A cover letter has the potential to be your greatest asset when you're fighting through that tar pit called the job market...but only if you use it properly. There's a lot involved with getting that baby working at max potential, both on and off the page. Luckily, it can be summarized into 3 pretty simple steps.

Really when you're employing your cover letter in an effort to get YOURSELF employed, only about a third of the work is really with the cover letter itself. Before you write your cover letter, you need to do a lot of research into the company you want to apply to, as well as the position you're after. After you write your cover letter, you have to make sure it gets to the right place and work on your follow-up.

It all starts with the exact second that it clicks in your head, your synapses fire, and you decide "I need to get a job." From there, you think about what you could do, what you'd be happy doing, and what could support your financial needs. You start looking around for a company that you'd like to work for, and Phase One of your job hunting campaign begins.

When you find a company you think could suit your work needs, you research it like crazy. Find out everything you can about who they are, what they do, who the people running the show are, what kind of benefits you could get, what the position hierarchy is...everything you can possibly learn. The Internet is helpful, but you may have to make a few calls.

The important thing is to know that place inside and out. Don't just have a glimmer of what goes on behind those big glass doors, you want to be walking into this with both eyes open and a complete understanding of everything you'll ever need to know while working there. Who would your boss be, what would your job be, how would you contribute to the overall benefit of the company? This is all stuff you need to know. You should be the most knowledgeable person in that entire place before you ever set foot in it.

All that information comes seriously in handy when you get to Phase Two: writing your cover letter. When you're putting this baby together, you need to make absolute sure of several things:

• You know who you're writing to, who should be the specific person who can snap his/her fingers and say "you're hired."
• You don't have a SINGLE spelling or grammar error. Just one could kill your chances.
• You're not wasting precious cover letter space. Don't rehash your resume, and don't fill it with irrelevant personal info.
• You're not sounding desperate. You want to impress an employer, not make them feel bad when they hit the "Next" button.
• You're the one setting up the interview. More on this to come.

These are really only 5 very basic points, but they're all important. All your research becomes useful because you're able to demonstrate that you know what you're talking about by only including relevant information, as well as knowing EXACTLY who you need to talk to. Don't waste your time sending that beauty of a cover letter to Human Resources...would you rather be one applicant in a stack of hundreds, or one envelope sitting on the corner of the head honcho's desk? Which would get you noticed more?

For the sake of article space, I'm not going to go into the cover letter writing process any more here. In just a little while I'll point you in the direction of a great place to go for tips and info on just that, but for now I want to move on to Phase 3 of your job hunt: the follow-up.

Perhaps the most critical, this is the part where YOU set up and complete your interview. In your cover letter, you need to have it in there somewhere that you'll be calling at a designated (by you) time to set up an appointment for an interview. Don't wait for them to call you, you do the walking and talking. Make the call, and get that appointment set up.

Proactivity like this is something employers LOVE in their employees. It means you're not lazy, not sluggish, not cowardly, and not afraid to get out there and get stuff done. It tells them all these things without you having to "toot your own horn" and tell them yourself. So light a fire under your own backside and get your interview.

Once you get that interview, all your research will come in handy again as you'll actually know what you're talking about when they ask you why they should hire you. Knowing what they do, what they value, and why you can be of critical use to them is such an advantage that I can't even stress it enough.

If you've done all I've advised, your chances of nailing a job immediately are pretty darn good, and even if the first company you go for doesn't hire you, you're GOING to find a job, and a lot faster than you'd expect. Really, the cover letter is only part of the job hunting process, but it's the vital messenger who paves the way for you...if you use it properly.