r/techsales

I spent the last month sending out applications at A and B tier companies (Wiz, Databricks, Datadog etc) for remote AE, SAR and similar roles. I have not applied for SDR/BDR roles as those OTEs all seem well below my 150k base. I am currently 0 for 28. About half have been a rejection email within a week of submission, the other half have been silent. Zero phone screens thus far.

My career path has been:

1.5 years as ASR at a major disti, 3 years at a D-tier SaaS company getting promoted twice from BDR to AM to Channel Manager, now 6 years at a small company in the SaaS/hosting space with 3 promotions. Current title is inflated pseudo-executive in name but sales in reality. Current company has basically zero name recognition. Zero resume gaps.

I might have been naive thinking, "Ill just crush the interview and that will overcome any objections about not having a strong logo on my resume."

Do you think my inflated title should be removed from the resume? Do you think I am naive for thinking I could waltz into a company like Wiz or datadog in an AE role without a strong logo in my employment history?

Maybe I was putting too much faith in my promotion history carrying me further than name recognition. I am debating on continuing the shotgun application approach but am curious on if you all think think this is par for the course or if my expectations are too high.

I used to ask “Is there anything that we discussed today that would hesitate you to move me forward in the process?” but i wanted to see if there are other closing questions that could be better or something that not everyone is using.

I’ve started applying to roles because my current workplace is not the best fit for me anymore and I have 2 interviews scheduled but I haven’t done one in some time so I just wanted to get any advice from the community here

How’s the culture? Will the company be killed by AI, or will their pivot make them stronger?

I’m coming from 2 “unknown” startup sales roles and am trying to get my first “big logo” on my resume. I’m happy at my current start up, so don’t need to make the jump right at this moment. But I do feel the gap in my resume when talking to recruiters about “big tech” roles, and I don’t have the network yet to get into the big players.

I’d like to make the jump one day and am wondering if Figma could be the bridge. But if the company is only going downhill, that concerns me too.

Curious everyone’s candid thoughts on the this role??.

YOE: 9

After moving to the UK, I switched careers around 4 years ago. I've been at startups since, but now have enough experience that I've interviewed at some bigger names.

• Google – FSR role - All "hire" recs, great feedback, but they hired internally mid-cycle. No cooling-off period, so I can reapply, but need to network heavily
• Databricks – Greenfield AE - Clicked with the HM, he even advocated for me internally. Didn't clear the technical bar, but the recruiter said he was trying to place me elsewhere. I'm actively working on closing that technical gap.
• AWS – AE - Thought I did fine, but the HM had a strange demeanour. Kept asking if ChatGPT wrote my answers. (First of all, I use Claude... but anyway...)

The startup is at an interesting inflection point — we're just starting to generate real UK revenue, and I'm leading expansion into my home country's market, which also overlaps with my previous industry. The CEO tends to hire externally for leadership roles, so a promotion is unlikely. My development is entirely self-directed — we're all figuring it out for the first time. And because it's early stage, it's not a clean quota-carrying role.

I'm also implementing, doing plenty of role-adjacent work, and that at times makes it a harder story to tell in interviews with larger companies. BUT it is very flexible and I get lots of technical exposure & learning, which I'm enjoying. Equity isn't anything meaningful (apparently being reworked). I pushed for a market-rate salary adjustment a year ago and got 20-25% — not nothing, but now I know I can do better. And I'm flying economy and expensing my own meals on work trips, not ideal...half joking. It's the classic early-stage trap: all the responsibility, limited authority, unclear trajectory.

Google and Databricks would be either a 2x or 3X OTE bump. I have a young family and while I genuinely value the flexibility I have now — but I don't want to stay somewhere comfortable at the expense of my career trajectory.

So — as an employee, what's the move? Stay the course at a Seed/Series B and see it through, or jump to an enterprise company now?

7 months ago I was an SDR. The grind was real, and I won’t pretend it was always easy — but here we are.

Closed my first six-figure deal today.

Making this post because if you’re early in your career and wondering whether the work pays off: it does. I graduated college only a couple years ago. You can do this too.

Buying a new pair of sneakers and a pack of pre-rolls.

after 3 years working the floor im being moved up into sales, and i dont know how its going to work for me. im not scared nor nervous i honestly wanted this move to happen but im going in blind. i know im going to be trained and learn how the sales side works but its a major wake up call for me. is there anything i should know or prepare myself rather holding someones hand until i get the hang of it. i'll already be managing a book of consistent clients and some cold calling/emailing which i guess is a plus itself. any sort of guidance is appreciated :)

I got a letter from my previous company saying I owe them about $4k from them overpaying me in 2024.

Is this normal? What are my options and do sales reps usually pay it back?

25 y/o currently working as a BDR at a larger enterprise CX/software company (~2.5 years full-time in role). Company is now PE-backed and going through integration/restructuring changes after a major acquisition. There’s a possibility of an internal AE promotion opening in the next few months, but nothing guaranteed and I’d likely be competing against at least 2 other internal candidates.

At the same time, I have an external offer for an AE role at a smaller MSP/managed services/networking company. Comp looks solid, immediate AE title, more ownership, recurring revenue/residual commissions, and more of a consultative infrastructure/MSP sale.

Trying to think long-term career-wise, not emotionally.

Would you:
- stay at the larger/more recognizable enterprise software company and wait for the potential internal AE promotion
OR
- take the smaller company AE role now and start getting closing experience immediately?

Curious especially from people who:
- stayed too long waiting for internal promotion
- left for a smaller company
- work in MSP/VAR/infrastructure sales
- moved from BDR to AE externally

No sugarcoating please.

Hey guys, I’m 25 from Austria and just finished my Marketing & Sales Bachelor-degree. I have arround 6months of tech sale experience from an internship in Barcelona.

I keep seeing people on LinkedIn starting at Salesforce Dublin as an SDR or BDR and i’m wondering:

*Is it realistic to get in with limited sales experience?

*Is Salesforce really that valuable for your CV etc.

*Can you actually live/save money in Dublin on a SDR salary (i think arround 75kOTE)? Is it possible to live alone maybe a bit outside of Dublin?

Would appreciate any honest insights from people working in tech-sale or in Dublin.

Thank you 🙌

I run a 50 person BDR team, I want to get them more comfortable handling cold calling.

I want them to get hyped and excited for it, selling enterprise technology.

Any suggestions for an external partner to run 1 or 2 virtual enablement session?

I’m reading reviews on Glassdoor about Gong. Is it really that bad?

People are saying don’t apply here. Pay sucks.

You get the better job, higher income, promotion, savings goal, etc. and for a short while it feels like you’ve finally caught up. Then pretty quickly your brain moves the goalpost and starts focusing on the next gap.

For those who’ve dealt with this, what actually helped you feel more settled?

Our CRO is complaining that none of us are making quota. But if you ask around in our industry our target is way out of range. A few friends I know in our space thinks our quotas are unrealistic.

How do you all get "market" data for your space?

Anyone else have this issue?

A bunch of mediocre sales people were employed and taking up all the jobs during Covid, when anybody could sell.

It feels like late 2022-2025 was rough but it’s ungodly out there right now. At this point I’m sure most people have just given up on sales and are trying something else, and newer SDRs are going to be replaced by ai

My only hope, is that at least for decently tenured reps (5+ years as AE) that we will have less competition for MM or ENT roles

Over a decade and a half in the game here, and I’ve been successful, at least in part, by running towards change. When it comes to the practical use of AI in our field, I’m just not seeing the value.

The account research and meeting transcription use-cases are obvious, and provide some nice but marginal gains IMHO.

I’ve tried using Gemini to build/cleanup decks, but it always turns out shit (likely my lack of knowledge on prompting).

Im smart enough to envision a few agentic workflows that could automate tasks for me (CRM/forecasts cleanup, aggregating data from disparate systems to inform outreach or the next move in a campaign), but my company won’t allow me to give an agent the necessary permissions to build them (and I don’t blame them).

I don’t want to be a luddite, but I feel like when I hear about AI-usage in any role outside of software dev it’s mostly bluster.

So help me understand peeps, are any of you actually getting value out of the tech? And if so, how?

***late edit- I work in Strategic Account sales, supporting only a few F500 customers, so the AI-authored email use-cases don’t make much sense for me. I’m no longer doing large volumes of outbound.

I'm UK based and considering going for a sales specialist role there (in via referral).

I've been in Hyperscaler land for last 9 years (5 years at Microsoft as an Azure Infra Sales Specialist and now just hit 4 years as a Google Cloud doing a similar role).

Anyone have any insights?

Received a job offer need advice, I'll try to keep it concise.

28M, partner no kids. Have been in the industry 5 years now.

• 15 months into AE role at Tier 1 ERP company.
• 142k Base, 230K OTE. Realistically will make 180K this year maybe slightly more next year.
• Hybrid wfh model.
• Great people in the team, however my role isn't in a well supported industry, less strategic.
• Been told not to expect promotion into a strategic role for 2-3 years.
• Current role is low pressure for a sales role, not expected to deliver much and have a supportive manager.

Been offered the following Snr AE role at a global SaaS company although not as well known/market leading.

• 225K base - 350k OTE
• Strategic role in a supported industry, hybrid model.
• From what I can see there's neutral/positive reviews from employees online.
• My concern in the back of my head is this role will be very high pressure/high expectations and there's a risk of being moved on within a year if I don't deliver.
• Role was advertised as 8+ years experience I have 5.
• I anticipate I'd go from working the 30-35 hour weeks I'm currently doing to 50+.

Appreciate and guidance/advice from this sub. Anything else I need to consider? Would I be stupid not to take the role?

**Edit numbers are AUD if that matters

I’m building a SaaS product for multi-shift manufacturers and I’m in that ugly early stage where I can’t tell if the market doesn’t care, my message is off, or I just haven’t done enough reps yet.

Not trying to pitch here. I’m looking for sales feedback.

The product basically sits around ERP/MES reports and helps plants close the gap between “we saw the bad metric” and “someone actually owned the follow-up.”

Example:

2nd shift has high scrap, extended downtime, missed output, quality issue, etc.

Most plants can see the number somewhere.

What I’m trying to solve is:

Did anyone acknowledge it?

Did they add context?

Was a task created if it needed follow-up?

Who owns the fix?

Did it ever get closed?

My basic line has been:

“ERP tells you what happened. We help make sure something actually happens about it.”

ICP I’m testing:

Multi-shift / multi-site manufacturers
100 to 2,500 employees
Plastics, food, metal fab, CNC, stamping
Reaching out to VP Ops, Directors of Manufacturing, CI leaders, Plant Managers, Ops Managers

Cold call script I’ve been using:

"When a production metric is off target, like scrap or downtime, what system makes sure the issue is acknowledged, assigned, and followed through to closure?”

If they say they already have software, I’ve been saying something like:

“Yeah, makes sense. A lot of plants have ERP, dashboards, Teams, whiteboards, etc. What I’m trying to understand is whether the action-to-closure part is actually systemized or if it still lives in handoffs and follow-up meetings.”

So far:

100+ leads worked
Mostly email + some calls
1 soft demo
Only a couple replies
Some email opens and site visits, but not many real conversations

What would you change?

Is the problem too abstract?

Am I going too high by targeting Directors/VPs before talking to more Plant/Ops Managers?

Should I lead harder with shift handoff failures, recurring scrap/downtime, margin leakage, or leadership visibility? Open to any advice people may have.

For background, I am currently account executive for a tax resolution firm. Full cycle sales, quota carrying role. I’m looking to relocate, I would be living near a tech hub. It seems like all the advice is that you have to start with an SDR position in this market.

Running an outbound team of 6 SDRs and the amount of times they hit office lines is killing our connect rates. We're averaging maybe 5% pickups because half our "direct" numbers just go to reception or some automated directory.

Been testing different data providers to find direct mobile numbers instead of these office lines. Our current vendor (won't name names but they rhyme with boominfo) charges premium for mobile data and still delivers mostly office numbers labeled as "direct." My manager is breathing down my neck about connect rates and I keep having to explain that the data is the bottleneck, not the reps.

Seriously looking at Prospeo for direct dial phone numbers because they claim a big database of verified mobiles - actual cell phone numbers, not just desk phones that ring into the void. Also been poking around RocketReach but their mobile number coverage seems lighter from what I can tell on their free tier.

Anyone here successfully getting real cell numbers at scale? What sales data provider are you using and what kind of connect rates are you seeing? Trying to make a decision by end of month.