How can I stand out in my job search over other candidates?

PROJECTS! You need to be able to show that you have the skills, passion, and independence to hit the ground running and make an impact, especially if you're early in your career or light on relevant work experience. The best way to do that, by far, is to do a bunch of relevant projects, and then list and link to them within a PROJECTS section on your resume (can do this in the Education section of our resume builder).

Examples:

• For developers, make sure your GitHub is chock-full of software projects, and linked in multiple places on your resume, including in your header.
• For designers, make sure your portfolio is beautiful and easy to navigate (and linked in your resume header).
• For marketers, create a few ad campaign pitch decks for different brands; go crazy and have fun with it!
• For writers, write some amazing and unique content that AI could never replicate.

Even more specifically, if you want to stand out as much as possible, do a project that's relevant to the role FOR THE COMPANY YOU'RE APPLYING TO, and send it in with your resume. It's basically a guarantee that they'll interview you, and you'll stand head and shoulders above every other candidate with a simple cover letter.