Role of a Sales Manager

by | Apr 7, 2015 | Blog, Marketing, Sales | 7 comments

Role of a Sales Manager

The role of a sales manager is often confused with a sales representative's role.

Sure, the ideal sales team member is expected to be able to think strategically, negotiate well, and be great with people. What separates the Sales Manager is their ability to lead the entire team. And in many cases they need to be able to CREATE the team.

Some Sales Manager Tasks

In my many years of work with large product launches, I've actually been the sales manager for years. What a sales manager is asked to do varies a ton!

  • Hire & train sales people
  • Setup pricing strategies
  • Setup who works on what accounts, quotas, commissions
  • Calculate sales rep commission checks
  • Work with the marketing department (or BE the marketing department in small businesses)
  • Coordinate with product development for new product releases
  • Book and attend certain sales meetings
  • Even ship out samples sometimes
Let's think of the sales manager as the person in charge of the bigger picture. Instead of managing a single account, shipment or schedule, the sales manager would be in charge of assigning representatives to individual accounts, setting quotas and determining the value of the accounts.

Sales managers are also involved in training sales reps on the product's features and benefits. Depending on how you setup your business, you might ask your sales manager to lead all activities at trade shows. (Read my proven tactics for great trade show results in this Entrepreneur magazine article. Or in our previous article.)

In the following audio, we discuss sales manager responsibilities and expectations.

This audio is part of our Product Power Coaching call series. Click here to join the complimentary calls.

Make sure you are hiring the right skills for this important position if you are bringing in a sales manager. They will need to be comfortable leading people.

 

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7 Comments

  1. Paul Nelson
    Paul Nelson on January 5, 2016 at 12:04 pm

    An intelligent point of view, well expressed! Thanks!

  2. Peggy Burns
    Peggy Burns on January 5, 2016 at 11:42 am

    Your posting really straightened me out. Thanks!

  3. Hank
    Hank on January 5, 2016 at 11:09 am

    Thanks alot - your answer solved all my problems after several days struggling

  4. Tom Harris
    Tom Harris on January 5, 2016 at 10:14 am

    Good point. I hadn't thought about it quite that way. 🙂

  5. Rick
    Rick on December 29, 2015 at 1:13 pm

    Great post!

  6. Louey
    Louey on December 23, 2015 at 9:51 am

    There is a critical shortage of informative articles like this.

  7. Lauren Gray
    Lauren Gray on December 23, 2015 at 8:16 am

    Well done article that. I'll make sure to use it wisely.

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