Should I email the recruiter with my resume instead of applying online?

Question

Lots of companies have online application forms, but I find that often times my resume just gets lost in the large pool that it gets put in. My school has a career site linked to experience.com that has a lot of contact information to recruiters for many companies. Would it be fine for me to just send my resume and CV to the recruiter directly instead of going through the online form?

So far its worked well for the companies I've tried this with, but they were much smaller ones(2k employees). Because of that, I got two interviews within a day. But for larger sized places would this approach be appreciated by the recruiters?

Answer 1

Probably not.

What you can do, however, is call the recruiter with a question about the position or company you are applying to. At the end of the conversation, say something like "Thanks for the information, that sounds great, I would love to apply for [said position/company]. Is it okay if I send you my resume and CV?"

This way, you are not sending in your resume and CV "cold" and annoy the recruiter by flooding his inbox. Rather, the recruiter will be expecting an e-mail from you and will be happy when he receives it.

Answer 2

The problem with the larger companies is that the recruiter is just the person that does the initial filtering of the resumes and applications. These need to exist in the system before you can move on to the next step.

The bigger companies may have recruiters thousands of miles from you. They can have a set of recruiters working with college campuses, but they will be a different set from those trying to fill specific positions. Jobs you see online could be handled by either group. Even if you university has the name of a recruiter, unless they are the one tasked will filling that position, they won't be of much help.

Nevertheless do try to contact the recruiter because you want to use as many approaches to the job hunt as possible.

Answer 3

It is best to have personal contact unless your skills are in hot demand at the time. Make a phone call and talk to them, ask some good questions, and then ask who to send your resume to.

Answer 4

Resume has to be entered to the HR system somehow by someone, to be filtered and processed. If you rely on your email being imported or copy/pasted, it may get mangled, decreasing your chance of success.

That said, in my experience entering resume to HR databases is waste of time. Possibly OK for junior positions. Instead, work with a recruiter, who has your current resume customized for the position you want to apply. You enter your data into HR after you got the offer.

Answer 5

Why not both? If a post/site has included the recruiter's information, be smart and grab that info. You will either get a call, or not hear from them. Either ways no harm done. Make sure you craft your email so that it grabs eyeballs and actually make the recruiter open your resume.