Avoid 5 Major Mistakes While Writing A Cover Letter

Cover letter is a formal type of written communication. Cover letter is a short forwarding letter sent along with the resume while applying for a particular post. While your resume must be an impressive presentation of your qualities and qualifications, the cover letter which is to be read even before your resume has to be equally appealing to the potential reader.

I have seen many candidates who are a bit reluctant to spend time on writing a nice cover letter which is wrong. You should be very careful about each and every word that you write in a cover letter. There are a few common mistakes which one might make while writing or typing a cover letter. If you avoid those, success will be nearer than it appears. Here are the 5 major mistakes that we make while writing a cover letter:

1)      Confusion with the addresses: There are two addresses to be written in the cover letter: Sender’s Address and the Receiver’s Address. According to the American modified block format which is now widely used in letter writing, senders’ address i.e. the applicant’s address should come in the beginning on the right hand side in the block format.

2)      Confusion with the Date: The date on which you are writing the letter should come in the left hand side below the sender’s address. People make mistakes while writing the date as well. The standard American format used in letter writing is name of the month followed by the date then a comma followed by the year. So the date should be like September 08, 2004 and not 08/09/2004 or 08 September 2004. These are not the rules but the norms.

3)      Content of the letter: Content is the soul of the letter and you must think twice before finalizing the content of the letter. The cover letter should be short and precise. The important point to be noted here is that the points in the cover letter should be different from the ones mentioned in the resume. You are not supposed to copy down the content from the resume and write the cover letter. Cover letter should lead the potential employer to the resume attached therewith.Writing a long prosy cover letter is wrong. True, you are supposed to present yourself well before the potential employer; but that doesn’t mean you would write pages together praising yourself. Also remember that your tone in the letter should be positive. You should tell how you can prove useful to the employer rather than telling him how his organization will be useful to you.

4)      Concluding part: Never forget to thank the reader for his valuable time spent on your letter and never forget to sign the letter in the end.

5)      Enclosure: Never forget to enclose the resume along with the cover letter. I haven’t seen any worse example of absent mindedness than candidates sending just the cover letter without the resume. I hope you haven’t done this ever.

These are some of the common mistakes that we make while writing a cover letter. To avoid these mistakes, it is better to read some cover letter samples and then write you own letter. 

All the best!