I’m a junior in college and spent all of last semester applying to finance and marketing internships. Sent out over 50 applications. Heard back from maybe 3. I genuinely started thinking I just wasn’t good enough and should lower my expectations.

Turns out it (supposedly) had nothing to do with my qualifications.

A friend in HR told me most companies run every resume through software before a human ever sees it. The software scans for exact keywords from the job posting and scores your resume automatically. If your score is too low you just never exist to them. No rejection. Just silence.

I went back and looked at job postings I had applied to and compared the wording to my resume. The gap was embarrassing. I was writing “assisted with data analysis” when the posting said “conducted financial modeling.” Close enough for a human. Not close enough for the software.

Once I started matching my resume to each specific job description word for word my response rate completely changed (kinda - maybe got 3 more interviews cause of it). I use a tool that did this automatically now by comparing my resume to the job description and showing me exactly what’s missing. Wish I had known about that in September instead of spending months wondering what was wrong with me.

If you’re in the application void right now good luck! Ngl this is actually so ridiculous though how has getting a job or internship come to this??