Why do some people get interviews after 20 applications while others send 200 and hear nothing?

After reading a lot of job search posts here, I started noticing a pattern.

Two people can be in the same field and put in similar effort, but their results look completely different. One person sends 20–30 applications and starts getting interviews. Another sends 150–200 and barely hears anything back.

At first it’s easy to assume the difference must be talent, effort, or a better resume. But hiring decisions often don’t work that way.

Most recruiters aren’t carefully studying every resume and trying to figure out someone’s potential. They’re scanning quickly and asking a simpler question: does this person already look like the role?

If the job is for a SaaS marketer, the resume that clearly shows SaaS marketing usually wins. If they’re hiring a backend developer with AWS experience, the candidate who already did that exact thing feels like the safer choice.

From the company’s perspective it’s often a risk decision. Hiring the person who already looks like the job feels more predictable than betting on someone who might learn it.

But job seekers are usually trying to show they can do many different things. Companies are usually trying to find the person who looks most aligned with the role they need right now.

That mismatch seems to be where a lot of the frustration in job searching comes from.

Has anyone else noticed something similar during their job search?