How to End a Cover Letter 12+ Proven Strategies

How to End a Cover Letter 12+ Proven Strategies How to End a Cover Letter: 12+ Proven Strategies Don’t fall at the final hurdle â€" use our tips to write an elegant and professional cover letter closing that impresses hiring managers to the very last word. Build My Cover Letter Now The secret to a well-written cover letter closing is to always leave the reader wanting more. It should convince the hiring manager to call you in for an interview before another company snaps you up first. Read on to learn how to end a cover letter in a way that ties your application together and makes potential employers eager to meet you in person. Table of Contents What to Include in a Cover Letter Closing Ending a Cover Letter: 3 Ready-to-Use Examples How to Close a Cover Letter With a Call To Action Key Takeaways (+1 Secret Weapon) 1. What to Include in a Cover Letter Closing Theres more to ending a cover letter than signing your name and hoping for the best. While cover letter openings are vital for grabbing the hiring managers attention, cover letter closings are where you reinforce your strongest selling points as a candidate. When presented with several pieces of information, people most easily remember the last one. Psychologists call this the serial position effect. Thanks to how the human brain works, the second half of your cover letter is what will stick in the hiring managers mind. Now that youre aware of this fact, you can use it to your advantage. Heres a proven cover letter ending formula: Final body paragraph add your key selling points here Call to action push for an interview and say youll follow up Sign off use HR-approved language to achieve the right level of formality Lets look at how these components can be used to great effect, so you can construct your own masterful cover letter conclusion with ease. Tip Need to start from the beginning? Find out how to start a cover letter and put all the pieces together. 2. Ending a Cover Letter: 3 Ready-to-Use Examples Before you prompt the hiring manager to contact you in your cover letter closing paragraph, you need to reinforce why they should. Remember this step and youll nail it every time: Explain how you will add value to the company if hired. Many candidates believe they should end their cover letter by pointing out how much they want the job. This is 100% wrong. You should emphasize what you can do for your potential employer, not what they can do for you. Tip Read our full guide to how to write a cover letter for more actionable advice and examples. State how your skills and experience will directly benefit their business. By focusing on the needs of the company instead of your own, youll change the tone of your cover letter closing possibly even your whole application. Choose an approach below as the last body paragraph of a cover letter, and youll be miles ahead of other candidates. Express Your Passion One of the most desirable traits in an employee is genuine enthusiasm. Not only are businesses with highly-engaged staff more profitable, but passionate workers maintain and improve their performance over time. This means longer retention rates and higher productivity. Emphasize what you can do for your potential employer, not what they can do for you. Use your cover letters last paragraph to demonstrate how passionate you are about the work you would perform, and youll immediately be viewed more favorably by hiring managers. Example 1 As a devotee of the beauty industry and a loyal customer of Body+ Skincare, I’m excited to use my social media and marketing skills to bolster the company’s reach online. I can’t wait to share my ideas for how best to spread the brand’s message that everyone is beautiful. Make an Offer They Cant Refuse Many applicants reiterate their impressive qualifications and skills, but forget to describe how they would use these abilities if offered the position. One effective choice for ending a cover letter is to explain exactly how you will contribute to the companys bottom line. If you make it clear that theyd essentially be losing money if they didnt hire you, then your chances of landing an interview are looking pretty good. Example 2 If hired, I’ll bring the same results-oriented mindset to Power Gym as I brought to UltraFit. I’m looking forward to showing you how I improved member retention by 35% and drove monthly sales of over $2500 in supplements and fitness accessories. Connect With the Companys Future If youve researched your target company thoroughly, you should roughly know its values and goals. Such insight allows you to establish a connection with the hiring manager, and show how you are a vital part of achieving the companys mission. Use the following closing for your cover letter to explain how your objectives align with the organizations, and how you will help the organization grow. Example 3 SmartMeals’ mission statement is that it wants to reinvent how people approach their diet. On your team I would continue to develop my conscientious approach to customer service and help create the most compelling organic food shopping experience imaginable. 3. How to Close a Cover Letter With a Call To Action Once the hiring manager views you as a potential asset, you can prompt them to call you. This can be tricky to get right because you must carefully tread the line between confidence and pushiness. We call this cover letter closing statement a call to action because it encourages the reader to act in this case, to get in touch with you. Use these four steps to craft a subtle yet effective call to action. Step 1: Inform the hiring manager that youd love the opportunity to discuss your application further. Step 2: List your contact details. It will save the hiring manager time if they can pick up the phone or start typing an email straight away. Step 3: Say youll be in contact within a week. This shows that youre proactive and that the job is important to you. Step 4: Say thank you to the hiring manager for reading your cover letter. Its a small addition, but a heartfelt thank you is polite and professional. Heres how it looks in the closing paragraph of a cover letter: Im looking forward to discussing my skills and experience in more detail soon. Please contact me at (123) 456 789 or bestcoverletterendings@rg.com any time. Ill be in touch next week to follow up, just to make sure you received my application. Thank you for your time and consideration. Tip Which of the following should you not do in the closing paragraph of your cover letter 1. Restate content from your resume, or 2. Mention the job title? Read these cover letter tips to find out. How to Sign Off a Cover Letter in Style Now that job applications are usually sent by email, your cover letter sign off can be the most stressful stage of the entire writing process. You dont want to sound too rigid and formal, but you dont want to treat the hiring manager like an old friend either. Strike a balance by ending with one of the following cover letter closing salutations. Use These 7 Professional Cover Letter Sign Offs Sincerely Best Regards Thank you Respectfully Kind regards Best regards Each of these is formal without sounding stuffy. On the other hand, there are closings that dont resonate with hiring managers. Steer clear of these endings, and youll be in much better shape when you start sending out cover letters. Avoid These 11 Inappropriate Cover Letter Sign Offs Cheers Warm regards Affectionately Yours truly Take care See you soon Fondly Take it easy Godspeed Best wishes Have a good day These complimentary closes are a mix of informal, over-familiar, and just downright awkward. Dont write the perfect cover letter and then blow it by using one of these clumsy closes. Tip Ever wondered how long should a cover letter be? The answer varies depending on the industry and job title. 4. Key Takeaways (+1 Secret Weapon) Youre now an expert on how to conclude a strong cover letter. Your application will be a breath of fresh air to hiring managers, and an interview should be right around the corner. Here are the three components to remember: One paragraph explaining how you add value A confident call-to-action Your name and an elegant sign off Not that you need anything else by this point, but theres one more trick that our career experts recommend for your closing remarks. Secret Weapon for Closing a Cover Letter: The Postscript (P.S.) Remember how the last thing the reader sees is what they recall most easily? If you have one knockout quality that makes you a unique candidate, or simply a favorite cover letter closing line, put it in a P.S. as a nice finishing touch. Having this extra section at the bottom of the page draws the hiring managers eye. Theyll probably read it before the body of the letter and then again after. Dont restate information in a P.S. though. Follow the cover letter structure laid out previously to showcase your skills and experience, and then treat the P.S. as the cherry on top. Were not saying its the best way to end a cover letter, but it can be a powerful tool if used well: P.S. I consider myself a lifelong student, and would love the opportunity to apply my 10+ years of experience in education but also continue to learn as a member of your school faculty. Good luck on the job hunt! If youre ready to write, try adding your ideas to one of our free cover letter templates. We have a range of designs targeted at different industries that can be easily downloaded for Microsoft Word. Or if you prefer, our free cover letter builder can help you create not only a great closing but a complete, HR-approved cover letter in roughly five minutes.