What is the Real Benefit of the Cover Letter?

Has it ever occurred to you to search the answer of a certain question and find it right under your nose? I think that during my search for examples of cover letters I read more than 400 of them. And something irritated me in most of them: their first sentence. In most cases it’s something of the kind: “Concerning your advertisement in “X” newspaper or “Y” job portal I’d like to… ” Well, tell me what’s unique in this sentence? How the employer will read a few hundred similar beginnings of cover letters and will he read them at all if they are written in this style?

I don’t know the answer of this question, but here is my opinion about these “rules that we shouldn’t break” when writing a cover letter. If I’m an employer and I publish a job ad, it wouldn’t be only in one place. It’ll be released in special job sites, newspapers, etc. It depends on the company budget. And, of course, I’ll be eager to know where it has been applied from the most. Did you get my idea? This mass drumming of the benefit of the so important first sentence in our heads is all about the right distribution of the advertising budget! Why should I pour money for a job ad in “X” newspaper in vain, if I had only 100 candidates coming from it? Instead I’ll invest the money in the “Z” job site, where I can get 1000 resumes and cover letters from.

There is nothing casual in the world! Even our cover letters!