[jisaacstone]

My experience (back when Hired was known as DeveloperAuction) is that most of the 'offers' I received were completely impersonal and disingenuous.

What I mean is that it seems the companies 'bid' on anyone who met some minimum requirement and relied on the initial phone screen to actually vet the candidate. The three phone screens I had the person on the other end displayed no knowledge of the experience and skills I listed on my profile and one did not even have any preference what division of the company I should work for (was just looking for another somewhat competent software engineer, not caring much beyond that)

My point is: personalized messages are more likely to result in a hire BECAUSE the person writing the message knows what they are looking for. Conversely the recruiters I deal with on a regular basis are only looking for a 'python engineer' or something similar. They could not possibly write a personalized recruiting message.