Use keywords
This video is 12 minutes long. It explains why keywords are important, how to pick them, and how to add them to your CV.
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See an index of all the lessons here.
Transcript:
Hello, my name is Matt Krause, and I am the CV Doctor in Istanbul, Turkey.
Today’s lesson is called, “Use keywords”.
In your CV, use important keywords for your industry.
Why? Because these days, most CVs are scanned into a database.
It doesn’t matter where in your career you are.
If you are 24 years old, applying for an entry level position, the HR department is going to scan your CV into a database.
If you are 50 years old applying for senior positions, the headhunters are going to scan your CV into a database, too.
Then, when the hiring manager, or the HR Department, or the headhunter, or whoever, wants to call some people in for an interview, they are going to sit down at their computer, and search their database by typing in some keywords.
If your CV has those keywords, your CV will show up in the results, and the hiring manager will see it. If your CV doesn’t have those keywords, your CV won’t show up.
Sure, you might be the best person for the job, but if your CV doesn’t show up in the results, no one is going to call you.
You might say, “okay Matt, that’s nice, but how do I know which keywords to use?”
Well, one good place to start is the job listings you are applying for. Whatever industry-related or profession-related words they use to describe the position, make sure those same words are on your CV.
Let me show you how, using myself as an example…
Now, my background is in supply chain and inventory analysis. So for this example, let’s pretend I want to continue my career in supply chain…
So, I’m going to go to some job sites, and look for supply chain jobs, to read the job descriptions and find out what the important keywords are…
I went to Kariyer.net, a popular job site in Turkey, and typed “inventory” into the search box…
Here’s one job listing I found, at Avon, for a “Demand Planning Specialist”…
Let’s read this, and find out what words they are using…
Well, start with the job title — “demand” and “planning”. There’s two keywords.
If you’re an HR person, and the supply chain manager comes to you and says we need to hire a “Demand Planning Specialist”, the first two search words you’re going to type into your database are “demand” and “planning”, right?
What else?
Ah, okay, they’re looking for someone to work with the Marketing Department. So if someone has experience working with Marketing people, they’re probably going to prefer that candidate.
So let’s sure the word “marketing” appears on our CV, too…
Other words I see… “university”, “team”…
“estimates”, “tracking”, “analysis”…
“reducing inventory”, “service targets,” “risk analysis”, “supply chain”.
Before we add these keywords to my CV, let’s do a little “reality check”…
Imagine the Supply Chain Manager. He walks up to the HR person’s desk, and sits down. The HR person asks him, what kind of person are you looking for?
Imagine those keywords coming out of the Supply Chain Manager’s mouth. Do they sound natural? Would a Supply Chain Manager use them while talking?
“We need a demand planning specialist, a university graduate, someone who knows how to work with Marketing, a team player, someone who has done inventory planning, supply chain management, someone who can help me reduce our inventory…”
The HR person is going to take those words, type them into her computer, and get a list of candidates to interview.
So, if you can imagine that Supply Chain Manager sitting at the HR person’s desk, describing the job, using those words, then you have the right keywords.
Okay now, let’s see if my CV has them. If it doesn’t, I’ll show you how to add them…
Let’s start with “demand” and “planning”…
We go to my CV, and search it to see if it has those words…
“Demand”, yeah, it’s there. But it only appears once, so let’s see if we can find somewhere else to put it, so it appears at least twice. We’ll do that in a second…
“Planning”, uh oh, it’s not there. We’ll add it in a second…
What else…
“Marketing”… yep, it appears a couple times…
“University”… yes, it appears a couple times…
“Inventory”… yeah, it appears six times…
“Service”… yeah, it appears about 4 times…
“Supply chain”… yeah, it appears once, which isn’t very much, but the single word “supply” appears three times, which is good.
So we’ll concentrate on adding “demand” and “planning” into my CV…
There we go, look under Progressive International, under Purchasing Supervisor. See bullet #4, “With inventory planners…”? I’m going to change that to “With demand planners…”…
Okay, so now “demand” is in there twice. Let’s see if we can get “planning” in there…
Notice the word “plan” is in there, 4 times. Sometimes it’s alone, just as “plan”. Sometimes it appears as “planner”. So the root word, “plan+”, is in there already. We’re just adding the specific word “planning”, to make it a little better…
One thing I noticed. I use the word “forecast” 5 times in this CV. And the word “forecasting” and “planning” are pretty similar, especially in this industry.
So, maybe I’ll look for the word “forecasting”, and change it to “planning”…
Let’s see if there’s a place to do that…
Look at Eddie Bauer, bullet point #2. I already use the word “forecast” twice in that bullet point. I’m going to change the first one to “store-level sales planning”.
Okay now, so if I search the CV for the word “planning”, does it come up? Let me see..
Yes, it comes up in the search results.
Okay, there we go. That’s it for today’s lesson…
Remember, the goal of this lesson was: Use keywords on your CV. Find out what the important keywords are, make a list of them, and then search your CV to see if they appear.
Also, remember that your CV can ALWAYS be improved. You can ALWAYS apply these lessons. They will never get old. Improve your CV, and then improve it again, and then improve it again, and then improve it again.
Thank you for watching, good luck to you, and remember, I am always here to help. Take care.
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