What skills should a Sales Engineer put on a resume?

O*NET rates Persuasion, Speaking, Active Listening, Critical Thinking, and Judgment and Decision Making among the most important skills for this occupation. Name the ones that are genuinely yours and show where you used them. A resume that lists skills you do not have is weaker than one that lists fewer.

What software should a Sales Engineer list?

Software recorded for this occupation includes Ab Initio, Amazon Web Services AWS software, Ansible software, Apache Cassandra, and Apache Hadoop. Applicant tracking systems match on the exact product name, so write the tool as the posting writes it rather than describing it in general terms.

What other job titles cover Sales Engineer work?

O*NET records 27 titles for this occupation, including Business Development Engineer, Product Sales Engineer, Technical Marketing Engineer, and Inside Sales Engineer. Searching only your own job title hides most of the openings you could apply to.

What qualifications does a Sales Engineer need?

In O*NET's survey of people doing this job, 57% reported their level of education as "Bachelor's Degree". That is what current postholders reported, not a requirement any single employer sets.

Will this resume pass an ATS for a Sales Engineer role?

No tool outside an employer can tell you how that employer's system is configured, including ours. What you can control is that the resume parses cleanly, names the work in the words the posting uses, and does not claim anything you cannot back up.

Sales Engineer resume example

A resume for a Sales Engineer needs to show the work itself: sell business goods or services, the selling of which requires a technical background equivalent to a baccalaureate degree in engineering. Day to day that means work like this: develop, present, or respond to proposals for specific customer requirements, including request for proposal responses and industry-specific solutions; collaborate with sales teams to understand customer requirements, to promote the sale of company products, and to provide sales support. Recruiters and applicant tracking systems both read for the tasks and tools this role actually involves, so the strongest resume names them in your own experience rather than describing the job in the abstract. Below are the tasks O*NET records for this occupation, the software and tools it uses, the titles it is advertised under, and the skills worth naming if they are genuinely yours.

Also advertised as

The same job is posted under many titles. Searching only your own job title hides most of the openings you could apply to.

Business Development Engineer
Product Sales Engineer
Technical Marketing Engineer
Inside Sales Engineer
Sales Applications Engineer
Technical Sales Engineer
HVAC Commercial Salesperson
Aeronautical Products Sales Engineer
Aerospace Products Sales Engineer
Agricultural Equipment Sales Engineer
Ceramic Products Sales Engineer
Chemical Equipment Sales Engineer
Electrical Products Sales Engineer
Enterprise Sales Engineer
Field Marketing Representative
Field Sales Engineer
Field Service Representative
Inside Sales Representative

O*NET records 27 titles for this occupation in total.

What this work actually involves

Tasks recorded for this occupation, in O*NET's words. If your experience covers one of these, it belongs on your resume in your own words.

Develop, present, or respond to proposals for specific customer requirements, including request for proposal responses and industry-specific solutions.
Collaborate with sales teams to understand customer requirements, to promote the sale of company products, and to provide sales support.
Create sales or service contracts for products or services.
Visit prospective buyers at commercial, industrial, or other establishments to show samples or catalogs, and to inform them about product pricing, availability, and advantages.
Keep informed on industry news and trends, products, services, competitors, relevant information about legacy, existing, and emerging technologies, and the latest product-line developments.
Identify resale opportunities and support them to achieve sales plans.
Confer with customers and engineers to assess equipment needs and to determine system requirements.
Plan and modify product configurations to meet customer needs.
Prepare and deliver technical presentations that explain products or services to customers and prospective customers.
Recommend improved materials or machinery to customers, documenting how such changes will lower costs or increase production.
Maintain sales forecasting reports.
Document account activities, generate reports, and keep records of business transactions with customers and suppliers.

25 tasks are recorded in total; these are the most central.

Example bullets for this role

Built from this occupation's own tasks. The brackets stay empty on purpose: we will not invent a number for you, and a fabricated metric is the fastest way to lose an interview you had already won.

Develop, present, or respond to proposals for specific customer requirements, including request for proposal responses and industry-specific solutions, for [who or what it served], at [what volume].
Collaborate with sales teams to understand customer requirements, to promote the sale of company products, and to provide sales support, for [who or what it served], at [what volume].
Create sales or service contracts for products or services, for [who or what it served], at [what volume].
Visit prospective buyers at commercial, industrial, or other establishments to show samples or catalogs, and to inform them about product pricing, availability, and advantages, for [who or what it served], at [what volume].

Software used in this role

Recorded for this occupation by O*NET. An applicant tracking system matches the exact product name, so write the tool the way the posting writes it.

Ab Initio
Amazon Web Services AWS software
Ansible software
Apache Cassandra
Apache Hadoop
Apache HBase
Apache Pig
Apache Struts
Apple iOS
Atlassian JIRA
Autodesk AutoCAD
Border Gateway Protocol BGP
C
C++

97 software entries are recorded in total.

Tools and equipment

The physical equipment this occupation is recorded as using. Worth naming when a posting asks for it by name.

Desktop computers
Laptop computers
Mainframe computers
Personal computers

Skills an ATS reads for

Worth naming only if they are genuinely yours. Keyword overlap is one input to a resume's score, not a verdict.

Python
Salesforce

What this job rates as most important

O*NET rates every skill for importance to this occupation. These are the highest rated, in order.

01Persuasion
02Speaking
03Active Listening
04Critical Thinking
05Judgment and Decision Making
06Reading Comprehension
07Social Perceptiveness
08Complex Problem Solving
09Negotiation
10Active Learning

Knowledge areas

The subject knowledge this occupation draws on, rated by importance.

Customer and Personal Service
Sales and Marketing
Engineering and Technology
English Language
Mathematics
Administration and Management
Design
Administrative

What qualifications people in this job have

From O*NET's survey of people doing this work. This is what postholders reported, not a requirement any single employer sets.

57%Bachelor's Degree
25%Master's Degree
12%Associate's Degree

What level this role is pitched at

O*NET places this occupation in “Considerable Preparation Needed”. Most of these occupations require a four-year bachelor's degree, but some do not.

A considerable amount of work-related skill, knowledge, or experience is needed for these occupations. For example, an accountant must complete four years of college and work for several years in accounting to be considered qualified.

Common questions

What does a Sales Engineer do?: Sell business goods or services, the selling of which requires a technical background equivalent to a baccalaureate degree in engineering. Day to day that includes work like develop, present, or respond to proposals for specific customer requirements, including request for proposal responses and industry-specific solutions and Collaborate with sales teams to understand customer requirements, to promote the sale of company products, and to provide sales support.
What skills should a Sales Engineer put on a resume?: O*NET rates Persuasion, Speaking, Active Listening, Critical Thinking, and Judgment and Decision Making among the most important skills for this occupation. Name the ones that are genuinely yours and show where you used them. A resume that lists skills you do not have is weaker than one that lists fewer.
What software should a Sales Engineer list?: Software recorded for this occupation includes Ab Initio, Amazon Web Services AWS software, Ansible software, Apache Cassandra, and Apache Hadoop. Applicant tracking systems match on the exact product name, so write the tool as the posting writes it rather than describing it in general terms.
What other job titles cover Sales Engineer work?: O*NET records 27 titles for this occupation, including Business Development Engineer, Product Sales Engineer, Technical Marketing Engineer, and Inside Sales Engineer. Searching only your own job title hides most of the openings you could apply to.
What qualifications does a Sales Engineer need?: In O*NET's survey of people doing this job, 57% reported their level of education as "Bachelor's Degree". That is what current postholders reported, not a requirement any single employer sets.
Will this resume pass an ATS for a Sales Engineer role?: No tool outside an employer can tell you how that employer's system is configured, including ours. What you can control is that the resume parses cleanly, names the work in the words the posting uses, and does not claim anything you cannot back up.

Related roles

Occupations O*NET records as closest to this one, and worth looking at if this search is not moving.

What this page cannot tell you

No tool outside an employer can tell you how that employer’s ATS is configured, including ours.
This page makes no claim about pay, demand or how many people hold this job. O*NET does not publish that here and we will not estimate it.
Keyword overlap is one input to a resume’s score, not a verdict on you. A resume that names skills you do not have is worse than one that names fewer.

If this is the job you are aiming at, the guide to tailoring a resume covers how to aim one posting properly, and building and exporting a resume here is free.

Occupation data from the O*NET 29.1 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA), used under CC BY 4.0. O*NET is a trademark of USDOL/ETA. SpartanResume is not endorsed by USDOL/ETA.