How to Beat an Applicant Tracking System (ATS)

Gone are the days of mailing hard copy resumes and cover letters on fine watermarked paper. Platforms like ZipRecruiter, Indeed and Monster have outpaced the paper process to make recruiting top talent more efficient in the digital age. Now employers use something called an Applicant Tracking System (ATS) to weed through applications and narrow their focus to the candidates who are most likely to succeed.

Unfortunately for job seekers, this leveraging of technology makes it harder to get noticed and some applicants never surface to a human eye. There are steps you can take to maximize your chances of that carefully-crafted resume or application getting past the automated tracking system (ATS) and in front of a real person.

While you are working hard to get your next job, consider the application process an opportunity to practice many skills that most jobs require, especially attention to detail. Any skills appearing in job descriptions of jobs that interest you should be practiced as you work through your job search and hiring process. Employers will judge you before they even meet you by whether or not you are performing these skills in your attempts to procure the job.

If you are really interested in it, don’t be afraid to apply when you have less than 100% of the skills. As a general rule, you can apply for any job where you have at least 70% of the core skills they desire. “Core skills” does NOT include ones described as “is a plus” or “preferred”.

Save the Job Description

When you get a call for an interview, you’ll want to go back and review the job description/posting in preparation. You can’t rely on their original job posting as it may no longer exist by then. I.have.had.it.happen.

When you apply for a lot of jobs in a short time frame, you will have a tough time remembering the details of the specific job you’re getting a call back on.

  1. To get started, make a copy of this job posting template. Be sure to save it in a folder with all your job searching files.

  2. Title the doc with a name such as 23.03.25 Prudential CSA JD where the date is YY.MM.DD followed by the Company Name, Job Title (or abbreviation) and JD (for job description). The date format facilitates organizing files in date order later on. The company name helps identify the file you need to go back to when called for an interview. The job title abbreviation helps keep things straight when you apply for more than one job at the same company. When you use all three consistently, the files you create for each job will be listed together in Google Drive.

  3. Three top lines of your doc:

    • Line 1: actual job title. You most likely abbreviated this in the file title (since that was suggested), so you want to know exactly what the employer called it when you talk to them.

    • Line 2: the URL where you found the posting. You are finding jobs from multiple sources. Recruiters and interviewers WILL ask where you found the job. This will also help you identify which sources are most fruitful so you can focus your search through the best sources.

    • Line 3: the URL where you applied for the posting. Very often this will be different from the source of the posting. You may later need to go back and edit or update your application, or repurpose work you did on a previous application for a new application on the same site.

  4. Copy / paste the job posting of interest into your new doc.

  5. Choose two highlight colors, one for skills you have, another for skills you may not yet have but skills you can either learn or improve.

    • Go through the posting carefully and highlight any keywords that represent a skill you already have with the first color.

    • Go back through the posting a second time (yes, really; don’t try to do these both in one pass) and highlight any keywords that represent a skill you do not yet have but can learn.

  6. Copy / paste the highlighted skills into the appropriate column at the bottom of the posting.

Create a Custom Resume

When you get a call for an interview, you’ll want to go back and review this resume in preparation.

When you apply for a lot of jobs in a short time frame, you will have a tough time remembering the details of how you customized your resume for the specific job you’re getting a call back on.

  1. Make a copy of your original resume file to customize it for a specific job posting. Be sure to save it in a special folder where you will keep all job search related files.

  2. Title the doc something like 23.03.25 Prudential CSA Resume where the date is YY.MM.DD followed by the Company Name, Job Title Abbreviation and Resume. This facilitates organizing in date order later on and identifying the file you need to go back to when called for an interview. See a theme developing here?

  3. Incorporate keywords from the job posting into your resume copy for this job posting:

    • Refer to the table of skills you created at the bottom of your JD doc.

    • Thoughtfully read your resume! Search for places you already mentioned the same skills using different words.

    • Swap out your words and put keywords from the job posting in their places. These days a lot of companies use something called an Applicant Tracking System (ATS) to sort resumes and applications, weeding out those that don’t fit their criteria. The system will look for keywords of their choosing. If not enough of them are found, the application never makes it to a human.

  4. For skills you have that were in the job posting but not mentioned on your resume:

    • If possible, try to work them into one of your previous job descriptions in the Experience section of your resume. This is the better method to get past an applicant tracking system (ATS) and into a human’s hands.

    • If certain keywords just won’t fit into one of your previous job descriptions but you do have experience with them (like from a job you didn’t keep on the resume), either add to or swap out some bullets in the Skills section of your resume. This is better than not including the keywords at all, but some ATS’s may not look at the sidebar, so if at all possible, include important keywords in the Experience section.

  5. A note of caution on keywords: Only include keywords you are prepared to discuss how you performed them in a previous position. It can be any position, whether older than you put on your resume or even an unpaid position! You just need to be able to demonstrate experience using the skill once you get into an interview situation.

Create a Cover Letter

This document will be important to keep! Many job postings will ask for a cover letter. Some will say it is optional, but it really isn't. If the prospective employer gives a space to submit one, you MUST do it to stand out from other applicants. They are essentially asking you for a writing sample, so be sure to follow all the rules you learned in school!

When you get a call for an interview, you’ll want to go back and review your cover letter in preparation. Recruiters and interviewers WILL ask about the content of your cover letter, so you will need to know what you said and to whom.

When you apply for a lot of jobs in a short time frame, you will have a tough time remembering the details of how you customized a cover letter for the specific job you’re getting a call back on.

  1. Browse these cover letter templates. Select one and make a copy to customize it for a job posting. Be sure to save it in your job search folder.

  2. Title the doc something like 23.03.25 Prudential CSA Letter where the date is YY.MM.DD followed by the Company Name, Job Title (or abbreviation) and Letter. This establishes organization and helps later locate the files to review WHEN you get called back for an interview.

  3. You can loosely follow the keyword guidance from the previous step to customize a cover letter.

  4. Make sure any “stories” you include in your cover letter are ones you’d be comfortable discussing in an interview.

Acquire & Improve Skills

Repeat the above (save job postings, customize resumes, cover letters as required) at least 10 times before proceeding. Then, follow the next steps to acquire or improve skills that are commonly required for positions in which you are interested. Once you have applied for multiple positions following the above steps, you already will have identified areas for improvement (remember that keyword exercise where you also identified skills that could use work?)

If you begin working now on acquiring some of these skills, in an interview you will be able to show that you can identify areas of weakness and be proactive in remedying those areas.

This will go a long way when you aren’t feeling qualified AND show your willingness to become qualified. It turns weakness into strength!

  1. Review your JD files to identify which skills you most need to acquire or improve.

  2. Select two that are most important (for example, Excel and Word).

  3. Find ways to acquire these skills.

    • One example would be to practice typing to increase your speed using a game like Typer Shark Deluxe or a site where you can take practice tests. A good goal would be to exceed 50 WPM.

    • Another idea would be to find a Udemy.com course that covers one or more skills you are less than comfortable with now but will be required to prove to get a job or use to keep the job.

    • If you are interested in a Salesforce career, check out the various career paths and certifications you can prepare for on Trailhead. If you haven’t earned any certifications yet, the Salesforce Administrator would be a great starting point. I have heard that once you conquer that one, it isn’t much more effort to go ahead and follow through with the Advanced Administrator certification.

Comments

Post a Comment