Why Your Job Applications Are Being Ignored… And What To Do About It

John Galt Services (JGS) hires young Indonesian professionals to work remotely for our English-speaking clients in a variety of roles, including customer support, IT services, and paralegal support.

We hire to a very high standard and pay 2-3 times the typical salary for these roles, which means we get a lot of applications!

The Numbers Game From The Other Side

In just the past month, JGS has processed over 2,500 job applications. Our hiring process is so efficient that we were able to reject over 99% of those applications without ever contacting the applicant or even looking at their resume. Of the remainder, less than a third got an interview, and at the end of this period—next week, in fact—we will hire just ONE new employee.

The candidate who gets that job passed a tough set of interviews. But they only got to that point because they were able to get past the initial screening. So what did they do differently?

The key is to understand the hiring process. And the first thing you need to understand about the hiring process is that your job application is your REAL first job interview!

Nailing Interview Zero

At JGS, attention to detail and the ability to follow instructions are critical skills. Every JGS job listing is therefore a test of those skills. It contains the following information:

• Minimum requirements. These are the skills and experience you must have to be considered for the role. Importantly for us, each of these is supported by a filter in our application system. So if you don’t meet these minimum requirements, your application will never even be seen by a human being. Whatever time you spent on it is wasted time.

• Application instructions. These are the steps you MUST follow to apply for the role. Importantly for us, it is IMMEDIATELY obvious if you haven’t followed these instructions. So we can reject your application at a glance, without even looking at your resume.

Most high-level employers will do something like this. So right away, here are three basic rules of thumb when applying for a high-level job:

• Read the entire job listing! It’s tempting to just hit the “Submit” button and upload your canned cover letter to every job listing you see. Don’t do it! If a job is really worth having, then there’s probably something in the job listing that you need to know. So read it carefully!

• Only apply if you meet the minimum requirements! Applying when you don’t is WORSE than pointless, because when you apply for another JGS job you actually ARE qualified for, we can immediately see how many times you tried to fool us in the past. We will NEVER hire you, because you’ve already shown us we can’t trust you!

• Follow the application instructions. This is how you actually PROVE to us that you read the job listing.

Now wait a minute! I have hundreds of jobs to apply for… I can’t do all that for every one!

Exactly.

Too Many Jobs, Too Little Time

If you’re like most people, the trouble with your job application process is that you are applying for too many jobs!

You’re applying for jobs you aren’t qualified for—even for jobs you don’t really care about—and because this creates a very long list of jobs, you can only afford to spend a few seconds or maybe a minute or two on each one. Which is why you write a generic cover letter, maybe change the company name and job title to fit each listing, and hit the Submit button.

But what if you only applied for 5% of these jobs? Then you could afford to spend TWENTY TIMES as much time on each application!

And here’s the real secret: a hiring manager will almost never spend more time on your job application than YOU did!

So if you want to get noticed, you need to spend WAY more time on each job application. And the best way to do that is to apply for WAY fewer jobs.

Flipping the Script

The key to reducing your application load is to flip the script.

If you ask “Which employers MIGHT HIRE me?” you’ll wind up with a LARGE number of job listings for which you meet SOME requirements. You’ll spend so little time on each application that even the ones you might have qualified for will reject you out of hand.

If instead you ask “Which employers WON’T REJECT me?” you’ll wind up with a SMALL number of job listings for which you’ve met ALL the requirements. The more aggressive you are about weeding out the jobs that don’t suit you, the more time you can spend applying for each of the ones that do!

Here’s a simple process that sould work well on most job platforms:

1. Make sure your resume and profile reflect reality. If you barely speak Korean, don’t claim to be fluent. If a job requires Korean fluency, you won’t get it either way… so why waste time applying and interviewing that you COULD spend on a job you ARE qualified for?

2. Make a list of jobs that match your ACTUAL skills and interests. If your profile is accurate, this should be easy… one button click on most platforms.

3. Read through every job listing and reject every one that doesn’t fit. If the job doesn’t fit, you probably won’t get it. And if you do, you probably won’t like it. So take it off the list NOW—the moment you spot the first detail that doesn’t fit—and spend the time you save applying for jobs you actually want that you can actually GET.

4. Apply for the jobs that are left. Now that you have the time, use it to research each employer and write every cover letter from scratch. Above all, follow any application instructions to the letter! Make it CRYSTAL CLEAR that each application has your FULL attention.

Be The Signal In The Noise

Let’s assume that you aren’t looking to con your way into a job you aren’t remotely qualified for and milk your new employer for just as long as you can avoid getting fired.

If that’s true, then you and some hiring manager out there have exactly aligned interests: you’re looking for a job (HIS!) that fits you perfectly, and he’s looking for a person (YOU!) who is a perfect fit for his job.

Thanks to the internet, finding a great job is pretty easy. But also thanks to the internet, making yourself visible through the tidal wave of spam applications on the hiring manager’s desk can be downright difficult… especially if you act just like every other spammer!

So just DON’T act like a spammer. Instead, act like a professional at whatever it is you do, and craft a small number of targeted, serious applications just like an actual professional would.

You’ll get noticed, and a hiring manager is going to want to talk to you, because that is EXACTLY what people who hire professionals are actually looking for.

Semoga sukses!