In most cases, your resume is the first document a hiring manager will use to begin getting to know you. This means that before you have even met your interviewer, they have formed an impression about you based on the contents of your resume. On average, hiring managers receive over 75 resumes every day for their open positions. They want to find the right candidate and they want to find them fast. In fact, most hiring managers only look at a resume for about six seconds. This is why it is imperative to keep your resume short, sweet, to the point, and ultimately, on one page. Follow these steps and you can cut down your resume down to one page in no time.

Reduce your margins

A standard word document has one-inch margins all around the document (top, bottom, left and right). Making your margins a little bit smaller by decreasing the inches can give you much more space to write without making a huge difference in the format and layout of your resume. To utilize this trick, we recommend a margin size of 0.7 inches all around, but no less than 0.5 inches. An appropriate amount of blank space is needed on your resume to keep it well-organized and easy to read.

Avoid ‘widowed’ words

When we use the term ‘widow’ when referring to a text, we are talking about the common mistake of having a single word or short phrase fall to the next line. Not only does this affect the appearance of your formatting, it also unnecessarily takes up an entire line of space for only a single word. Because we should be confining our resume down to one page, we don’t want to waste any of that space. When dealing with ‘widows’ in bullet points, try to discover ways in which you can either build up that bullet point or condense it down.

We recommend starting your bullet point with a power verb to describe what you were responsible for and the outcome of your actions. Think about what you accomplished in that role rather than simply what your responsibilities were. To help you understand this, keep in mind that the first few words of your bullet points are more important than the rest because hiring managers will only be skimming your resume. But don’t worry, you’ll have plenty of time to talk about the full story once you land the interview.

Include only recent and relevant information

A resume is all about grabbing your potential employer’s attention. It should be a tool that markets you as the ideal person for the job that you are applying for. Consider taking the time to tailor your resume to the company’s job description. By doing this, you can be sure that you are using all of the   while only including the most relevant information.

Take a moment and think about it; if you are applying for a job that involves interacting with children, you would most likely include past experiences you’ve had working with kids. If you are applying for a job at an accounting firm, you would most likely include your past experiences that involved accounting, finance, or math. Perhaps you were an accounting tutor. Only include information that will put you at an advantage; everything else is unnecessary and a waste of space.

Creating a one page resume is not an easy task. It takes time and thought. Even the most experienced resume writers can sometimes still struggle to keep all of that information condensed onto one page. If you’re still struggling, BrandResumes is here to help.