Here’s the harsh reality:  your resume by itself will not get you a job. In fact, it probably will not even land you a job interview.

Think of your resume as a reference manual and your cover letter as a sales brochure. The owner’s manual in the glove box of a new car won’t sell the car. Likewise your resume won’t effectively sell you.

A reference manual contains the features, or the basic facts describing a product. Your resume is your reference manual which contains the facts of your brand—where you have worked, the job titles you’ve held, the education or training you’ve received and other such items.

Your cover letter, on the other hand, is the sales brochure written to capture the interest of a hiring manager. Properly written, your cover letter will make your resume relevant to the specific needs of a prospective employer.

Your cover letter should talk about the benefits you offer, not your features. A one-page letter should paint a picture that helps a potential employer visualize the benefits of having you as part of the team.

You’ve probably obsessed long enough on your resume. It’s time to create a compelling cover letter that will really sell the brand hidden beneath the features listed on your resume.

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These ideas on personal branding were originally presented during two workshops I conducted for the Nonprofit Leadership Alliance. The sessions were attended by current and aspiring nonprofit leaders who came from across the nation for the annual Alliance Management/Leadership Institute, the nation’s largest leadership development and networking symposium for students, faculty and nonprofit professionals. —DH

Likewise, effective job seekers know the difference. Sadly, though, most people looking for a job focus only on their features when they should be talking about the benefits they offer.

So what’s the crucial difference?

1. Features Tell. Features are the plain facts, the list of items on your resume that describe you. Features are bits of basic information about who you are—your previous job titles, the responsibilities you carried and the education or training you received.
2. Benefits Sell. Benefits are features that have been converted into relevant information. They describe why a feature is important.

To convert a feature into a benefit, begin by asking So what? For each feature, ask: So what? Why is this information important? How is it relevant? Why should anyone care about that?

Converting a feature into a benefit can seem overwhelming, but it’s simply reframing a conversation so you are talking from the perspective of an employer.

Never throw out a feature and then leave it to a prospective employer to make the right assumptions about why it is important. You must describe how the feature will actually benefit him or her. As you’re talking about benefits, you’re actually making promises. In effect, you are telling a prospective employer, “Here what I can do for you.” That gets attention.

Think about how you are selling yourself. Do you consciously convert features into benefits?

While your resume probably focuses more on features, your cover letter provides an opportunity to bring to life the benefits of your personal brand.

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These ideas on personal branding were originally presented during two workshops I conducted for the Nonprofit Leadership Alliance. The sessions were attended by current and aspiring nonprofit leaders who came from across the nation for the annual Alliance Management/Leadership Institute, the nation’s largest leadership development and networking symposium for students, faculty and nonprofit professionals. —DH

First, be aware that by the time you are scheduled for an interview you have already cleared several hurdles. Apparently you said something in your cover letter to differentiate yourself from the herd of other applicants. The content of your resume indicates that you’ve met the essential criteria listed in the job description. Without question, the person interviewing you has already Googled your name to find any additional information contained in your digital footprint.

Congratulations! You’re on base and in scoring position. You haven’t yet crossed home plate, though, so here are my coaching tips. To emerge the winner, here are several items to remember:

1. Be yourself. If you don’t feel comfortable “in your own skin” during the interview, that might be an indication that you won’t be comfortable in the job itself.
2. Exchange enough information so both parties can make a rational decision about whether this will be a good match. Don’t think of the interview as “selling” yourself. Think of it as a first date where you’re just talking to see if there’s potential for a long-term relationship.
3. Tell stories. Make them interesting. Make them brief.
4. Never denigrate a current or former employer. I was disappointed several years ago when my strongest candidate (on paper) began the interview by telling me everything wrong with her current employer. Though we talked for 45 minutes, the interview was actually over within the first seven minutes.
5. Help the interviewer envision you as already being successful once you’ve been hired. Twice I’ve selected people for my marketing team who gave me written lists of things they anticipated doing during their first 90 days on the job.
6. Ask good questions. When I’m interviewing candidates, I pay special attention to the types of questions they ask me. That tells me whether they are really engaged in the conversation or just going through the motions. The best candidates have the best questions.
7. Ask for feedback. Make sure you have clarified everything the hiring manager will need to make an informed decision.
8. Do not be the first to mention compensation. As a rule of thumb, the first person to bring up money is at a negotiating disadvantage.
9. Find reasons to follow up. Then make sure you actually do follow up. Quickly.
10. Have a strong closing statement. Talk about your growing interest in being part of the team. Mention specific reasons why you would be successful in the new position.

It helps to think of the interview as a two-way conversation, not an interrogation. Be a good conversationalist and you’ll likely be a good interviewee. Good luck!

Likewise, effective job seekers must also know the difference. That knowledge often determines who gets an interview and ultimately who snags the job offer.

Sadly, most job seekers focus only on features when they should be talking about benefits. So what’s the crucial difference?

Features Tell. Features are facts, the list of items on your resume that describe you. They provide basic information — Who you are. Where you’ve worked. Dates you were there. Job titles. Accomplishments. Education. Community involvement.

Benefits Sell. Benefits convert features into relevant information. Benefits describe the value that a potential employer might find in one of your features. A hiring manager is always asking questions such as — So what? How is this relevant? Why should I care? What can you do for me?

Features and benefits are both important. To be effective, though, you must lead with benefits and then follow up with features.

As you’re talking about benefits, you’re actually making promises. In effect, you are saying to a prospective employer, “Here what I can do for you.” That gets attention. Once you’ve gotten attention, present supporting evidence. In other words, support your claim with a feature. In essence, you’re saying, “Here’s why I can confidently make such a promise.”

Think about how you are selling yourself. Do you communicate benefits on your resume? In your cover letter? In your LinkedIn profile?

Here’s an interesting exercise:  Take a salient feature from your resume and turn it into a benefit by answering, “Why would a prospective employer want to know that? What would I like him or her to do with that piece of information?”

The Case of the Volunteer Coordinator

I recently interviewed a woman who listed on her resume that she was the volunteer coordinator for her church. “Why do you want me to know that?” I asked. “I’m not hiring for a church volunteer coordinator position.”

The woman impressively began converting that feature into a benefit. She told me what she’d gained from that experience. She had learned to recruit, organize and motivate teams of diverse people. She talked about how that would benefit her next employer. She would have been more effective, however, had she led with those promises.

The Case of the NFL Cheerleader

Another bright young woman once asked me to help her market herself in a job search. She had just graduated from college and was looking for her first job. She was quite busy networking, but she was not getting much traction.

I diagnosed her problem early on—she was emotionally attached to a prominent feature on her resume. Unfortunately, she was unable to convert that feature into a benefit.

The feature? She was an NFL cheerleader and quite proud of it. In most conversations she would quickly tell people what she did on Sunday afternoons.

When she and I met for coffee I said, “Let’s assume I’m interviewing you for a job. Why would you want me to know you’re a cheerleader? I’m not hiring for any such positions, so why should I care?”

As anticipated, she didn’t have an answer.

Converting a feature into a benefit can be difficult. Seeing a feature from the perspective of an employer, though, can reframe the conversation.

To help the woman reframe her thinking, I took a blank sheet of paper and divided it into two columns. In the left column I listed all the features on her resume. In the right column I wrote out possible reasons why an employer might be interested. Our chart looked something like this:

Never throw out a feature and then leave it to a prospective employer to make the right assumptions. You must talk about how the feature will actually benefit him or her. Sell yourself effectively by talking about the benefits you can offer. Before you know it, you’ll have a job offer.

Right now, I personally know at least three dozen people who are between jobs. Though they’ve remained positive during these stressful times, it’s very easy to become overwhelmed with fear and negativity. Few employers are hiring in December. The economy is still bad and who knows what the future holds. On top of that, personal finances are likely strained during this season of materialism and consumerism.

On the other side of the coin, though, the holiday season can actually be a deeply meaningful time for job hunting. Done rightly, December can be a time of renewal and rejuvenation as you anticipate all the good things awaiting you in the coming new year.

Here’s my advice to anyone feeling trapped in a holiday job search:

1. Spend quality time with family and friends. A stressful career transition can refocus you on life’s true priorities—family and friends. Surround yourself with people who truly care about you and your well-being. Let them know how important they are to you.
2. Reconnect with your existing network. Update your professional contacts on the progress (or lack of) you are making. Remind them what you’re looking for. Suggest simple ways they can help. Look for ways to express gratitude for things they have already done.
3. Make new friends. The holidays are a good time to network and meet new people at parties, religious services or other social events.
4. Rethink your strategy. From time to time, we all need to think about what we’re doing and why. For me, nothing works quite like sitting alone in a coffee shop. I can clear the clutter in my mind, filter out distractions and experience a surge of creativity. The change of venue gives me a fresh perspective.
5. Revise your marketing materials. Look at your resume, cover letter, business cards and LinkedIn profile. Revise them as necessary to present yourself in a consistent, positive and differentiated way.
6. Expand your digital footprint. Be findable when someone Googles your name. For starters, make sure you have a complete Google Profile. Update your LinkedIn information and use this as a networking tool. Also, consider using Facebook as a personal branding tool. I don’t understand why someone looking for a job would set their Facebook privacy settings too high. You actually want a potential employer to see you as a real person. In my opinion, those who are authentic, transparent and visible will have a distinct advantage over those who are secretive, guarded and overly protective.
7. Do nothing. Everyone needs a little down time, so don’t feel guilty when you stop to catch your breath. Here’s an idea:  Spend an afternoon sitting on the couch watching the classic movie It’s a Wonderful Life. You’ll be more purposeful, focused and energetic when you get back in the game.

Happy holidays! And best wishes for the New Year!

In planning for an upcoming networking meeting, here’s an idea:  Have objectives! In other words, go into the meeting knowing what you want to get out of it. It’s not very difficult if you hang your requests on these three pegs:

1. Feedback. Get the other person’s input on your resume, cover letter and job search strategies. Seek feedback on market conditions and other areas where the person has expertise or knowledge.
2. Names. Ask for names of other individuals who might be helpful in your job search. Perhaps the other person will offer to introduce you to the new contact. Such introductions are especially beneficial. If you are going to contact the person directly, make sure you have permission prior to using someone’s names as a door-opener when introducing yourself.
3. Follow-up. Ask the person if you can stay in touch. Who could deny such a request? Then, by all means, find ways to follow up. I’m dumbfounded by the number of people who look at a networking meeting as a one-time interaction rather than the beginning of professional relationship. You can stay connected via LinkedIn, e-mail, a handwritten thank you note, an in-person follow-up meeting or some other method of keeping the person updated on your status.

Look for ways to give something back. Any good relationship is always interactive and ongoing. Those who only take and never give back will never be successful networkers.

Those who view networking as a short-term means for getting a job will find the experience shallow and burdensome. However, those who see networking as a way of life—a way of staying connected with the world—will be rewarded in unexpected and inmeasurable ways.

His comments caught me off guard. Quite frankly, I thought I already knew marketing, yet I’d never considered applying marketing principles to myself as if I were a product. My professor’s wisdom echoed in my mind, and through the years I grew to appreciate his sage advice even more.

Fifteen years later I stood before my own class of university students. With graduation approaching, these young people would soon be marketing themselves in a competitive job market, so I talked with them about applying marketing principles to their own job searches. I designed a tool for them to use in conducting a marketing audit on themselves. (This was a take-home assignment to be completed over spring break—the spiteful revenge of an instructor who noted that too many students skipped class on mardi gras to attend a sorority party.)

Later, when I lost my job as a marketing professional, I reached into my marketing toolbox, found that homework assignment and used it to develop a personal marketing plan for my own job search.

There are five sequential steps in the marketing process. (These are neatly organized in the textbook I taught from—Marketing Workbook for Nonprofit Organizations.) I adapted those steps to my situation and then built a career marketing plan using this process:

1. Set measurable goals. I wrote specific goals for my job search. These described the type of job I wanted, the date I hoped to begin and the salary I would require.

2. Position yourself. My next step was to identify specific attributes that described the essence of who I was professionally. These were things that would be of value to a potential employer that most other job candidates would be unable to say about themselves. I also conducted a competitor analysis so I’d know how to best differentiate myself.

3. Conduct a marketing audit. This focused on the “6 Ps of Marketing.” (Okay, I know most marketing classes teach the “4 Ps” but I liked two additional ones that were included in the textbook I used.) The marketing mix for my job search was built around the following 6 Ps:

Product. Here I defined what I would offer in the “exchange process” with a potential employer. I identified the results I could produce, the solutions I could provide and the impact I could have.
Publics. This focused on who I would target in my job search. I categorized the list by industry and then listed specific companies to target. I also developed a list of individuals with whom I would communicate.
Price. Without selling myself short, I focused on the salary I would require, the benefits I would need and other items I wanted such as learning opportunities and involvement in professional organizations.
Place. Here I defined the geographic location of the office, including the commute time and the safety of the surrounding area. I also looked at out-of-town travel and the ability to work remotely.
Production. I looked at how I wanted my career to fit with the other facets of my life. I carefully considered the pace of prospective companies, the stress level that would come with the job, the volume of work required and the balance with other facets of my life.
Promotion. I assessed my communication skills, the available technology and the tools needed for me to a) create awareness, b) maintain visibility and c) ultimately “close the sale” on my job search.

4. Develop the actual marketing plan. Only after completing the foregoing work was I ready to put together the entire plan for my job search. Once I knew where I was going, how I was differentiated and how I would market myself, I was prepared to move to the final step—communication.

5. Conduct a promotion campaign. As the final step, I expanded my networking activities, sent out a few resumes and applied for a handful of specially-targeted jobs. Promotion of myself began with strategy and ended with tactics. Those who begin a job search by sending out lots of resumes or applying indiscriminately for open positions do not understand marketing.

I used a mix of marketing tools, including e-mail, postal mail, phone calls and in-person meetings. Supporting the promotional campaign were collateral materials such as the resume, cover letter, networking e-mails, business cards and a portfolio of work I had done.

Years ago my marketing professor was right—you will never market anything more important than yourself. I found that my career took on a whole new meaning as I marketed myself professionally.

I’d love to hear from others who have successfully marketed or branded themselves.