Month: January 2022

Do’s and Don’ts of Writing Thank You Email after Interview

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It doesn’t matter if you had your interview through zoom or face-to-face; as long as you had a formal interview for a job you’ve been eyeing, take the time to sit down and write a thank you email after interview.

The extra effort is worth it. If you wrote something eye-catchy, the email could even give a good first impression that could land you the job. Many surveys (like this and that) conclude that over 60% of recruiters think highly of applicants who send thank you notes and that it impacts their decision-making.

Haven’t written one before? This post tackles everything you need to know about writing a thank you note after your interview.

When should you write a thank you email after an interview?

How soon after the interview should you write the letter? Will writing one immediately after the interview make you seem desperate?

You don’t necessarily have to send the email a minute after you turned off the camera. The consensus is you should send it out within 24 to 48 hours after your interview.

Who should you write it to?

Interviews done by multiple people are very common. If you were screened by two or more people, make sure to write them thank-you emails separately.

Don’t just copy-paste the message either, especially if you talked to one of the interviewers with something specific (such as your love for cats, or how awesome it was that you grew up in the same small town).

What should you write in the email?

You can always customize the email to your preferred style, but make sure you include the following:

  1. A salutation. Yes, the email can be casual in tone, but simply having a salutation to begin your letter looks much nicer and polite in general.
  2. Express your gratitude. Say thank you for the interviewer’s time and mean it.
  3. Confirm why you’re a good fit for the position. Briefly reinforce your interest in the position and the reasons why you’d be perfect for the job. Make sure you’re not repeating your entire resume here.
  4. Add links to supporting documents, portfolio, etc. If your resume couldn’t accommodate these links and you think they would help with your application, then include them here.
  5. Mention something unique that would remind them of you. Did you talk about the same passion for Gundam? Or gardening? These kinds of topics are easy identifiers for hiring professionals since faces and names usually blur after the 10th or so interviewee of the day.
  6. Offer answers. Maybe during your interview, a question came up that needed time to be solved. Here’s the perfect time to answer them with a solution. You can also offer to answer additional questions they might have.
  7. Add a final expression of gratitude. Ask about the next steps briefly, then include “Again, thank you for your time” or a similar phrase that reiterates your appreciation for the interview. This is a perfect way to end your letter.
  8. Close your letter. Use “Best,” “Sincerely,” “Cheers,” “Regards” or other appropriate ways to close a letter. One-word closing is best.
  9. Sign your letter. “Signing” doesn’t necessarily have to include your signature. However, include your complete name, phone number, email address, and LinkedIn profile (if you have one).

When it comes to the length of your e-mail, a good way to measure is to read the entire thing. If you can read your email in under a minute or two, then that’s an appropriate length. Shorten it up if even you’re feeling lazy to proofread your email – this just means it’s too long.

Tips and FAQs: Thank You Email after Interview

For first-timers who haven’t done a thank you email before, follow these tips:

  • What should the email subject line be? Because you’re writing a thank you email, this should be conveyed on the email subject. A simple “Thank you for your time” would do just fine. This gives the hiring person an idea of what the email is about, instead of feeling duped when you entered “important email inside” as the subject line only to read something else.
  • How long does the email have to be? You don’t need to write an essay. Everybody’s busy, so keep your thank-you note short, interesting and easy to read. Of course, it should tell the reader that you put some effort into it as well.
  • Proofread before sending. The point of thank-you notes is to show gratitude while reiterating your interest in the position. Make sure there are no errors within your letter, so it won’t backfire.
  • Don’t use “to whom it may concern”: Address your letter accordingly. Use a salutation or “dear” to start your letter. On the other side of the coin, don’t be too casual either. Addressing them with “bro”, “dude” or “sis” will not work to your advantage even if you felt a friendly bond with the interviewer.
  • Don’t bring up mistakes you made during the interview. If you’re sending a thank-you letter only to correct a mistake you said or did during the interview, the entire letter won’t feel sincere. It would sound self-serving, rather than appreciative. Most HR professionals recommend finishing on a positive note.
  • Make sure your links show you in a positive light. If you’re including a LinkedIn profile, take the time to update it and check for errors. If you added your Facebook profile, make sure you don’t post racist, offensive, non-inclusive, rude, or other content that could put your application in jeopardy.

Thank You Email after Interview Template

If you’re trying to write and going blank, here are three examples of a thank-you email after interview. I hope these could inspire you to write your own.

Sample 1: Short and casual

  • Subject line: Thank you for your time!
  • EMAIL BODY:

Hello Ms. Jane,

Thanks for taking the time to include me in your busy schedule yesterday morning. I enjoyed our conversation about the Social Media Manager position and was excited to be shown around the company’s tech division.

I was born to take on this role, especially since I eat and breathe social media and have a master’s degree in marketing.

Your advice about disciplining naughty cats is highly appreciated. I will try it with my newly-adopted kitten.

Thank you again. If you have any questions, feel free to contact me anytime.

Pru Smith
pru.smith@realemail.com
123-456-7899

Sample 2: Brief and Professional (with additional info)

  • Subject line: Thank You for meeting me! – from Pru Smith
  • EMAIL BODY:

Dear Ms. Jane,

I wanted to reach out to thank you for taking the time to speak with me this morning about the social media manager position.

I really enjoyed talking to you about the role and learning more about where your team is headed. AI in social media is an exciting path and it sounds like the marketing department will be experiencing a first in the industry.

I would love to lend my experience as a seasoned digital marketer and be part of this innovative team. As for the problem your team is having with marketing ecommerce websites, I recommend you check out MarketBot – it’s an AI-tech that analyzes customer behavior and uses this data to predict product demand and future trends.

On a personal note, I really enjoyed talking to you about robots and how AI is shaping our world now.

I look forward to speaking further with you. Again, I appreciate your time and if I can help with anything else, please don’t hesitate to email back.

Sincerely,
Pru Smith (enter your LinkedIn profile page here)
pru.smith@realemail.com
123-456-7899

Sample 3

  • Subject line: Appreciate your time today. – Pru Smith, Social Media Manager
  • MESSAGE BODY:

Hello Ms. Jane,

Thank you so much for meeting with me earlier today and discussing the exciting job opportunity at Amazon.

I’m very interested in the managerial position and believe my 10 years of experience managing social media accounts for several clients and handling day-to-day copywriting and designing graphics would be valuable as your company expands to accommodate more clients.

You mentioned that your team is in the middle of courting new clients, and I wanted to offer you a few ideas I think would help.

      • Poster-style infographics of A/B testing
      • Case studies of using artificial intelligence in social media marketing
      • Tutorial series for would-be clients (i.e. how to create head-turning Instagram-ready graphics via Canva)

Please let me know if there’s anything else you need from me to move the process forward. Thank you for taking the time to read my email.

Best regards,

Pru Smith
pru.smith@realemail.com
123-456-7899

Does sending a thank you email really work?

If you wrote a well-written, well-meaning thank you email, then there’s a good chance you’ll get brownie points for it. For some people, this could even give them the edge over other applicants, who may be equally as good as them, except they didn’t bother with a thank you note.

Just look at it this way: no HR professional or hiring manager would look at applicants who send thank-you emails poorly. There’s no harm in sending them. These emails only bring a good kind of attention to your application. Sometimes, the HR person would reply. If this is the case, you can use this same e-mail to follow up on your application after a week or so.

Just don’t bombard him/her with a ton of follow-up emails. If you don’t hear back after several weeks, accept this as a rejection and move on.

If you haven’t had your online interview yet and is looking for more guidance, check out these tried-and-tested tips to help you get hired,

From Trash to Cash: Car Battery Recycling for Cash

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If you don’t know it yet, car battery recycling for cash is a thing. How cool is it to protect the environment, destash stuff from your garage, and earn money in one go, right?

Once your car battery is dead (or damaged), recycling is the best option because they contain non-renewable resources like cadmium, mercury, zinc, lithium and lead. If all our car batteries end up in landfills, these batteries will eventually erode and the heavy metals would leak into the ground, contaminating our water supplies and affecting our future (and our kids’ future).

This guide will talk about everything you need to know about turning your car battery trash into cash.

Benefits of Car Battery Recycling for Cash

If you’re not sold yet, here are the four major benefits of recycling old and dead car batteries:

Avoid fines

When you buy a car battery, retailers in all 50 states can charge a fee called “battery core charge.” In over 30 states, this fee is required by law since it gives people the responsibility of recycling batteries.

A core charge is a deposit you pay when buying a car battery. In some stores, you are refunded in cash when you return a used battery. For other stores, no cash will be given, but you can save money on core fees when buying a new car battery.

Check BatteryCouncil.org or Call2Recycle.org about the deposits, refunds, and refund periods by state.

Many states make it illegal to discard or improperly dispose of a motor-vehicle battery or other lead-acid battery. So to avoid fines, it’s only reasonable to recycle your used car batteries.

Turn your junk into something useful

If you clear up your garage once a year, make sure to check for dead or unused car batteries that could be dangerously seeping out chemicals in your house.

Instead of just keeping used batteries stored in your garage, recycling centers can still make use of the parts. For example, every battery you sell will be torn apart in several ways and recycled:

  • Plastics – The batteries go through a hammer mill machine to break it up, then into a vat where all the lead and heavy materials fall to the bottom. All plastic (or polypropylene) pieces eventually rise on top and scooped away, transferred to another machine where they are washed, blown-dried, and brought to a plastic recycling facility. When recycled, molten plastic is turned into small, uniform-sized plastic pellets that are going to be used to create battery cases by various manufacturers.
  • The lead, heavy materials, and other liquids – Lead is separated from these materials left in the vat and then cleaned before being melted together in a furnace. The molten lead is then poured into molds, which are then cooled, removed from molds, and sent back to battery manufacturers for use as lead plates and other battery parts.
  • Sulfuric acid – The used battery acid can also be recycled either as treated water released into the public sewer system or converted as sodium sulfate (used for glass, laundry detergents, or textile).

There are other kinds of batteries such as alkaline and Zinc, Nickel-Cadmium or Lithium-Ion batteries that are recycled differently for safety and proper separation of materials, but can all be recycled nonetheless.

In most cases, a car battery gets recycled by two or more recycling centers, but it is also possible that a facility maximizes its space and does all three.

Support environmental efforts

Environmentally-wise, people are doing good with car battery recycling with 99% of lead-acid batteries recycled, but 1% is still a BIG DEAL In fact, each year about 1.8 million used car batteries are not recycled properly and are deposited (either intentionally or unintentionally) into our landfills, streams and lakes.

No matter how many times a car battery is recycled and reused, it is considered a closed-loop system (which means the car battery recycling process can be done continuously for decades to come).

Earn money

Aside from being able to get refunds from the core charge, you can also sell the entire used car battery directly to other facilities that buy used car batteries for cash.

Requirements to Sell Car Battery

Do car batteries have to be in any certain condition to be able to sell them?

The good thing about car battery recycling is that most parts of the battery can be recycled and reused in different ways. As long as the plastic of the battery case hasn’t melted and merged into the lead and other components inside, you could still sell your used car batteries.

How Much Cash to Expect for Recycling Batteries Near Me

How much can you get joining the car battery recycling for cash movement?

>The prices would vary by state, but the dollar value of used car batteries is based on their lead content. Expect to earn about 20 to 40 cents per pound of lead, which would be around $6 to $20 per car battery and up to $15 each for truck batteries.

Note that this amount would also change daily based on lead values on the market and factors such as charge left, original price bought, the brand of battery, and if the battery you’re selling is still usable or already dead.

Other battery contents could also be sold. For example:

  • brass ($1.40 to $1.70 per pound),
  • copper ($1 to $3.15 per pound),
  • aluminum (around $0.50 per pound), and more.

10 Places that Offer Car Battery Recycling for Cash

So where can you sell used car batteries? Who buys used car batteries? This list will get you started:

1. Local Scrap Yard

The scrapyard is the go-to place when you want to sell old appliances, bottles, jars, and yes, even auto parts.

Scrapyard owners are business people and know that almost anything can be recycled, so it’s less likely they’ll turn you away. They would, however, have different market prices for lead. While the average price is about 30 cents a pound, which makes a 21-pound lead amount in a typical car battery priced around $6, you might receive lower rates.

For your trip to the local scrapyard to be worth it, try to call the local scrap yards near you and ask for the current lead scrap buying price.

Don’t know where to start? Download the iScrap app on your phone and locate local scrap yards. It’s super easy to use and even lets you schedule pickups for your used batteries for sale.

2. Auto Parts Shop

If you absolutely need to dispose of car batteries, visit your local auto parts shop because they’re more than likely to accept the batteries no matter their condition. There are two ways these shops handle used batteries:

  • Get core charge ($5 to $12 depending on where you live) is refunded as cash whether you’re buying a new car battery or not.
  • The core charge becomes store credit towards the purchase of a new battery, so expect no cash.

Some auto parts stores would require you to bring your receipt with you, while others do not. National auto parts brands like Advance Auto Parts, AutoZone, NAPA Auto Parts, O’Reilly Auto Parts, and Pep Boys (among others) are guaranteed to purchase used car batteries from you. Even smaller, family-owner or local auto parts stores will honor the core charge.

3. United Battery

If you live near Longview Washington or Portland Oregon, United Battery branches will give you cash for junk batteries if you give them lead-acid batteries in-store.

They accept car batteries as well as batteries of trucks, golf carts, RVs, boats, forklifts, UPS, telecom and other kinds of automotive and industrial batteries.

To know prices, call (503) 289-6644 for Portland, or (360) 577-3833 for the Longview location.

4. Metal Recycling Centers

Compared to the local scrapyard that accepts every “scrap” under the sun, metal recycling centers only deal with metals and have the machinery to process metals and other battery components.

And because metals are valuable materials that can be recycled over and over again without degrading their properties, scrap metals like those found in used batteries are always in demand at metal recycling centers. Many of these centers even partner with car manufacturers and other buyers.

Just like in junkyards, metal recycling centers use market pricing when buying your used car battery, so be ready for the car battery pricing to fluctuate. Find and call “metal recycling centers near me” to inquire about current prices, but this should be somewhere between $5 and $12.

5. Auto Repair Shops

The amount you can get by selling used car batteries in auto repair shops varies, but if you’re having your car done at a local repair shop or the nearest Walmart Auto Care Center, it is easier to sell your used batteries.

If the car battery can still be fixed (and not just passable for recycling), auto repair shops would often recondition the batteries they bought from you and resell them at the shop as refurbished car batteries. Note that they would check the battery if it is still possible for reconditioning.

If you’re not planning to buy a new battery, many auto repair shops also participate in the core charge program, so check if the shop you visited will accommodate your refund request on the core charge.

6. Pawnshops

Some pawnshops will accept dead car batteries, but others will only pay for batteries that still have a bit of power left.

One thing is sure, if you take the pawnshop route, you’re most likely going to be paid less than the other options above.

7. Sell Your Car with Batteries included at Peddle.com

If you want to sell your car batteries along with the actual car, just send a form through Peddle, list down detailed information about the car, and Peddle will give you an instant quote. If you accept the offer, Peddle will pick up the car from your location and you’ll get paid.

Peddle is available in 50 states and has over 87,000 positive reviews from past customers.

8. Online Classifieds

You can find a buyer for your used battery without leaving your home as well. Online classifieds are ideal if your car battery isn’t dead yet, or it comes with a charge still left in it.

Try these traditional online classified ads sites:

  • Craigslist: You can e choose your city’s Craigslist, so the swap will just be local.
  • eBay: The site takes a small commission out of the purchase price, but you can have the battery shipped out and not brought to a physical location.
  • OfferUp: This is similar to Craigslist and is geared towards local buy and sell.
  • Facebook Marketplace: One of the most popular social media platforms today definitely will give you more chances of a buyer (the people are already there) and you can use Facebook’s location and other tools to boost your listing. Of course, you can also sell the car batteries directly on your personal page, or join local community groups.

The best thing about listing your used car battery on any of these sites is that you have control over the price and can negotiate if you want to.

Just make sure that when you meet up with the buyer, you’ll complete the transaction in a public place.

9. GlobalTech Environmental

If you have a scrap metal business, junkyard, recycling center, or any similar business operating in the U.S. and have accumulated over 500 pounds of car batteries or junk electronic scrap, you can sell them to the eco-friendly battery recycling company, Global Tech Environmental.

You can sell any kind of automobile and industrial batteries.

10. Host a Yard Sale

You can also just keep the selling simple and go with an old-school yard sale, especially if you just cleared your garage and found a lot more items than just your car batteries.

To make sure other people know about your yard sale? Use modern tools like Facebook groups to announce the dates you’ll be hosting the yard sale.

The Bottom Line of Car Battery Recycling for Cash

Car battery recycling for cash is a good way to transform trash for cash, but not something you can earn from regularly. However, even if you only get back the core charge refund for “returning” your used battery at the store where you bought them new, it’s still better than nothing.

Looking for other ways to earn from your car? Try these guides: