How to find the right keywords in a job post

Updated 17 October 2026 · 6 min read

What counts as a resume keyword?

A keyword is any word or phrase a recruiter might type into an ATS search or scan for when skimming your resume. They fall into five groups:

The first four groups do most of the work. Soft skills matter to the employer, but the words themselves almost never decide a search. Show them through results instead ("mentored 3 junior analysts" beats "leadership").

How do you pull keywords out of a job post?

Use this five-minute method on any post.

1. Separate requirements from filler

Ignore the company introduction, benefits and generic culture lines. Focus on sections titled Requirements, Qualifications, What you'll do, What you'll need, or bullet lists with "experience with", "proficiency in", "you have".

2. List every noun phrase that is a skill, tool or title

Go line by line. From this example requirement:

3+ years in B2B marketing, owning paid search and paid social budgets. Hands-on with Google Ads, LinkedIn Campaign Manager and HubSpot. Strong grasp of attribution and marketing analytics; SQL a plus.

You would pull: B2B marketing, paid search, paid social, Google Ads, LinkedIn Campaign Manager, HubSpot, attribution, marketing analytics, and SQL (nice-to-have).

3. Count repeats

Anything mentioned in both the summary of the role and the requirements, or twice in the requirements, is a priority. Employers repeat what they care about.

4. Mark must-have vs nice-to-have

"Required", "must", "you have" and years-of-experience lines are must-haves. "Preferred", "bonus", "a plus" and "familiarity with" are nice-to-haves. Put must-haves you have in both your skills and your bullets; nice-to-haves can live in skills only.

5. Check against reality

Cross out anything you cannot discuss with a concrete example. A keyword that gets you an interview you then fail is a net loss.

Where should keywords go on your resume?

Placement matters as much as presence. A term in your skills list says you know it; the same term in a bullet with a result proves it.

• Headline: the job title, if it truthfully fits your experience.
• Summary: 2–3 of the most important skills or domains.
• Skills section: all relevant tools and hard skills, using the post's spelling.
• Experience bullets: the must-haves, used in context with an outcome.

Here is the difference in practice:

The "after" bullets use the post's exact terms, start with a verb and end with a result. Use real figures from your own work; if you are unsure of an exact number, use a count or range you can defend.

Should you use the exact wording from the job post?

Yes, for skills and tools. Recruiters search for specific strings, and some systems match variants better than others. A few habits help:

• Match spelling and format: "Microsoft Power BI", "JavaScript", "Google Analytics 4", "Salesforce Sales Cloud".
• Include both acronym and full form once: "Search engine optimization (SEO)", "Electronic health records (EHR)".
• Mirror the employer's synonym: if they say "client onboarding" and you wrote "customer onboarding", use theirs. Same work, their word.
• Do not copy whole sentences. Borrow the vocabulary, not the paragraph.

How many keywords should a resume have?

There is no magic count, and keyword density is not how recruiters search. A practical target is to cover most of the post's must-have skills that you genuinely have, each appearing in the skills section and ideally once in a bullet. A skills section of 6–15 items is typical for most roles; technical roles may list more, grouped by category (Languages, Frameworks, Tools).

Signs you have overdone it:

• The same phrase appears more than two or three times.
• Your skills section lists tools you used once in a tutorial.
• Bullets read like a list of nouns with no outcome.
• You have hidden text or a block of keywords at the bottom. Do not do this; parsers extract hidden text and recruiters see it.

What about soft skills?

Soft skills are better demonstrated than listed. Instead of "excellent communication skills", write the evidence:

Before: Excellent communicator and team player.
After: Presented monthly performance reviews to the VP of Sales and 6 regional managers; wrote the onboarding guide now used for every new hire.

If a post leans heavily on a soft skill ("stakeholder management", "cross-functional collaboration"), it is worth using that exact phrase once in a bullet, because some recruiters search for it.

Keyword checklist before you apply

• ☐ Job title from the post is in your headline or summary (if accurate).
• ☐ Every must-have tool you have is listed in skills with the post's spelling.
• ☐ Each must-have skill appears in at least one bullet with a result.
• ☐ Acronyms spelled out once.
• ☐ No keyword repeated more than two or three times.
• ☐ Nothing listed that you could not discuss in an interview.

Keywords only work if the parser can read them, so pair this with the formatting rules in what makes a resume ATS-friendly, then work through the full 15-minute tailoring method. You can also test your file with the ATS resume checker.

Frequently asked questions