If you keep sending off the same CV for every job advertisement, you're unlikely to meet with success.

Read and analyse the job advertisement, see what key skills and experience they are seeking, and make sure that your CV is a good match - not just through interpretation but in exact words and phrases.

Although your CV still needs to make sense and read well, it needs to be specifically targetted to match each job vacancy advertisement.

If the job ad specifies Advanced Excel, make sure you include those exact words in your CV - remember you need to actually be advanced in Excel - no BS please...

If the advertisement specifies that they want someone with excellent organisational skills, then include those skills on your CV.

Prioritise your skills on your CV to match the priorities of the job advertisement.

Start off with one good CV.  Save this as the Master.  Then copy, edit and save each adaptation under a new file name.  This takes a little time  but it really pays dividends.

The same applies to cover letters.  These should "match" the job advertisement.  Don't just rehash your CV, address the advertisement - identify with their requirements - be the perfect match.  Tell them what excites you about the role, why you're interested, what you could bring to the role but make sure you're letter isn't all "me, me, me".  Talk about the company and how you think you would fit in and contribute to their goals.  It helps to check out their website and to read the advertisement fully before responding.

Good luck with your job search!  Get in touch if you need help.

There is an abundance of free CV templates (aka Resume Templates) available online and many companies who sell templated CVs.

We never use CV templates because every client is unique and "one size" CV templates aren't suitable. 

Rather like the story of Cinderella, where all the ladies were trying to force their foot into the tiny glass slipper so that the prince would choose them, it simply doesn't work.  It's far better that the slipper is designed to fit the foot!

We firmly believe that it is the CONTENT of a CV that is important.  Whilst a CV template may provide some useful headings, you are still left with the problem of creating the content.

Whereas "Education" may feature highly on one client's CV, it may hardly feature at all on another's. This is because a client may have many years' experience where their education is totally irrelevant to the role or industry they are applying to.

Likewise, "Hobbies and Interests" may be totally irrelevant and omitted from one client's CV but included in another where they bring transferable skills such as leadership.

After content, keywords (to match Applicant Tracking Software Systems) and relevance are important too.  CV templates can't assist with these either, except by suggesting useful headings.

Because our clients all have different experiences, achievements, skills and personalities, we build their CVs from scratch, focussing on their individual strengths. This is much easier to achieve through avoiding the use of CV templates.

Ultimately, our CVs are beautifully formatted and you would be forgiven for thinking that we use CV templates; we do not.  What we do use is a particular "style" and "layout" that works extremely well for our clients, as our client testimonials bear out.

I'm sure we've all heard of jobseekers who've sent off 100+ job applications and not received a single response...  If you're submitting zillions of job applications and getting nowhere, then you need to sit back and take a hard look at what you're doing wrong.

• Are you sending the same generic CV for every application?
• Are you applying for jobs for which you're not a good match - perhaps you lack relevant experience?
• Are you using a scattergun approach, applying for every job you see?

These approaches rarely work. Recruiters, and particularly online job sites, use Applicant Tracking Systems or Software, "ATS" to match your CV against the vacancy you're applying for. If your CV doesn't contain a high percentage of the keywords determined by the recruiter or hirer, your application will simply be bypassed.

So you need to prepare one high quality "master" CV - perhaps with the help of a professional CV writer. Then you need to tweak it to "word match" each job you apply for, incorporating matching key words and rearranging or reprioritising your skills, so they are a better match for each job.  You probably ought to amend each personal statement too.  In essence, if you apply for 5 jobs, you should have approx 6 versions of your CV - one master and five amended CVs each one specifically targeted to each vacancy.

All of this takes time, but it's well worth the effort as it will improve the number of keyword matches, and therefore give you better odds of being invited to interview.

Even the local Job Centres have recognised the importance of keyword and skills matching, and they are in the process of rolling out their new jobs site where you can upload 5 different versions of your CV.

With computer software largely controlling the recruitment process, you need to play the game.