How to structure your cover letter [with real examples]

Hey friends - by the time you read this Newsletter, I’d be flying somewhere over the Pacific Ocean for 15 hours straight. I’ve gotta confess, I have a strong preference for flying over land than oceans. Things you do for family, aye!

Ok, let’s talk cover letters now. Today, we’ll discuss:

• How to approach writing a cover letter

• One of the best cover letters I’ve seen

• How do you ensure your cover letter is actually read

The first use of “cover letter” in the context of employment appeared 67 years ago. It was in a New York Times classified ad for Dutch Boy Paints.

Today, cover letters have become so popular that job seekers are willing to pay $20-$200 an hour to outsource this headache to a professional.

In doing my research about cover letters, I had a very interesting conversation with Sarah Pike, the Senior Digital PR Manager at U.S. News & World Report.

I wanted to learn how she transitioned from academia into a totally unrelated role in marketing. It turns out that the credit, to a large part, goes to her cover letters.

Before we dive deep into her masterpiece, let’s define cover letters in 1 sentence. For me, it’s your argument to the question, ‘why should we hire you?’

Now to construct a compelling argument, you need to include 3 things:

• what’s your understanding of the role or the company

• what skills make you appealing for the employer

• what’s the proof you actually possess these skills

It’s something as simple as…

“Hey Vince McMahon, I understand you need someone to replace John Cena and revive your tv ratings. I’m a great wrestler and I’m also extremely marketable. In my time wrestling for AEW, I was their biggest merchandise seller.”

Imagine you’ve gotta read 100 pages, and all those pages have the same opening sentence:

“I’m writing this cover letter to apply for this role at your organisation” or “Thank you for providing me the opportunity to apply for this role”.

It’s a nightmare, isn’t it? If you wanna stand out, you’ll have to put some more thought into how you start.

The thing I love about Sarah’s cover letter is that it conveys, hey here’s what I think you need and this is how I’ll fulfill your requirements.

You can either use her structure, or a slightly different one which was successful in landing me my first 6 figure role in government.

Here’s the format I followed:

• Highlight the 3 most important skills I’ll bring to the role (bullets)

• What have I accomplished using these skills previously

• What will your organisation gain from my skills

You can read my actual cover letter here.

It’s hard to believe someone’s reading our cover letter when we’ve got studies showing our resumes only get read for 6-7 seconds on average.

So should you even bother writing then?

Look if you’re applying for a position advertised by a recruitment agency who haven’t disclosed the name of the company, save your time.

No cover letter > generic cover letter

But, if you’re applying directly at a company you’re deeply invested in working at, submit your resume online and then draft an email for the hiring manager.

Repurpose your cover letter as the email's main content, rather than including it as another attachment in your online application. This way, you'll be making a more personalised connection.

That’s all for our 5th edition folks!

As you might have guessed, someone has dedicated a lot of time researching and putting this together 🙋 

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