Sales · free guide

How to tailor your resume for a Sales Representative role

A screener on a Sales Representative posting reads like a sales manager forecasts: quota, attainment, rank, adjectives never. Tailoring means moving your attainment percentage into the first bullet of every role listed. That match, more than any other line on the page, decides whether this resume gets a second look.

Four moves for this posting
  1. Lead every role with quota and attainment percentage, matching any quota language the posting uses; a sales resume without that number reads as a confession, not a claim.
  2. Add your rank when it flatters you, matching any team-size language in the posting; a percentage tells the target, and rank tells the reader about the competition.
  3. Name your motion, hunting or farming, matching the posting's own sales model; crushed quota selling what, to whom, is the actual question a sales manager is asking.
  4. Match deal size and cycle length to the posting's stated product; a resume built around a very different deal size reads as the wrong kind of seller.
The fact behind this

Recruiters spend about 7 seconds on a first resume scan. (Ladders eye-tracking study)

Before you tailor anything

Start with the version a recruiter opens right now, then make these moves against it.

See what the first 7 seconds of your resume say, free

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