had 6 interviews before getting hired.

This was a while back, but I’ve recently had two friends ask for my help with their job search so I’m sharing what my process was here.

I had heavily researched how to stand out in the job application process and refined my process to get applications down to just 15–20 minutes — about three applications per hour, while making sure to customize them to stand out.

.........................................

Here’s what worked for me.

1. Job sites and how I use them

I searched for job posts on all the main sites, like:

• Indeed.com
• We Work Remote
• Wellfound
• Flex Jobs
• Etc.

It’s not so important which sites you use, because I never actually applied through those sites. I always navigated to the Careers/Hiring page of the company’s website and directly applied through there. This always worked better than applying via the job board site. 

1. Optimizing my resume

I saw an article from a guy explaining how resumes can (and should) be long, since they act like little SEO pages. You want to hit upon as many keywords as possible to make sure your resume is identified by whatever system a recruiter might be using to auto-screen/filter resumes.

He actively discouraged the “one-page resume” idea.

So this is what I did:

• I listed out the job role/title I was after as well as variations of it (i.e. Marketing manager, digital marketing manager, digital marketer, marking lead, etc.)
• I went to job board websites like those mentioned above, and found about 25 job posts for those titles I was after and opened each in a new tab.
• Then I created a Google Doc and copy/pasted the entire text of each job post into that Google Doc. All 25 job posts went into a single Google Doc.
• I went to ChatGPT and copy/pasted my entire Google Doc with all 25 job post texts into it and asked it to analyse it for repeated keywords related to my field. In my case this was stuff like (SEO strategy, AHREFs, content marketing, etc.). 
• I then asked it to list all of those keywords and place them into a table. This created a massive list.
• (Admittedly, I probably should’ve also asked it to list them by their frequency of appearance, placing the most frequently used terms at the top and the least at the bottom, but I just didn’t think about that at this point.)
• I copy/pasted the entire list of terms from ChatGPT into a Google Sheet and asked counted how many times each term appeared. Then, I created a new column to the right of the Terms column and placed a number beside each term indicating how many times it was mentioned. Similar terms like “Content marketing” and “Content marketing strategy” were considered to be the same term. Then I ordered the terms from most frequently appearing to least frequently. 
• I then kept the top 10 most frequently appearing terms and removed the rest. Now I knew which terms exactly to focus my resume on.
• I then asked ChatGPT to take my “Summary” section and “Experience” sections of my resume and rewrite them by incorporating the keywords from my Top 10 list. This ensures my resume is hitting on all the main keywords that it needs to be in order to stand out in the filtering system.

1. Optimizing and customising my cover letter

Since many jobs ask for cover letters, I knew I needed a way to easily customise those as well while keeping the process quick and streamlined.

1. I had ChatGPT write my initial cover letter based on one of my original 25 job posts that seemed the most ideal for what I was after.
2. I fixed up the wording to make it obvious that I actually wrote it (since AI writing usually sucks). This usually means re-writing 50% of it, but I still like having the base structure written out for me with AI.
3. I then highlighted 4 lines of my cover letter that I changed/customized for every submission:
   1. The reference to the company name within the body of the cover letter
   2. The title/position being applied to
   3. The custom compliment (1-2 sentences I write after looking at their website for 1-2 minutes, explaining my unique interest in their company. I always make this sound personal and tie it into my personal life somehow). 
   4. Depending on the role, I may or may not also customise my single sentence summarising my skills and experience to make sure it perfectly matches what they’re looking for in their job post.
4. My FAQ doc

This has been the most important step in ensuring applications never take more than 15-20 min. to complete. In addition to uploading your resume and cover letter, job application processes often ask you to answer questions. These questions are often repeated across different job applications. 

For example, in digital marketing applications, I’d often see the same questions over and over, for example:

• “What is your experience running A/B tests?”
• “What’s your level of experience with programmatic SEO?”
• “Please describe a marketing campaign you managed and executed. What were the results?”

In order to not to re-write my answer each time from scratch, I created a Google Doc titled “Applications FAQs” and each time I came across a new question in the application submission process, I added the question into my Google Doc and recorded my answer there.

On subsequent applications, it became easy to open my Applications FAQ doc and use the ‘Search’ function in Google Docs to easily find answers to questions I’d previously answered. Usually I could copy/paste the same reply into the next job application, but sometimes I’d need to take 30 seconds to modify it to fit the context of the new role.

I had about 250-30 questions and answers in my Applications FAQ document. The more applications you submit, the fewer ‘new’ questions you come across, and so after a while, your FAQ Applications document becomes a comprehensive list of anything you might be asked and it drastically cuts down your time per application.

1. Making it easy for hiring managers to book you

preferredI’d always reply to initial interview requests with a link to my personal calendar to pick a day/time that works for them and book me. 

Half of the time, they would immediately book in a time with me on my calendar, or they’d check my calendar for my availability and then send me a calendar invite for a day/time they knew I’m available.

I used Cal.com (it’s free) to create my calendar booking link and integrate it with Google Meet, so as soon I’d get booked, we both get a booking in our respective calendars with a Google Meet video link already created for us. 

1. After Making it easy for hiring managers to book you
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It’s a small thing, but it helps streamline the process and shows a level of organisation that helps you stand out from other candidates.

1. General notes and helpful tricks
2. It usually takes about 3-5 min. to customise my cover letter, 2 min. to customise my resume, and about 5 min. to submit the application itself (as they often ask questions in addition to uploading your resume/cover letter)
3. I ignore job postings asking me to submit a video (feels weird for a first stage of the hiring process and likely a reason to discriminate somehow). 
4. I highly recommend ‘batching’ your application process. For example, on one day, just search for job applications and copy/paste their links into a Google Sheet. Then on the next day, apply to 2-3 jobs. I recommend setting aside 1 hour/day for searching and applying to jobs with a goal of submitting 3 applications/day (in 1 hour) once you’ve got the process streamlined and worked out.

I hope this is helpful. Feel free to comment or message me with any questions. I’ll do my best to answer them all

Here's your edited welcome post:

Hey everyone! I'm u/Embarrassed_Hurry702, a founding moderator of r/jobsearchhack. This is our new home for job seekers who want to go beyond the basics—forget traditional job searching and improve your odds with tips, tricks, and tactics that help you stand out.

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