Tips to Create an ATS-Friendly Resume

Tips to Create an ATS-Friendly Resume

Are you nearing the end of your studies and on your way to professional life? Or are you looking for a new professional challenge and planning a job change? If you don’t want to leave anything to chance in the application process these days, you should definitely optimize your CV for ATS. To create an ATS-Friendly Resume read the blog blog below.

More and more companies are using an Applicant Tracking System (ATS) to digitally pre-select applicants. If your ATS-friendly CV clears this first hurdle, you can hope for an invitation to an interview. Would you like to learn more about digital applicant management? Textproz provides helpful tips on the ATS CV

Why an ATS-Friendly Resume?

Today, you are increasingly submitting your application documents via an online application form – and there’s a reason for that. This approach allows the company to analyze the documents you have entered digitally without much effort and with the help of CV parsing. CV stands for resume (curriculum vitae) and parsing for syntax analysis.

A CV parser is, more precisely, a tool that can automatically analyze and save data from a resume. This means that important information from your ATS resume, especially keywords from the job advertisement, is filtered out. The computer then uses these keywords to make an initial pre-selection for the next round of applicants. CV parsing can read all common file formats and even filter out application photos. CV parsing can therefore be used to fish out the right fish from the applicant pool!

Applicant Management 2.0: Recruiting Made Easy

Human resources departments often have to deal with a flood of applications, which entails a lot of processing work. In order to cope with this volume of applicants and speed up the recruitment process, more and more companies are switching to digital applicant management. In other words, the entire recruitment process, from the online publication of the job offer to the digital pre-selection of applicants and the job offer, is becoming increasingly automated thanks to the latest applicant management software. Digital applicant management thus takes over a large part of what was once time-consuming recruiter work.

The days when HR managers had to look through stacks of application folders are finally a thing of the past. This makes it all the more important to optimize your CV for ATS in the future.

Tips: How to Write an ATS-Friendly Resume

What should you do if the computer rejects your application? It’s easy to optimize your CV for ATS. Find out now how to do this and which rules you should follow.

Avoid Spelling Mistakes & Co

An ATS-friendly CV is scanned by a machine that does not forgive spelling, typing, or careless mistakes. Not because there is a particular level of care required here, but simply because an ATS scanner simply cannot identify misspelled words. Spelling mistakes generally have no place in an application – although an HR manager might be lucky enough to overlook or ignore a typo if the candidate otherwise has a perfect applicant profile. If in doubt, a CV parser will sort out your application straight away.

When preparing your ATS resume, keep the following points in mind:

• simple, clear language
• correct spelling
• no typos or careless errors
• Be careful with (ambiguous) abbreviations, rather write them out
• do not use special characters
• easy-to-read fonts (e.g. Calibri, Times New Roman, Arial)

More Formatting Tips

• Structure your ATS resume with concise and common headings
• Upload documents online only in PDF format
• your ATS-friendly resume starts with the most recent data
• How to Use Keywords in Your Resume?

No Design Works of Art

A visually pimped-up CV shows your commitment and your special interest in the advertised job. But with an ATS CV, less is more at least if you want to use special graphics software for the design. Because, unlike a word processing program, graphics software processes text elements into images that are not readable by CV parsing tools. An ATS-friendly CV should therefore definitely be created with a classic word processing program. There is nothing wrong with a bit of color, however. However, restraint is required when using graphic elements such as symbols, logos, or icons.

Use Keywords From the Job Advertisement

Your application should always refer to the job advertisement, that’s clear. However, this point is particularly important for an ATS CV. As already described, CV parsing programs react to the use of keywords described in the job advertisement when automatically analyzing and evaluating your CV. If these are not present, your application will be rejected faster than you would like. Therefore, carefully note down the tasks and requirements from the job advertisement and use these terms in your ATS-friendly CV. Find out where your greatest strengths lie.

Which ATS Keywords are Relevant?

The recruiting professionals in the HR departments and their CV parsing tool expect a precise, concise statement of your job-related skills, the so-called hard skills. In addition, HR managers are increasingly looking at soft factors, the so-called soft skills. Accordingly, an ATS-friendly CV contains keywords in the form of industry-specific skills as well as soft skills such as analytical thinking, initiative, ability to work in a team, or intercultural skills.

One last tip: Try to use keywords as often as possible in your ATS-friendly resume – without overloading the text, of course. It’s best to add a paragraph to your resume about your “skills & qualifications”. This is the easiest place to include the key terms.

ATS-Friendly CV – You Too Have a Choice

Being selected through an application tracking system is one thing, but on the other hand you should of course also think about choosing your future employer beforehand. Does your personal attitude match the values ​​and wishes of the company? So is there a good cultural fit? Also, try to find out whether there has ever been any mention of mobbing in connection with your dream job. Word of this often gets around in the industry. In any case, we wish you the best of luck with your next application with the ATS CV.

For expert assistance in creating an ATS-friendly resume & increasing your chances of getting noticed by recruiters, consider using our professional resume-writing service.