How To Get A Response To Your Emails

There are mixed opinions about cover letters. Some recruiters say a solid cover letter can move them to contact a candidate. Others say they never read cover letters.

Since you don’t know what a recruiter might do, the best bet is to always send one.

Thank you notes are different. The majority (80%) of hiring managers say a candidate’s thank you note is helpful with 22% saying very helpful and 58% saying somewhat helpful according to a 2017 survey by Accountemps.

So, it seems that sending thank you notes is a must. Despite that HR managers report that only 24% of candidates send them.

Just as with a resume, content is KING in your cover letters and thank you notes. You need to demonstrate your value as it relates to the employer. In essence, what you can do for them.

But it’s important to pay attention to the little things too.

When it comes to correspondence, the language you use to sign off is more important than you may think.

A study of 350K emails by Boomerang indicates that the most popular signoffs may not be the best. The most often used email signoffs, each appeared over 1K times, were:

Thanks

Regards

Cheers

Best Regards

Thanks in advance

Thank you

Best

Kind Regards

However, the emails that closes with a variation of thank you received 62% more responses than most of the popular closings. Those that received the greatest response were:

Thanks in advance — 65.7%

Thanks — 63.0%

Thank you — 57.9%

Cheers — 54.4%

Kind regards — 53.9%

Regards — 53.9%

Best regards, — 52.9%

Best — 51.2%

Baseline (all emails) — 47.5%

Until recently, I didn’t think much about a cover letter or thank you note closing. While I still believe that the most important thing is what’s in the note, going forward I’m going to recommend closing with Thanks in advance.

Based on the study, I’ve changed my general signoff from Best to Kind regards. Does it make a difference? I don’t know. But I like it.

For more details on the study visit Boomerang.

This post originally appeared on the career intelligence Resume Writing blog.