Is tailoring your resume always worth it?

I’m starting to question something about job searching.

We’re told to tailor the resume for every application - and I used to spend 30–60 minutes doing exactly that.

But after a while I noticed a pattern:

Some roles responded even with minimal customization.
Others never responded no matter how much effort I put in.

It didn’t seem related to effort - it seemed related to whether my background already matched the kind of candidate they were looking for.

Now I do a quick “fit check” before investing time, and only tailor when the alignment looks strong.

For people who’ve been job hunting longer, does tailoring actually change outcomes, or mainly help when the base fit already exists?