Has anyone used a resume service before?

Has anyone here paid someone or had some place online make their resumes stand out more? if so how much did you pay and where?

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boredgamelad

I personally don't think it's a worthwhile investment. I've seen too many resumes brought here that were supposedly done by or looked at by professionals that I wouldn't dream of sending to a potential employer.

Psoasman

Your best bet is to post your resume here. There are a lot of people on this site with great experience, that will help you more than a resume service.

ltj8765

Yes, I used one about 9 or 10 years ago and it was a complete waste of my money. They copied what I had already written and simply changed a couple of words here and there. Basically, they gave me back this so called super resume and it was nothing more then the one I had already written!!

Good advice from the others on writing it yourself and posting here for review.

SteveLord

I swear I thought the last time this was asked.....a few actually spoke highly of such services. Hmmm....

Xyro

It depends who responds lol.

ltj8765

I think there might be some good writers out there, but with the myriad of bad ones, it is hit or miss with odds seeming to be more on the miss.

it_consultant

The next time I put a resume out there I will have it professionally done. My resume is OK, but having read a lot of resumes the last few months I can say for certain that ones that are well written and professional stand out. Don't get taken for a ride, but if you think your resume is crap, it probably is, have someone help you.

ltj8765

Maybe we need a new sticky thread on "recommended resume writers?"

astrogeek

ltj8765 wrote: »

I think there might be some good writers out there, but with the myriad of bad ones, it is hit or miss with odds seeming to be more on the miss.

I think this is pretty much the case. I'd take a guess that about 90% aren't very good at all, but the ones that are good can help. However, anytime you have someone else do your resume you should make some small edits to personalize it to your liking.

What makes finding a good resume service very difficult is that there are a lot of websites that get paid to advertise for the bad ones. Many of those websites are masked as "reviews" for these resume writing companies, so essentially you'll see great reviews for what really are crappy, or at best mediocre services.

I used ResumeEdge.com. I did a bunch of research and they seemed to have some of the best reviews from what I could gather. I forget exactly what I paid, but I had a LinkedIn discount and some other discount that brought it to about $300 for writing my resume, cover letter, and my LinkedIn profile.

I really liked my resume writer. She had been a recruiter for about 15 years so she had plenty of experience handling resumes - this was really what I was looking for, professional advice from someone that deals with resumes on a daily basis - so that alone was worth the entire cost. My resume writer also debunked a common myth that resumes should only be one page, she basically said you don't want to leave out something just to cram everything on one page, and honestly that seems to make a lot of sense to me. I didn't even think I could create a 2 page resume for myself considering I have very little IT experience, but she gave me a very nice looking 2 page resume that is leaps and bounds better than what I could have done on my own.

I did make a lot of changes to it after I got it, but that's not to say I didn't like what was made for me, any good resume should be personalized to you and that's basically what I did after I got it. I kept the general layout the same, there were just some minor changes here and there that I personally thought was better. The linkedIn profile was kind of a joke because it was basically just my resume in a format that would work on LinkedIn, I could have done that myself, but with the discount I had it was only like $10 so I don't really care. I was happy to get the cover letter though, I really had no idea what a cover letter was supposed to look like anyway and my writer gave me some good ideas of what it should look like - again, I made some changes to mine and generally you'll want to curtail the cover letter to each job you apply for.

Overall I'm very happy with what I paid for, just keep in mind where I was coming from and what my expectations were. I had a horribly written resume that I had assembled myself after downloading various resume templates online - I really didn't know what I was doing and it showed in what I had. I was just looking for some sort of base resume I could then work off of, something to give me a professional point in the right direction and I feel that's exactly what I got.

It really all depends what you expect from a resume writing service. At the end of the day any service will, (and should be), one experienced person and their opinions crafting your resume. This is why I made some small changes, but generally I think my resume writer really knew what she was doing and did a good job so I'm happy. But I haven't been looking for other jobs lately so I can't honestly say it's helped my career yet. Ultimately I feel it was well worth the $300 or so I paid, I mean I've spent 3 times that much on lab equipment, but a stack of Cisco switches and routers aren't going to get you into a job interview!

BigMevy

Thanks astrogeek, that's very helpful. I've been considering having mine done by a pro, but I've been leery for some of the reasons you and others mentioned above. Recommendations for good ones are appreciated.

jibbajabba

What makes a good one a good one though ? Success Rate ? Independend people say its a good one ? You personally like it ?

To be honest, I like my CV to an extend and some people did tell me that this is not a good one at all. I did get all my jobs with it, or at least interview with jobs I am applying for (with it) - is this a good one ? In the view of some - not at all .. In the view of recruiter - probably / maybe not, but it didn't stop them from inviting me anyway.

What would change if I'd have the perfect CV and changed everything and anything people suggest ? IS IT the perfect CV ? Or is it the perfect CV in the eyes of some? Is there a a chance I am not getting interviews anymore because my CV looks TOO PERFECT and rather "constructed" or copy / pasted from the "perfect resume" websites ? Of course there is a chance ...

I think what I learned in my time, is that you need to be yourself - in interviews and on paper. If you end up with the perfect CV .. does this reflect your "writing style" at all ?!?

Imagine you have one made up .. you are proud of it .. intawebz agrees .. you apply for a job and you get an interview .. now you are tasked to write up say, a design, a tender or something like that and you fail completely to work with the basic office products .. So how did you manage to create such a perfect CV / Resume ?

I hope you get what I mean ... A perfect resume can easily mean you shoot yourself in the foot. There is just one thing I do NOT understand, perfect resume or not - how can people have grammar and spelling mistake in it ? It goes without saying that no matter the layout - write it in proper English (or whatever language it needs it to be).

If a perfect resume means no mistakes - then you certainly don't need (or shouldn't need) a high priced service for it - all it takes is you proof reading it or have someone else do it for you.

danny069

There is nothing in the world you can't do yourself.

koz24

danny069 wrote: »

There is nothing in the world you can't do yourself.

Yes but time is money and it would take me personally much longer to put together a professional resume than someone who does it for a living. Which is why I would rather pay someone else to do it and in fact, I will be doing this for my next job. The point of the resume to me is to get me to the technical interview where I hope to shine. I won't be needing any resume-writing skills once I get the job.

koz24

astrogeek wrote: »

I think this is pretty much the case. I'd take a guess that about 90% aren't very good at all, but the ones that are good can help. However, anytime you have someone else do your resume you should make some small edits to personalize it to your liking.

What makes finding a good resume service very difficult is that there are a lot of websites that get paid to advertise for the bad ones. Many of those websites are masked as "reviews" for these resume writing companies, so essentially you'll see great reviews for what really are crappy, or at best mediocre services.

I used ResumeEdge.com. I did a bunch of research and they seemed to have some of the best reviews from what I could gather. I forget exactly what I paid, but I had a LinkedIn discount and some other discount that brought it to about $300 for writing my resume, cover letter, and my LinkedIn profile.

I really liked my resume writer. She had been a recruiter for about 15 years so she had plenty of experience handling resumes - this was really what I was looking for, professional advice from someone that deals with resumes on a daily basis - so that alone was worth the entire cost. My resume writer also debunked a common myth that resumes should only be one page, she basically said you don't want to leave out something just to cram everything on one page, and honestly that seems to make a lot of sense to me. I didn't even think I could create a 2 page resume for myself considering I have very little IT experience, but she gave me a very nice looking 2 page resume that is leaps and bounds better than what I could have done on my own.

I did make a lot of changes to it after I got it, but that's not to say I didn't like what was made for me, any good resume should be personalized to you and that's basically what I did after I got it. I kept the general layout the same, there were just some minor changes here and there that I personally thought was better. The linkedIn profile was kind of a joke because it was basically just my resume in a format that would work on LinkedIn, I could have done that myself, but with the discount I had it was only like $10 so I don't really care. I was happy to get the cover letter though, I really had no idea what a cover letter was supposed to look like anyway and my writer gave me some good ideas of what it should look like - again, I made some changes to mine and generally you'll want to curtail the cover letter to each job you apply for.

Overall I'm very happy with what I paid for, just keep in mind where I was coming from and what my expectations were. I had a horribly written resume that I had assembled myself after downloading various resume templates online - I really didn't know what I was doing and it showed in what I had. I was just looking for some sort of base resume I could then work off of, something to give me a professional point in the right direction and I feel that's exactly what I got.

It really all depends what you expect from a resume writing service. At the end of the day any service will, (and should be), one experienced person and their opinions crafting your resume. This is why I made some small changes, but generally I think my resume writer really knew what she was doing and did a good job so I'm happy. But I haven't been looking for other jobs lately so I can't honestly say it's helped my career yet. Ultimately I feel it was well worth the $300 or so I paid, I mean I've spent 3 times that much on lab equipment, but a stack of Cisco switches and routers aren't going to get you into a job interview!

Good post sir. I will check out ResumeEdge since I need a new resume.

keenon

jsb515 wrote: »

Has anyone here paid someone or had some place online make their resumes stand out more? if so how much did you pay and where?

I have been paid to write or rewrite a resume. I have never paid anyone to do this for myself.

Fulcrum45

Yeah, post it here and TE can help you better than a writer. I used one a few years back and what I got in return was over used verbiage and half truths. Things like "results focused", "detail oriented" and "team player" were all over the place. They also decided to embellish some of my past work history by saying I had saved my previous companies "millions of dollars" etc. No one thinks more highly of me than me so even I knew that wasn't right

I suspect a lot of these resume writers still think their target audience is HR when in fact 90% of the time your resume is getting scanned for key words by the larger job websites.

PocketLumberjack

I used my college to help with my resume. They will help with resumes for free up to 5 years after graduation. It was really helpful to have another set up eyes look it over and help with structure.

keenon

I would also add you should learn to speak and sell yourself on your own behalf. A resume is the written word about you and what you have been doing.

srabiee

If you have the time and patience, there are plenty of resources on this site that you can use to write a really nice resume.

Here's a link to a resume resources thread that I posted awhile back, that includes sample resumes, guides, action verbs, cover letters, etc. It's fairly comprehensive.

http://www.techexams.net/forums/jobs-degrees/113891-resume-writing-resources.html

As someone else stated, once you have a good first draft completed, you can post it on the forums and I'm sure multiple members wouldn't mind helping you tweak it.

kurosaki00

It's more worthwhile learning how to write resumes yourself.
All the info you need to learn how to write a resume are here in this forums. Use the search function.

I've gone through 3-4 jobs in the last several years and I wrote the resume I applied with for all of them. I learned everything about writing a resume here in techexams. After that, I've never had a problem finding a job. Put a few hours into it, post it here, review, fix, learn how to, post it again, apply.

It's a great life skill, don't pay another person to do it. I helped my brother in law with his resume when he was in college and he got an internship with an engineering company. I helped my gf with hers and she got a job with a Law firm.
Learn how to do it correctly and you can apply it to any career/path.

mzx380

Other than providing the tip of doing the resume yourself, I recommend not using a fancy looking template as the resume you use to apply. A lot of times, these image heavy templates will not parse through an HRIS system and will make your resume look like jibberish. Keep the format simple for applying and if you get to the next level, you can wow them with a fancy design in person.

infoscrub

PocketLumberjack wrote: »

I used my college to help with my resume. They will help with resumes for free up to 5 years after graduation. It was really helpful to have another set up eyes look it over and help with structure.

I used my school's resume services once. They gave me plenty of help with format and readability. I appreciated their advice but I wouldn't recommend having an English major whose never been near IT write bullets on your resume.

BradleyHU

nah bruv!

NavyMooseCCNA

jsb515 said:

Has anyone here paid someone or had some place online make their resumes stand out more? if so how much did you pay and where?

I did back in 2010 or so. My company wanted resumes that were going to be used to assign people to projects to be in a specific format and I had no plans on spending hours writing a resume for their specific format. I hired a local resume service. I don't remember how much it ran me, but I am still using some of what he created for my regular resume. It was well worth the expense.

AndrewVogler

Yes, there are a lot of them in the Web. Let's check, what direction do you need? Just resumes?

paul78

AndrewVogler said:

Yes, there are a lot of them in the Web. Let's check, what direction do you need? Just resumes?

Hopefully after six years, OP has figured out how to write a resume and get a job.