How to write a cover letter for a specific job
A simple four-paragraph structure for a cover letter that hiring managers actually read, how long it should be, who to address it to, and a full example tailored to a real-world job posting.
Short answer: a good cover letter is 250 to 400 words in four short paragraphs: (1) the role you want and one line on why you fit, (2) proof that you can do the two or three things the job needs most, (3) why this company specifically, and (4) a brief, confident close. Address it to the hiring manager by name if you can find it, otherwise "Dear Hiring Team".
Many applications make the cover letter optional, and many recruiters admit they skim them. But when two candidates look similar on paper, a short, specific letter is often the tiebreaker. It's also the one place you can explain things a resume can't: a career change, a gap, a move, or why a role you're slightly underqualified for is still a fit.
Skip it only when the application says not to send one. Otherwise, a tailored letter takes 20 minutes and can only help.
The four-paragraph structure
1. Opening: the job and your hook
Name the role and give the single strongest reason you're a fit. Don't start with "My name is" or "I am writing to apply". They already know both.
2. Proof: the two or three things that matter most
Pick the posting's top requirements and show, with specifics and numbers, that you've done them. This is the heart of the letter. One concrete story beats a list of adjectives.
3. Why this company
One or two sentences that could only be written to this employer: their product, customers, a recent launch, the way they work. It shows you're applying to them, not to every opening on the internet.
4. Close
Say you'd welcome a conversation, thank them, and sign off. No need to repeat your resume or to plead.
Example cover letter
Here's a letter for the fictional Senior Marketing Data Analyst posting in our before-and-after sample. Every fact in it comes from the sample candidate's resume.
Dear Hiring Team,
I'm applying for the Senior Marketing Data Analyst role at Fernwood Outdoor Co. I've spent five years turning retail and logistics data into dashboards, reports and test readouts that teams act on, which is the core of the role you describe.
At Brightline Retail Group, I led a customer churn analysis that identified late deliveries as a key reason customers left; after the fix, churn fell 12%. I build the Tableau dashboards and weekly sales reports our regional managers rely on, write the SQL behind them, and analyze A/B test results for our marketing team. Before that, at Lakeshore Logistics, I automated a daily KPI report in Python that saved about six hours of manual work a week.
Fernwood's mix of online sales and 40 retail stores is exactly where careful retention analysis and testing pay off, and it's the kind of problem I want to work on next.
I'd welcome the chance to talk about how I could help your marketing team run better experiments and spend smarter. Thank you for your consideration.
Sincerely,
Jordan Rivera
It's under 200 words. Notice what it doesn't do: no "I'm a passionate, results-driven team player", no repeating the resume line by line, and no apologizing for what's missing.
Tips that make a cover letter work
- Mirror the posting's priorities and, where accurate, its words. If the job says "experimentation", say "experimentation".
- Use numbers. "Cut onboarding time from three weeks to one" is memorable; "improved onboarding" isn't.
- Address gaps briefly and positively, if at all: "I haven't used dbt in production, but I build the same kinds of transformations in Python every week."
- Match your resume's header (name, email, phone, city) so the two documents look like a set.
- Send a PDF unless the application asks for something else, named like
Jordan-Rivera-Cover-Letter.pdf. - Proofread names. The fastest way to the "no" pile is the wrong company name, left over from your last letter.
Common cover letter mistakes
- Writing more than one page, or more than about 400 words.
- Summarizing your whole career instead of the parts this job needs.
- Generic praise ("your innovative company") that could go to anyone.
- Talking only about what you want, not about what you'll do for them.
- Using a template so obviously that the letter could belong to anyone.
Common questions
How long should a cover letter be?
Between 250 and 400 words: three to five short paragraphs that fit comfortably on one page.
Who should I address a cover letter to?
The hiring manager by name if the posting or the company's site makes it clear. If not, "Dear Hiring Team" or "Dear [Company] Recruiting Team" is fine. Avoid "To whom it may concern".
Should I mention salary in a cover letter?
Only if the application asks for your expectations. Otherwise, save pay for the conversation with the recruiter.
Can I use AI to write my cover letter?
Yes, as long as every claim is true and the letter is specific to the job. Our tailoring service writes the cover letter from your real resume and the posting, alongside your tailored resume, and never invents achievements.