Resume tips

As a preface, resumes should at a minimum share what you have sold, to whom and for how much. This is how to do so.

1. CEOs keep score. They love numbers. Their favorite bedtime stories are those about the million-dollar deals that they have closed. So, be sure to include as many numbers as possible on your resume.   They include: How many managed, Annual Budget/Quota, Average deal size, your largest 3 deals, your ranking on the sales team, your attainment of club/trip/award, the number of deals that you closed, the percent revenue growth your drove in the territory, the number of clients in your territory/call list, your revenue percentage of the company as a whole. Do not include pipeline unless it is at least 4x your quota, as to do so connotes that you did not close business.
2. Vice President’s love to name drop, so do the same. This includes: The names of your clients (remember, this does not violate your confidentiality clause because you are not publishing it, it is only being shared with the hiring manager, and you will have to share who you have done business with at some point or another with them during the interview process.), The verticals you cover (i.e. Retail, eCommerce, Financial services, etc.) What was the title or department of the person that wrote the check for the solution (CMO/CTO/CIO) remember, start with the business owners before IT, because business owners are better buyers
3. There are hunters, and then there are HUNTERS. If you are selling a new product deal into a company that has previously purchased a product from your company, you are a Strategic Account Executive, and you sell “net new deals” and should say that on your resume. If you are selling a new product into a client firm that has never done business with your company before, but your product is in an established/budgeted category (CRM, Email, BI, ERP, etc.) you are hunter, and your resume should say that you are a hunter selling in a green field. If you are selling a new deal to a new client for a new product category where you have to introduce the product, create the need, find a business sponsor, help the create a budget, RFP and guide the client through the deal process, you are a HUNTER, and your resume should say that you are a hunter, market pioneer and product evangelist
4. What do you do that really adds value besides revenue? It’s a long list, but it can include working alongside partners in joint sales efforts (name the partner) Developing new sales materials, writing white papers, developing marketing campaigns, communicating customer feedback to marketing and product management, training new hires, etc.
5. Who did you compete against? My favorite resume ever had each job in their job history begin with who they had competed against for their deals. They started one job by saying “Competed against industry stalwarts Oracle, SAP, and Infor for business in the ERP products segment”.
6. Use your acronyms! If you sold BI, say you sold BI, if you sold Content Data Management, spell it out and include the acronym CDM, etc. If your product is covered by Gartner or Forrester, it is in a category, include that for every product you have sold.
7. How many people did you hire and in what capacity? How successful were they?
8. What was the revenue and ACV when you started? How much did they grow?
9. What was the typical deal cycle when you arrived, and did you compress it?
10. Did you bring aboard a partner that contributed to revenue, if so how?
11. What operational efficiencies did you create and what was the impact on revenue?
12. What workplace synergies between departments did you create and facilitate?