Some candidates now use tools to send about 200 applications a day. When you apply for a design role, that's the pile your application lands in.
You may have spent a whole evening on yours. You rewrote the summary, tuned the case study order, wrote a cover note that sounded like you. It sits next to hundreds that took a few seconds each. The hiring manager may never get to it.
I know that feeling well. After I came home from my studies, I spent 6 months getting some interviews and no offers. My first dream design job didn't come from any of those applications. It came from a conversation at a networking night.