Thinking of getting a new job? You tell your network that you’re in search of a new opportunity, but then what?

You’ll need to update your resume to wow potential employers.

How do you even start to update your resume? How will you prove you've got the skills and qualifications for your target role?

Keep in mind that you can find great resume design ideas on Envato Elements. Another good source for quick resume templates is GraphicRiver.

Without further ado, here are over 30 easy resume ideas for 2019 that'll help you get a job—including easy resume examples. 

Where to Find the Best Resume Templates

Before we dive into our list of tips, let's answer the question: where do you find quick resume templates?

The best new resume styles for 2019 can be found on Envato Elements. Elements is an all-you-can-download service for creatives. It features a vast array of stunning assets—graphic templates, projects, images, and more. 

For a low monthly fee, you can unlock unlimited access to the full Elements library including images, themes, courses, and more. 

In 2019, there’s truly no reason to waste precious time building your quick resume from scratch. Instead, choose a template from Envato, drop in your own content, and approach your career move with greater confidence!

Elements is great if you want unlimited downloads, but it isn’t the only option Envato has to offer. Let’s check out GraphicRiver, which is built on a pay-as-you-go model. At GraphicRiver, you don’t pay an access fee. Instead, you pay each time you use a template. 

On to our list of resume ideas...

33 Resume Ideas You Can Apply Quickly & Easily

If you're in the midst of a job search, your resume is key. You need to learn how to make a quick resume so you can start applying for jobs.

 Here's a list of creative resume ideas that'll help you find the job you need. For your convenience, we've divided the list into four easy sections:

1. Tips on Resume Content
2. Resume Design Ideas
3. Tips for Resume Writing
4. Other Resume Tips

You can also find additional resume ideas in our guide How to Create a Great Resume.

Tips on Resume Content

The creative resume ideas below will help you spruce up the content in every section of your resume.

1. Write About Problems You’ve Solved

While statements about your job achievements are fine, recruiters are used to them.

What they don’t expect is for you to write about a challenge you’ve solved. So, don’t be afraid to dedicate a bullet point or two about this, the role you played in solving it and the results you achieved.

After that, end your resume with the following statement: 

“Do I have your attention? With my education and experience, let’s explore whether I am a fit for (Company Name). Is there a telephone conversation in our future to discuss the specific results the hiring manager or principal hopes to achieve in filling this position?”

This approach helped Management and Behavior Psychologist Dr. Elliot Jaffa get a 35-minute phone interview with three C-level executives of a major baseball league team.

2. Use an Updated Email Address 

AOL, Comcast, Yahoo, Livewire, and other old email addresses betray your age. It also suggests you’re out of touch with the internet era. 

Instead, try using your Gmail account with your name. Or, pay the extra dollars and get an email extension based on your name. Examples: JaneDoe@gmail.com, Jane@JaneDoe.com.

3. Avoid Cutesy Email Addresses

Are you still using the same cutesy email you used back in college? Email addresses with school nicknames aren't professional. Your username might be cute or funny to you, but it might offend someone or make the recruiter think you’re not serious with your job search.

Instead, use an email addressed based on your name, or a variation of your name, as shown in Tip 2 above.

If you'll be sending your resume through email, you can learn more in the tutorial below:

• 
  Resumes
  How to Email Your Resume Professionally (Quick Guide)
  Laura Spencer

4. Don’t Include Your Graduation Date

Stephanie Thoma, Networking Strategy Coach, says, “Omitting your graduation year safeguards you from age discrimination. Your graduation year only suggests that you’re either too young or too old, before you even meet the recruiter.”

5.  Focus on Achievements

Most of the resumes recruiters receive focus on responsibilities so much that it lacks details of the applicant’s impact to their employer. 

The accomplishments you list don’t have to be your own, it could be something you did as part of a team. 

6.  Don’t Dilute Your Resume

Focus on experience, training, and skills relevant to the positions you want. 

“Unrelated duties dilute the related content and takes up valuable space that could’ve been used for keywords and skills that match the job you’re seeking,” says Nancy Spivey, Founder of Ready Set Resumes.

7. Add an Interest Section

Don’t have enough experience to prove you deserve the role? Or perhaps you've got an interesting hobby that could go as a conversation starter? 

Joshua Goldstein, Founder of underdog.io, a website that'll allow you to apply for several jobs at once, believes that adding an interesting hobby will help you stand out from the pack.

8. Organize Your Skills

Don’t just list your skills on a bullet point. Organize them by category to make it easy for the recruiter to see if you've got the skills they’re looking for. For instance, as a UI/UX designer, you can divide your skills in three groups: programming/technical, design, and soft skills.

The following tutorial goes into more depth on how to list your skills on your resume:

• 
  Resumes
  How to Effectively List Professional Skills on Your Resume
  Charley Mendoza

Resume Design Ideas 

Want to know how to make a quick and easy resume that still looks good? Follow the creative resume design ideas below.

9. Tailor Your Headings to the Job

Career and Gallup Strengths Career Coach Missy Scott suggests using specific headers instead of generic ones. 

Example: If you’re applying for a Market Research job and you've got experience in it, label your work history section as “Market Research Experience.” It’s a good way to add extra keywords into your resume to meet the requirements of an Applicant Tracking System (ATS) and the unique header will make your resume a tad more memorable.

10. Don’t Cram It

Don’t use single spaces just to save space. If you really want to save space, try other resume design ideas such as using text boxes, columns, or charts.

11.  Use a Readable Font

Keep it simple with a readable font that looks good both on screen and in print. Stick to font sizes 12 to 14 for the resume body and 16 to 20 for the headers. 

Remember, some fonts like Papyrus or Monotype Corsiva might look good on a laptop but are hardly readable on mobile or when printed. 

For more information on the best fonts for resume, check out this tutorial:

• 
  Careers
  What Is the Best Font for a Resume? (Professional Size & Proper Type for 2020)
  Charley Mendoza

12. Add Links

Add hyperlinks to your LinkedIn profile, website, or GitHub. This is particularly important for resumes that'll be viewed online first. Using clickable links makes it more likely that a recruiter or hiring manager will view the additional information about you.

13. Use Appropriate Line Spacing

Keep line spacing at 1.15 to 1.5 so your resume is easy to skim. This is especially important for human recruiters who may be reviewing your resume.

14.  Use PDF

Sending your resume via a PDF file preserves the formatting you use, so it looks the same whatever device is used to read it. 

There are also lots of easy resume template that you can edit as PDF, so you can just fill it with your information instead of converting a file from MS Word to PDF.

15. Stick to a Recognized Format

Use a chronological, functional or combined resume format so whoever reads it doesn’t have to waste time deciphering your resume’s format. 

Not sure which resume format to use? Check out these in-depth tutorials on combination, chronological, and functional resume formats with easy resume samples that you can follow:

• 
  Resumes
  How to Write a Functional or Skills-Based Resume (With Examples + Templates)
  Charley Mendoza
• 
  Resumes
  How to Make a Great Combination Format Resume With Templates
  Charley Mendoza
• 
  Careers
  How to Make a Chronological Order Resume with Templates
  Charley Mendoza

16. Use a Professional Resume Template

You don’t have to use a boring MS Word resume when you can easily create a professional looking template online. 

In a rush? You can choose from a variety of interesting resume ideas and easy resume template on Envato Marketplace and Graphic Rivers.

Here are some easy resume samples to choose from:

• 
  Resumes
  35+ Best Professional Business Resume Templates (Company CVs 2021)
  Andrew Childress
• 
  Resumes
  29+ Modern Resume Templates With Clean (Elegant) CV Designs (+ 2021 Video)
  Brenda Barron

17. Keep It to An Acceptable Resume Length

Fresh graduates and those with less than two years of professional experience should stick to a one-page resume. 

Those with more experience should use the space in a two-page resume to highlight how their qualifications can contribute to employers.

• 
  Careers
  How to Make Your Resume the Perfect Length (+To the Point)
  Charley Mendoza

18. Use a Simple Color Palette

Yes, colored resumes are no longer in bad taste, but don’t go crazy with the color combinations either. Use two to three colors at maximum and avoid neon colors that hurt the eyes. 

Tips for Resume Writing

Yes, writing the resume is perhaps the hardest part of this task. It doesn’t have to be hard if you just follow some basic rules when writing about your experience. 

You can write a quick resume in two hours or less if you follow the tips below.

19Use Action Verbs

Pair powerful action verbs like “optimized,” “directed,” or “trained” along with the skills mentioned in the job description. 

If possible, pair these skills and action verbs with an achievement for a triple combo that'll satisfy the ATS and catch the recruiter’s attention.

Read this guide on using action verbs and the difference between active/passive verbs to help you write powerful bullet points for your resume.

• 
  Resumes
  How to Best Use Resume Action Words (+117 Powerful Verbs)
  Charley Mendoza

20. Don’t Make Yourself Look Needy

Don’t write, “Seeking employment” or “looking for job…” in your resume summary, suggests Career Coach Kathy Caprino. 

The resume summary section should be filled with powerful headlines describing who you are and why you’re worth an interview.

21. Avoid Jargon and Unclear Terms

Avoid vague but fancy phrases like “synergy” or “dynamic” because they don’t add value to your application. Plus, some people will read them and just think you’re trying too hard to sound smart.

22. Use Keywords the Correct Way

Don’t stuff keywords in your resume just for the sake of getting them there. They've got to be inserted in a way that makes sense, because the ATS isn’t the only one that'll review your resume. Be sure to use the keywords in context and don't overdo it.

23. Show, Don’t Tell

Don’t use cliché descriptions like “strong analytical skills” or “team player.” It’s better to write what you did before that demonstrates those skills. 

24. Use a Word Cloud

Are you writing a resume for a specific job? 

Paste the whole job ad into a word cloud generator see which skills are mentioned the most. That'll tell you which qualifications are most important to the job, so you can then write about different ways you used said skills in different areas of your resume.

25. Stick to Believable Job Titles

As ageist as it sounds, no one will believe that you're a CEO if you’re 21 and fresh out of college. If you founded your own company or startup, it’s much better to use the job title “Founder.”

Fancy job titles like “Customer Success Engineer” also sound confusing. Are you an engineer or do you work in customer support? Titles like this may grab attention but they confuse the ATS and possibly, the recruiter, too.  

Other Resume Tips

26. Have Someone Else Review Your Resume

Job seekers should have multiple professionals review their resume before they start using it. Having a friend or two read it, may not be enough. Unless your friends have experience writing or reviewing resumes for a living — like recruiters do — they may not give you the feedback you need. 

Will Smith of Resume Workshop adds, 

“your resume will be perceived differently by different people so it’s critical you get a cross-section of feedback. 

If more than one reviewer makes the same suggestion, then that gives you all the more reason to follow it.”

27. Don’t Lie

It might be tempting, but don’t lie on your resume. You'll be found out. Even if they don’t find out right away, you could be terminated for it later on. 

28. Think Hard About Including Short Term jobs

It may be appropriate to include a short-term job if it was important to your career progress or includes relevant achievements to your next role. 

If not, don’t bother including those jobs because it suggests that you can’t hold down a long-term role. 

To lessen the appearance of job-hopping, Heather Marcom, Head of Talent Acquisition at Freedom Financial Network suggests, 

“You should group together positions with similar work scope by listing the total number of years or months, followed by the businesses that employed you and your accomplishments in each.

29. Prioritize the Top Third of Your Resume

Chris Chancey, Founder of Amplio Recruiting, says, 

“Save the top one-third of your resume for the best skills and expertise you have to offer. Recruiters only have a few minutes to skim through your resume, so you want them hooked from the get go.”

30. Keep a Master Resume 

Make a master resume that includes all the jobs and skills you ever had. Include everything you did for each job, every award, professional association, and accomplishment. 

Keep adding to this list every time you get a new project or job. Then when you need to write a resume for a specific job ad, just pull out information you need from this compilation.

31. Don’t Claim to be the Best

Don’t waste your time claiming you’re the best candidate for the job. That’s a waste of space in your resume because only the recruiter can decide that. 

32. Match LinkedIn With Your Resume

Your resume and LinkedIn profile serve two different purposes, but they should at least tell the same story about your career’s progression. Make sure the years, employers, skills, and experience listed are the same for your LinkedIn and resume to avoid confusion. 

33. Follow-Up

However eye-catching your resume is, it could still get lost in someone’s mailbox or desk pile. It’s not enough to get you a job. You need to follow-up with a strategically written email or well-timed phone call to remind the recruiter of your interest in the role. 

Create Your Resume Now

This article has given you plenty of tips to start writing your resume. Remember, the resume itself isn’t enough to land you a job so don’t rely on it. You've got to network, practice for interviews, and negotiate well too. 

And don't forget to choose a good professional template for your resume. Make a resume fast and easy with an Envato Elements resume template. Or download a quick resume template for one-time use from GraphicRiver.