Sales & Marketing Career

Sales & Marketing Career

Sales and marketing professionals are responsible for selling products and services. Marketing and sales careers include jobs that focus on selling to consumers (business-to-consumer or B2C sales), as well as selling to other businesses (B2B or business-to-business sales). Examples of B2C sales jobs include retail sales clerks, telemarketers, and in-store sales demonstrators. B2B sales jobs usually involve selling machinery, equipment, raw materials, or services to other companies. Some sales careers, such as real estate or insurance, can involve both B2C and B2B selling.

Marketing jobs focus on creating broad awareness, excitement, and a positive brand image for a company’s products. Whereas sales people typically focus on closing a sale with individual customers, marketing professionals seek to reach a wide audience of potential customers.

To reach this audience, marketing managers develop strategic campaigns, which may include tactics such as traditional advertising, product packaging, and coordinated media coverage. Increasingly, marketing managers are responsible for search engine marketing (SEM) — raising brand awareness through online advertising and search engine exposure.

Careers in sales and marketing are great for people with business savvy and a creative streak. Many sales and marketing professionals enjoy the daily challenge of using their creativity to increase sales and revenue for their business.

—Carl Demers—