Express Entry is one of the advanced immigration systems used by the Canadian government to provide permanent residence to skilled immigrants. Increasing your score can give you a fair advantage in Canada immigration.

Being one of the quickest ways to get permanent residency in Canada, there are lots of candidates applying for Express Entry. Due to a large number of applications only top applicants get invited. This system is point-based and based on multiple areas your application will get the score. Candidates can improve their score to stay at the top of the pool by working on the following main points.

1. Identify areas where you can increase your score

It’s always better to have a broad view as that helps to focus on multiple areas. The points are divided into multiple areas like education, skill, experience, language, etc. Identify and check another area where you can score or improve the points, which you might not have in your focus. It can improve the overall points if you’ll consider and focus on all the factors and respective areas. 

2. Getting a Provincial nomination

Provincial nomination helps candidates to improve the score and stay at the top of the pool. Each province has its own priority occupations. It’s always best to keep yourself updated and have the application updated as per the changes and requirements.  

3. Try for a Job offer

This can totally change the scenario for an applicant because a job offer can add up to 200 points for the candidate. You may search online for available jobs and by contacting online recruitment agencies. It’s best to visit the country once so that you can have an idea about the job market and upgrade your skills accordingly. You can meet the employer and have a better idea about the companies by contacting them in person.  

4. Enhance your Education

There are points based on the qualification and the degree of a candidate. Clearly, achieving a higher level of education means more points, although qualifications achieved outside Canada must first be verified through Educational Credential Assessment. 

Higher education (e.g. bachelor’s, master’s) degree is also one of the screening criteria for many Canadian employers. So, keep it in mind as advancing education helps in two ways, first adding points to improve the score and second helping you to get employment. 

5. Check who should be the Principle applicant – you or your spouse?

One very important point is to select, who will be the principal applicant. Usually, candidates assume that whoever is more qualified while applying as a couple should be the principal applicant, which isn’t true always. 

First, check the list of in-demand occupations for the province. Someone with the in-demand skill set has more chances to get picked up than the other with a better education. Another factor is age as that will add some points too so you should select the principle applicant accordingly. For a couple, you may also apply twice each as a principal applicant. Once you’ve decided on the principle applicant, the spouse can boost your score up to 40 points based on experience, education or language skills. 

6. Enhance your Work experience

Experience is another important factor that can increase your score by some 100 points. That depends if you’ve Canadian experience or non-Canadian experience. Canadian experience always counts more but even if you’ve non-Canadian experience that does count. You may combine non-Canadian experience with language skills and enhance the score. You should keep your profile up to date by updating the experience. Each province has different skillset and experience required and that can be changed so keep tracking those requirements as the in-demand occupation lists keep on updating. 

7. Improve your English Language Skills

Language plays an important role in the candidate’s profile, as you can improve the overall score by getting good marks in English or French (NCLC for French and CLB for English). You may keep upgrading your language score by retaking the tests for the language. You may go online and do check available language tutorials. You may also take classes and check the available institutes to help and get better coaching for the language. This can also help you later for employment.