Cover Letter for Internship Examples | How to Write (Format)

When you are applying for an internship, you must provide a resume, cover letter, or a recommendation letter with the job application as requested by the hiring manager/employer. Writing a great cover letter can give you an advantage over other candidates.

A Cover Letter is a document you use to highlight and show your skills, qualifications, and relevant experiences for the internship position.

The cover letter also enables you to indicate your goals, ambitions, and passion for the job.

A cover letter for an internship should be thoughtfully written to ensure that it meets its objectives. The main goal for your cover letter for the internship is to obtain an interview with the employer. It also aims to advertise your professional skills and accomplishments to the employer to help increase your chances of getting a position for an internship. Your cover letter should aim to interest the employer in reading your resume by illustrating your understanding of the position and expressing your interests in the organization.

When writing your cover letter for an internship, you should ensure that it contains the relevant information. The information provided will help you stand out from other candidates by ensuring a personalized cover letter.

A well-crafted cover letter for an internship should contain the following information:

Focus on the concerned role and company

The cover letter for the internship should focus on the role and company you are applying for. This helps you show the employer that the letter has been drafted specifically for his/her company. It also helps you provide information tailored to the requirements stated in the job posting.

 For example:

I am delightedly writing this letter about the summer marketing program at Griffiths marketing agency.

Address the manager by their name

You should ensure that the cover letter for the internship addresses the hiring manager by his/her name. This enables you to demonstrate your seriousness concerning the position and your resourcefulness. The hiring manager’s name can be obtained through the company website, LinkedIn, Google Search, or a phone call of inquiry to the company.

For example:

Dear Mr. Hugh,

Note: You can only address hiring managers in general, such as Dear Sir/Madam or ‘To whom it may concern’ if all your efforts to identify the names are futile.

Use the right keywords to grab attention

Hiring managers receive several applications. Therefore, you must ensure that your cover letter for an internship contains specific keywords that the hiring manager may be looking for. These keywords can be obtained from the job description of the internship advertisement. Using keywords will grab the attention of the hiring manager. Suppose the job description states that you must be creative and have strong organization and planning skills. In that case, you must ensure that these keywords are included in your cover letter for the internship.

For example:

As a marketing student at New York University, my time has enabled me to acquire excellent communication skills and strong organizational and planning skills. It has also helped me develop creative marketing skills.

Show ambition

You must ensure that the cover letter for the internship shows your ambition for the job. Employers are attracted to candidates with ambition because it demonstrates their drive and enthusiasm to do the job and often leads to high productivity, which results in a profitable business. Therefore, you must ensure that your cover letter for the internship demonstrates your desire to advance and accomplish set goals, which will enable you to stand out from candidates who are likely to focus more on experience, especially if you yourself have a lesser experience.

For example:

In the future, I hope to manage a creative marketing team motivated by four main marketing goals, which are profitability, market share, growth, and promotional objectives.

Include relevant coursework/projects

You should include coursework, projects, or classes relevant to the job description, position, or company if you have little to no work experience. Significant academic accomplishments can compensate for the lack of experience. You must ensure that the coursework, project, or classes are relevant and demonstrate areas of strength.

For example:

Last semester I enrolled in a short course in psychology which helped me cater to the customers’ needs and improve relations with them. It’s also helped me formulate marketing strategies for a variety of customers.

Emphasize relevant skills with passion

The cover letter for an internship should demonstrate your skills relevant to the position you are applying for. You can mention skills gained from volunteering for other jobs or projects. The skills mentioned should be beneficial to the company and illustrate how you can use them when you occupy the position.

For example:

Last semester, I spent a month volunteering in a local start-up where I led a small team of my classmates to create a targeted advertising campaign. We also developed pricing strategies based on research and demographic data.

Explain why you consider yourself a good fit for the role

You should review the job posting and identify the primary qualifications an employer is searching for. You must then link the information to why you believe you are suitable for the position. Finally, you should combine qualities identified in the job description with your unique attributes relevant to the role.

For example:

My creativity, excellent communication skills, and ability to multitask make me the perfect candidate for the position. This internship would help me grow my experience as a digital marketer and improve the quality of my work.

Aim of the internship

You must mention in the cover letter what you aim to achieve by interning in the company. This must include skills, experience, or relationships you hope to develop while interning in the company. This helps you demonstrate that you are goal-oriented and driven to be efficient at the job.

For example:

An internship in your company can help me improve my team-building and strategizing skills. It will also provide me with the first-hand experience of dealing with a client and improve my skills.

When writing your cover letter for an internship, you must ensure that the letter is formatted correctly. Proper business letter formatting demonstrates professionalism and seriousness, which is likely to evoke a positive response from an employer. In addition, the format used in the cover letter for internship is your attempt to make an excellent first impression on the employer.

It is therefore essential that to consider the following information as important when formatting your letter:

Follow business letter format

A cover letter for an internship is an official document; therefore, you must follow the business letter format. Using the business letter format will require you to provide your contact information along with the date and address. You should also include the employer’s name and address at the top of the letter and a salutation.

Be mindful about the length

You must ensure the cover letter for the internship is one page long. If the cover letter is too short, the employer might assume that you don’t care about the job, and if it’s too long, the employer may fail to read the entire letter. In addition, writing a one-page letter limits you from writing a lengthy letter while enabling you to focus on relevant information only.

Margins, line spacing, and alignment should be catered

You should ensure that you use Times New Roman font with a font size of 10 or 12 in their cover letter for internship. The letter should have a line spacing of 1.15, and the content should be left-aligned. This ensures that the employer can easily read the letter. It also gives the cover letter a professional look.

Try to write a unique cover letter that stands out

For you to stand out, you must ensure that the cover letter contents are unique. This is likely to have a positive impact on the employer and help increase your odds of obtaining an internship with the company you are interested in. You can ensure you provide unique information by adhering to the following process when writing a cover letter for an internship:

Paragraph 1: an introduction of yourself

An introductory paragraph plays a significant role in forming the employer’s perception of the applicant. It allows you to introduce yourself to the employer formally. You must also specify the internship you are applying for and possibly where you found or heard of the internship vacancy. This is because employers like to know the channels applicants used during their job search.

Paragraph 2: skills and accomplishments

The second paragraph of the cover letter for the internship should focus on your skills and accomplishments when applying for the role. Again, you can provide examples to support your skills and achievements. The stated skills and accomplishments should be drawn from your academic or work experience stated in the resume to ensure your application documents complement each other.

Paragraph 3:why you consider yourself befitting

The third paragraph of the cover letter for the internship should explain why you believe you are best suited for the internship. The reasons provided should be based on the research you conducted concerning the requirements for the job and your knowledge of the business. You should also state how best you can contribute to the goals of the company.

 Paragraph 4: call to action

You should express your readiness/interest or availability for an interview. This demonstrates that you are confident in your abilities to fulfill the needed job requirements. Your call to action should be a single sentence.

Prioritize your academic/extracurricular experience

You must first review the advertised job description for any academic experience demanded by the employer. You should also state any extracurricular experience. The extracurricular experience mentioned must be in line with the job description. Academic or extracurricular experience help you demonstrate that you have the necessary qualification for the job.

Proofread/edit your cover letter

Once the cover letter for the internship is completed, you must proofread and edit grammar, spelling, or syntax errors. Hiring managers or employers are keen to note poorly written letters because it quickly gives them a reason to eliminate you. You can also request a friend or family member to review the final draft of the letter.

A well-crafted cover letter for an internship should persuade the employer to consider you for the internship position. You must avoid anything that can jeopardize your chances of acquiring the position.

It is therefore essential that you avoid the following:

Do not state lack of experience

You must not state your lack of experience. This mistake would present you as an amateur and diminish the employer’s perception of you. You must also ensure that the tone of the cover letter is not apologetic because the aim of the cover letter is not to appeal to the employer’s empathy but rather to persuade him/her to consider you.

Do not copy a template for your ease

You should avoid copying templates. This is because a hiring manager has probably already been exposed to a variety of templates used by the other applicants. In addition, applicants who copy templates can be perceived as lazy and unwilling to put effort into a personalized cover letter.

Do not restate your resume

You should not restate your entire resume in the cover letter for the internship. If you provide repetitive information, you can overwhelm the hiring manager, creating a negative perception. Instead, the cover letter should complement the information contained in the resume and motivate the employer to read the resume.

Template of Cover Letter for Internship

Sample Cover Letter for Internship

Following are some free downloadable templates for you:

• A cover letter for an internship is your first impression of the employer. It is, therefore, essential that you ensure your cover letter is carefully written and formatted.
• If you have no prior work experience, you can use the cover letter to persuade the employer that your skills and qualifications are relevant to the position. This also helps them demonstrate how you stand out from other candidates with no work experience.
• A cover letter for an internship helps you prompt an employer’s interest to read your resume. Suppose your cover letter for an internship is interesting to the employer. In that case, he/she is also likely to read your resume, increasing your chances of occupying the position.
• Finally, a cover letter for an internship enables you to provide details that will not appear on the resume. It can strengthen your weak resume by enabling you to creatively demonstrate your professional skills.