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Technical Support Specialist Must-Have Resume Skills and Keywords

Are you interested in improving your job outlook and increasing your salary? How can you demonstrate that you are the most qualified candidate for a Technical Support Specialist position? Of course continuing to gain experience working as a Technical Support Specialist may be your best qualification, but there are other ways you can also develop your skills, like continuing education or volunteer opportunities. More immediately, however, you can be ready for your next opportunity or promotion by educating yourself about the duties, responsibilities, and required skills of a Technical Support Specialist and making sure your resume reflects your experience properly.

In order to do so, you’ll want to know that both employers hiring for a Technical Support Specialist and those who list the position of Technical Support Specialist on their resumes predominantly feature Technical and Troubleshooting as the most common and important terms, respectively. But the list quickly begins to diverge with resumes showing Customer Service, Hardware and MS Office at positions three, four and five, while job listings show a different pattern. Do you know what you would list?

We designed the ZipRecruiter Career Keyword Mapper to help you solve this problem and hopefully improve your resume. Using machine learning tools paired with industry research, our Marketplace Research Team helped analyze millions of job postings and resumes to identify the most important keywords related to Technical Support Specialist jobs. Our goal is to help you discover opportunities to improve your resume or to help you understand what skills and qualifications you need to be a Technical Support Specialist or to advance your career into beyond this role.

Top Skills Mentioned in Job Descriptions

Top
10
Job Skills
The top three keywords employers use in Technical Support Specialist job descriptions are Technical appearing in 26.99% of postings, Troubleshooting 13.68%, and Customer Service appearing in 13.49%. 54.16% of Technical Support Specialist job postings have at least one of these terms indicating the value employers place commonly place on these experiences when hiring candidates. Communication Skills, Hardware and Innovation are still quite important, but a smaller sliceof the employer Technical Support Specialist job postings with their combined total of 24.08%. At 21.78%, Collaboration, Documentation, MS Office, and Problem Solving Skills appear far less frequently, but are still a significant portion of the 10 top Technical Support Specialist skills and requirements according to employers.

Top Skills Mentioned in Resumes

Top
10
Job Skills
Job seeker resumes showcase a broad range of skills and qualifications in their descriptions of Technical Support Specialist positions. The top three keywords represent 48.28% of the total set of top resume listed keywords. Look to the Resume Checklist below to investigate how Technical, Troubleshooting, and Customer Service match up to employer job descriptions. Hardware, MS Office, and Information Technology represent a very decent share of skills found on resumes for Technical Support Specialist with 27.14% of the total. At 24.58%, Active Directory, Microsoft Windows, Database, and Help Desk Support appear far less frequently, but are still a significant portion of the 10 top Technical Support Specialist skills and qualifications found on resumes.

Most Important Skills Required to Be a Technical Support Specialist as Listed by Employers and Employees

Here is a simple table of the top 10 skills and qualifications as listed by employers in Technical Support Specialist job postings since January of 2018, followed by the top 10 skills and qualifications most commonly listed by people who held the title of Technical Support Specialist on their resumes.
Top Technical Support Specialist Skills
Skills Required by Employers Share
Technical 26.99%
Troubleshooting 13.68%
Customer Service 13.49%
Communication Skills 8.85%
Hardware 8.37%
Innovation 6.86%
Collaboration 6.37%
Documentation 5.91%
MS Office 5.08%
Problem Solving Skills 4.42%
Skills Listed by Employees Share
Technical 18.46%
Troubleshooting 15.57%
Customer Service 14.25%
Hardware 10.73%
MS Office 8.91%
Information Technology 7.50%
Active Directory 6.74%
Microsoft Windows 6.52%
Database 5.68%
Help Desk Support 5.64%

Technical Support Specialist Resume Checklist

Our Resume Keyword Checklist is based upon an analysis of the most commonly found terms within both job descriptions and resumes for Technical Support Specialist roles. Our algorithm helps isolate phrases and patterns to identify the most frequently recurring and reused keywords from each data source, while correcting for uncommon and outlier results. Various heuristic methodologies are then applied to ultimately create two top 20 lists of the most important and significant skills, certificates and requirements found within Technical Support Specialist job postings and resumes. We then merge the two lists together and use a combination of statistics and rules-based scenarios to create a list that is audited by the Marketplace Research team, and finally turned into the checklist you see below. Our hope is that knowing this information can help you make your best impression with your next potential employer.
Uncommon Keywords on Technical Support Specialist Resumes
Job Descriptions
Resumes
25%
50%
75%
100%
Innovation
Employer job listings tend to list Innovation as requirements in Technical Support Specialist job descriptions; however, job seekers mention them far less frequently on their resumes. If you possess this experience, including this keyword prominently on your resume when applying for a Technical Support Specialist role may help you stand out more to hiring managers.
Common Keywords on Technical Support Specialist Resumes
Job Descriptions
Resumes
25%
50%
75%
100%
Communication Skills
Proactive
Problem Solving Skills
Technical
Collaboration
Detail Oriented
Documentation
Computer Science
Vendor Management
Customer Service
Troubleshooting
English Speaking
Hardware
Help Desk Support
Analysis
Both employer job listings and resumes from people who’ve held the role of Technical Support Specialist tend to always include skills and requirements found in this list. Whether you’ve only got Communication Skills, Proactive, Problem Solving Skills, Technical, Collaboration, Detail Oriented, Documentation, Computer Science, Vendor Management, Customer Service, Troubleshooting, English Speaking, Hardware, Help Desk Support or Analysis in your background and experience, make sure to highlight the term prominently on your resume. As a job seeker you’ll be competing with many others who are bound to have as many as you (or more!) of these common resume keywords highlighted in their application for a job as a Technical Support Specialist.
Uncommon Keywords on Technical Support Specialist Job Descriptions
Job Descriptions
Resumes
25%
50%
75%
100%
MS Office
Information Technology
Database
SQL
Microsoft Windows
Active Directory
Project Management
Linux
Employer job listings infrequently list MS Office, Information Technology, Database, SQL, Microsoft Windows, Active Directory, Project Management or Linux as important skills or qualifications in Technical Support Specialist job descriptions. Nevertheless, job seekers mention them much more commonly in their resumes. If you possess any or all of these experiences, including these keywords prominently on your resume when applying for a Technical Support Specialist role may go unnoticed or even discounted by hiring managers.

FAQs about Technical Support Specialist Skills and Resume Keywords

What are the most important Technical Support Specialist job skills to have on my resume?

The most common important skills required by employers are Communication Skills, Proactive, Problem Solving Skills, Technical, Collaboration, Detail Oriented and Documentation. These skills and requirements are just as likely to be mentioned by employers as well as on resumes of people that held a job as a Technical Support Specialist, suggesting that having these keywords on a resume are important for success as a Technical Support Specialist. Additionally, employer Technical Support Specialist job descriptions list Innovation as a desirable experience, even though Innovation appears 3.51 times less on resumes, suggesting that it's worth considering including this skill if you possess the experience.

What are the least important Technical Support Specialist job skills to have on my resume?

Although you'd probably love to load up your resume with every possible keyword you can, employers tend to look for the things they specify in the job description. Our analysis suggests that highlighting too prominently terms like MS Office, Information Technology, Database, SQL, Microsoft Windows, Active Directory and Project Management may be something to reconsider. These 7 terms appear 2.15, 2.18, 2.56, 2.88, 2.90, 3.52 and 3.75 times less frequently, respectively, than in job descriptions for a Technical Support Specialist role. This indicates that highlighting any of these keywords on your resume may not be a great way to get noticed by a potential employer.

How do I make sure my resume has all of the right keywords for a Technical Support Specialist position?

Unless your resume has a good density of the following skills and experience listed, you may not be considered for the role of Technical Support Specialist. Make sure to include a strong showing for the following keywords on your resume:
  • Communication Skills
  • Proactive
  • Problem Solving Skills
  • Technical
  • Collaboration
  • Detail Oriented
  • Documentation
  • Computer Science
  • Vendor Management
  • Customer Service
  • Troubleshooting
  • English Speaking
  • Hardware
  • Help Desk Support
  • Analysis
Additionally employers frequently list the following as desirable qualities in a Technical Support Specialist candidate, but they are far less common on most resumes:
  • Innovation
Finally people who held the position of a Technical Support Specialist and list it on their resume are adding these terms that are less likely to be noticed by employers. You may want to consider downplaying these terms on your Technical Support Specialist application:
  • MS Office
  • Information Technology
  • Database
  • SQL
  • Microsoft Windows
  • Active Directory
  • Project Management
  • Linux

Before applying for a Technical Support Specialist job

At ZipRecruiter, we understand better than anyone the importance of using the right keywords to describe your experience — it’s crucial to attracting the right employers! We built our business on the ability to effectively match job seekers with employers using AI-technology that understands your resume and how likely you are to be noticed by a potential future employer. Having a ZipRecruiter profile that showcases your most relevant skills and abilities can help you get recruited into a new role as a Technical Support Specialist. Get started on your journey with a new ZipRecruiter Profile today!