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In the jobs I'm applying for, none of them have a contact listed, and I'm unable to identify a hiring manager in any way.
Right now I've got a generic line at the top of the cover letter:
To whom it may concern:
... but I feel like that's way too impersonal and detached, and the websites I've read tend to agree. But I just don't know what to put there, or whether I should just take it out entirely, or what.
In these situations it can be helpful to use a collective salutation that is specific to the company, something like
Dear Intertrode Recruiting Team,
or simply
To the Initech Team:
This personalizes it a bit while keeping it professional and sufficiently generalized. I also like that it sounds collaborative, implying that you know they are working together to make good hiring decisions. The exact content will depend on how much you know about who will be reading the info (e.g. if you are working with recruiters vs. hiring managers at first, or if you don't know and thus keep it more generic).
If you don't like this there are classics like
Dear Sir or Madam,
or
Dear Recruiting Professional,
