Took me ~200 applications to realize i was doing the whole thing wrong

So I wanna share this cause I wish someone told me earlier.

Was job hunting for months. Applying like a machine every day, Indeed LinkedIn all of it. And basically getting ghosted by everyone. It messes with your head after a while ngl, you start thinking maybe you're just not good enough.

I had sent around 200 applications. Got maybe 3 replies and they were all automatic rejections.

Here's the thing I didn't know. A lot of companies use software to scan your CV before a human reads it. And that software looks for the specific keywords from the job listing. So you can be perfectly qualified but if your CV doesn't match their wording you just don't make it through.

I was using ONE cv for everything. Same pdf to every job. Big mistake apparently.

What changed everything was adapting the CV to each offer. Like actually reading the job post and using their words. If they say "stakeholder management" you put stakeholder management (if it's true for you obviously). Sounds dumb but it works.

It takes forever to do this by hand i won't lie. Some days i just couldn't be bothered and i'd send the generic one anyway. But every time i actually tailored it i got way more responses. Went from silence to a few interviews pretty fast.

So yeah if you're sending the same cv everywhere and wondering why nobody answers.. that's probably part of it. Tailor each one, keep the format simple (no tables and weird columns, the scanners can't read them), and don't give up.

How do you guys handle tailoring every single application without losing your mind? Curious if people have a system.