How to Tailor Your Resume: Introducing Upword Resume’s Complete ATS Customization Guide

Seven seconds. 

According to a study by TheLadders, that’s about how long a job recruiter spends reviewing your resume before either trashing it or passing it up the chain. 

That is, if it gets into a recruiter’s hands in the first place. 

Chances are your resume will be reviewed by an ATS system before it ever reaches human hands. Essentially, this means a software program decides if you meet the basic criteria to land an interview for a position. 

As a job seeker, you must develop a resume that checks all the boxes: design, content, keywords, and readability. 

How do you build a resume that stands out and ensures employers will keep you at the top of the stack? 

Resume Customization. 

Upword Resume is a custom done-for-you-business.

We build resumes from the ground up for each of our clients. But we also build in places for you to customize your resume for specific job applications. We follow proven best practices that showcase your real experience, skillset, and full potential in an ATS-friendly formats that are easy to adapt on a job-by-job basis.

There are hundreds of services out there that will hand you good-looking resume. But few help you take the next step to make that resume work for you to its full potential. 

Why should I have to adjust my resume when I’ve already paid for you to create it for me?

The world’s best resume won’t be effective for multiple job posts–even when those jobs are very similar. The extra 10% of effort you invest in customizing your resume for each job opening means your resume is more likely to get to human hands, resulting in more interviews and job offers for you.

That’s because ATS systems are granular. Keywords matter.

Take these two job posts. They are both for identical roles within a company, posted at different times. They have nearly identical descriptions. 

Although the two posts show only slight variations in wording, they call for two slightly different resumes. That’s because ATS systems don’t distinguish between similar phrases or phrases that humans would recognize as having essentially the same meaning.

Collaborate vs collaborating

Set of skills vs skillset.

Team player vs teammate 

Energizing vs energize

These distinctions may seem insignificant, but tweaking your resume’s keywords to align with a job description can make a huge difference in your job application success rate.

Each job application requires a slightly different resume. Understandably, many job seekers find this overwhelming. Rewriting your resume can quickly add hours to the job application process and lead to small errors and typos.

This is where Upword Resume shines: Our resumes are built with ATS in mind. They’re designed to include specific spots for resume customization. And we provide a step-by-step Customization Guide to show you exactly how to make needed adjustments.

Using the Resume Customization Guide for Success

Upword Resume’s Customization Guide is included with each ALTITUDE or ELEVATE resume package. It provides all the information you need to make sure your resume gets past ATS gatekeepers:

  • Background on Applicant Tracking Systems and how they work.
  • How to sync keywords from a target job post with your resume.
  • The online tool that makes the resume customization process simple and effective.
  • How to customize your resume to score at 60-80% on Applicant Tracking Systems.

A professional resume is one of the highest-ROI career decisions you can make. Customizing your resume for each job application further boosts your success, leading to higher response rates, more interviews, and a faster job search.

We’re here to help

If you’re ready to take your job search to the next level, let the experts at UpwordResume create a powerful accomplisments-driven, ATS-optimized resume and LinkedIn profile based on current industry best practices.