How Long Should A Cover Letter Be?

Cover Letters are an important aspect of the recruitment process. You should almost always attach a covering letter unless the hiring manager specifically stipulated not to in the advertisement.

However, the length of the cover letter still remains uncertain, if the cover letter has little detail about the candidate the hiring manager might insinuate you do not care much about the job and if it’s too lengthy the hiring manager might conclude to be too time consuming and not consider you for an interview.

So what is the trick?

There is no specific word count when writing a cover letter the most important thing is to be concise. Hiring Managers pay much attention to the first and the last paragraph of your cover letter, the rest of the message is typically skimmed.

Things to Consider when writing a cover letter

· Font – You want to choose a font that is simple and readable such as; Arial, New Times Romans & Verdana) and an eligible font size preferably 12

· Line Spacing - Is the distance between lines of text. I prefer to use 1.15 it makes the text more readable and gives enough space between paragraphs.

· Margins- Margins are blank spaces that line the top. Bottom, left and right sides of the document. They help to make the document neat and presentable.

What to include?

· Heading

· Salutation

· Introductory Paragraph

· Qualifications (1 – 3 paragraphs or list of bullet points preferably)

· Signature (include your contact details in your signature email)

Golden Rule

Have sufficient white space in your letter this will help you prevent to have your letter looking too disorderly and problematic to read.