How many times have you applied for a job and never heard back (not counting autoreplies), I bet it’s quite a lot, right? But despite what you think it’s NOT necessarily you...

Working first-hand with many recruiting businesses (large and small) I get to see a unique perspective on how different internal recruitment processes and teams work and when it comes down to it many are just not familiar with how to hire effectively. In-fact I’m constantly surprised by how terrible hiring teams are, a snapshot of bad hiring practices include:

Robots reviewing CVs (badly);
Lack of knowledge - Recruiters often don’t fully understand the vacancy;
Lack of urgency.

Understanding that most employers engage in such bad practices can give you the competitive edge which you can leverage to your advantage through CV mirroring.

By adopting the vocabulary and tone of the employer you will make your application appear more relevant at a glance and buzzword heavy. Mirror text used within vacancy descriptions, job adverts and LinkedIn profiles to:

Increase the keyword density in your CV (to help pass stage 1),
Make your CV look suitable at a glance (to win over recruiters and pass stage 2)
Make your CV really stand-out so it gets forwarded to the hiring managers (to help progress your CV and pass stage 3).

Below is an example of CV mirroring in practice: