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National account manager skills for your resume and career

Updated January 8, 2025

6 min read

Quoted experts

Adry S. Clark Ph.D.,

James Wilkerson Ph.D.

Below we've compiled a list of the most critical national account manager skills. We ranked the top skills for national account managers based on the percentage of resumes they appeared on. For example, 9.0% of national account manager resumes contained account management as a skill. Continue reading to find out what skills a national account manager needs to be successful in the workplace.

15 national account manager skills for your resume and career

1. Account Management

The process of strengthening the relationship between a company and client is called account management. Effective account management has two key objectives, one is to retain loyal customers and the second one is to help the company grow by creating connections with new customers.

Here's how national account managers use account management:

Maintained clear communications with department managers and account executives and provided comprehensive account management to ensure client needs were being met.
Position encompassed all aspects of account management including opportunity analysis, product development, life-cycle management, and inventory/order management.

2. Customer Service

Customer service is the process of offering assistance to all the current and potential customers -- answering questions, fixing problems, and providing excellent service. The main goal of customer service is to build a strong relationship with the customers so that they keep coming back for more business.

Here's how national account managers use customer service:

Project Manager for installations, provided direction and worked closely with customer call center to ensure total customer service and satisfaction.
Interview, evaluated, selected and managed bilingual customer service representatives Responsible of providing bilingual technical and marketing support material.

3. National Accounts

Here's how national account managers use national accounts:

Developed inventory reporting specific to National Accounts, identifying transferred product, which resulted in significant cost savings in freight.
Achieved sales objectives for assigned national accounts through development of strategic promotional and sales programs within division's profit guidelines.

4. Healthcare

Healthcare is the maintenance or improvement of a person's health by the diagnosis and treatment of a person's injury, illness, or any other disease. Healthcare is a basic necessity of human life and is the responsibility of the country's government to ensure that each person gets healthcare. Providing healthcare is the job of certified health professionals that includes doctors, surgeons, nurses, and other physicians. Pharmaceutical companies, hospitals, dentistry, therapy, and health training all come under healthcare. Healthcare plays a vital role in the country's economy and its development.

Here's how national account managers use healthcare:

Developed hospitality and healthcare purchasing consortium focused on maximizing savings on purchases within multiple products and service product lines.
Provided managed care expertise to industry leading system developers to create web-based solutions for healthcare revenue cycle.

5. CRM

CRM stands for Customer relationship management and it is a complete process through which a business or organization monitors and administers its interactions with the customers. A process in which large amounts of data are collected through marketing via a company's website, polls, surveys, and other social media applications. The basic goal of CRM is to target the right audience for their product, and then fulfill their needs, to increase the sales and revenue of the company.

Here's how national account managers use crm:

Improved sales process documentation by utilizing CRM to better communicate with field sales staff in idealizing customer interactions.
Maintained and updated CRM system for accurate forecasting and pipeline transparency.

6. Customer Relationships

Customer relationships are the interactions and efforts made by a company to improve its customer service. Customer relationships cover not just all of the essential roles performed by customer support, but also the initiatives made before and after the interaction with a customer.

Here's how national account managers use customer relationships:

Retained and built new business primarily in the beverage industry on a national basis through extensive travel building solid customer relationships.
Established superior customer relationships with proven ability to succeed with all customer personality types leading to strong personal and corporate bonds.

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7. Business Development

Business development is the ideas or initiatives that work to make business work better. Selling, advertising, product development, supply chain management, and vendor management are only a few of the divisions involved with it. There is still a lot of networking, negotiating, forming alliances, and trying to save money. The goals set for business development guide and coordinate with all of these various operations and sectors.

Here's how national account managers use business development:

Maintained retail security; assumed responsibility for all business development activities and the execution of an industry sales and marketing strategy.
Cultivated relationships with key client stakeholders in targeted organizations through planning, organizing and leading a consultative business development process.

8. Sales Growth

Here's how national account managers use sales growth:

Delivered consistent sales growth even as geographical territory doubled and additional products segments were absorbed.
Achieved seven figure sales growth by employing category management business practices.

9. Product Development

Product development is the complete procedure of creating a product from concept until release of the final product. Product development has many stages after which a product is released into the market. Identifying the need, creating the opportunity, conceptualizing a product, and providing a solution, all are different stages of product development.

Here's how national account managers use product development:

Led Target Team responsible for strategic revenue growth, key executive relationship development, partnership linkage for product development and day-to-day operations
Result oriented building customer loyalty working with procurement, logistics, technical, product development, manufacturing and quality control.

10. Relationship Building

Relationship building is the act of building a lasting social connection with people whether online or in person. It's a soft skill required for those going into marketing, communication, and every other field that requires dealing with the public to help them connect better with people. It's also great as a personal skill for gaining meaningful relationships that can help one in the future.

Here's how national account managers use relationship building:

Delivered innovative technology based business solutions to diverse clientele using a consultative, value-added approach to relationship building.
Skilled at effectively maximizing the sales activity of channel partners through relationship building and consistent communication.

11. Trade Shows

Here's how national account managers use trade shows:

Exhibited and participated in professional trade shows and on-site vendor events, increased awareness of corporate program and generated sales.
Represented company at national trade shows, developed and delivered important sales presentations.

12. Business Relationships

Here's how national account managers use business relationships:

Developed new business relationships to uncover local business opportunities from national retail corporations headquartered out of BellSouth's 9 state region.
Experienced in establishing a long-term consultative business to business relationships leveraging the business provider as the best in the industry.

13. Product Line

Product line is a collection of similar or related products that may be under a single brand manufactured by the same company. It may include different varieties of a specific product of a brand which comes in different categories. In other cases, the product line may differ in some characteristics despite being from the same manufacturer.

Here's how national account managers use product line:

Delivered consistent market share growth while expanding product line merchandising, gaining new item placements and executing promotions within profit objectives.
Managed national book of business, negotiating renewals, selling additional product lines and implementing client improvement programs.

14. Business Reviews

A business review is a published survey about a company. It helps the company gauge their performance and see how they can improve, plan and implement policies to increase their companies' revenue.

Here's how national account managers use business reviews:

Utilize corporate marketing tools along with customized PowerPoint presentations to conduct quarterly business reviews, seminar training and new product proposals.
Assisted Kmart Category Managers in business reviews resulting in incremental sales for their category by identifying assortment opportunities.

15. Project Management

Here's how national account managers use project management:

Provided project management support, working with other Starbucks professional services groups, leading to improved Go-to-Market timing and customer satisfaction.
Worked closely with content aggregation specialists, product marketing and project management to customize wireless solutions/product offerings for clients.

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What skills help National Account Managers find jobs?

Tell us what job you are looking for, we’ll show you what skills employers want.

What skills stand out on national account manager resumes?

Adry S. Clark Ph.D.

Director, Western Oregon University

The skills that stand out on resumes fall into two categories: 1) Skills required to do the job and 2) Skills almost all employers look for. The most important aspect of resumes is to make sure it reflects exactly what the employer needs. Study the job description, identify key skills, and have them reflected on your resume. Think about transferrable skills, not the specific roles you've had.

Most employers look for skills such as communication (written/oral), flexibility, proactivity, problem-solving, project management, and technical. Make sure to cultivate those skills in whatever role you have, and have examples that demonstrate those skills.

What soft skills should all national account managers possess?

James Wilkerson Ph.D.

Business Program Coordinator, Project and Supply Chain Management Program Coordinator, The Pennsylvania State University

Verbal skills (both speaking and writing), negotiation skills, unfailing honesty, ability to empathize with clients' wants, and teamwork skills suitable for working collaboratively with sales and operations staff.

What hard/technical skills are most important for national account managers?

James Wilkerson Ph.D.

Business Program Coordinator, Project and Supply Chain Management Program Coordinator, The Pennsylvania State University

Spreadsheet (Excel) skills (including graph production from data), basic statistical knowledge, and online information search skills.

What national account manager skills would you recommend for someone trying to advance their career?

Kaustav Misra Ph.D.

Associate Dean, Central Connecticut State University

This pandemic taught us many things and one important thing that we have an efficiency gap.

The way of doing business will be much more technology orientated. Hence graduates should be ready to unskill and upskill their credentials. This time it is necessary to forget the old way of doing business and learn new skills to get a job or stay in a current job. Soft skills have become much more important than before, but a different soft skill set would be essential to interact with future market participants. Thus, a gap year should be utilized to unskill-upskill and enhance relevant credentials by getting into short-long term programs, training, and workshops would be highly recommended.

What type of skills will young national account managers need?

Michael Mikitka

Executive Vice President, MHI – Material Handling Industry

Courses and internships are essential. While the required depth of knowledge may vary from one position to another, employers are generally looking for candidates with strong "people-related" skills, those who are willing to continue to learn, and those with the ability to be flexible and adapt.

By "people-related" skills, I mean the abilities associated with effective communication (listen and express ideas and direction) and the skills related to working independently and a team.

As for the interest to continually learn... from a technology, data, and equipment perspective, today's supply chain looks very different than it did 10-years ago. The willingness and ability to continually learn are essential for anyone in a leadership role.

As for flexibility and adapting...supply chain/logistics is as much about responding to disruption and demand as it is planning for it. There is a predictable demand (i.e., seasonal...everyone knows when back-to-school shopping begins). Then there is the unpredictable demand (i.e., power-outages, wildfires, pandemic) that impact market and the ability to operate. Candidates that express flexibility and problem-solving skills will be much sought-after.

What technical skills for a national account manager stand out to employers?

Todd Lee Goen

Instructor & Internship Director, Christopher Newport University

Technical skills are often industry and/or position specific. Applicants should highlight any technical skills related to the position advertisement and those that add value to the position/organization. Most importantly, requirements for technical skills change with time and technological advances. This means employers value workers capable of adapting to change and continually improving and acquiring new technical skills. Thus, it's usually more important to demonstrate you are capable of learning and developing technical skills than it is to have a specific skill set upon hire (although this is not true for some positions/industries).
That said, technical skills related to online presentations, virtual meetings, virtual networking, remote working and the like are hot commodities right now. While most organizations were in the process of adopting many of these technologies and ways of doing business pre-pandemic, the pandemic accelerated the process. Organizations are making it work, but they often don't know best practices or the most efficient means of working in the largely virtual, pandemic environment. Post-pandemic, many of the remote/virtual changes the pandemic brought will stay in some form. Technical skills that support this type of workplace will make applicants stand out to many employers because they need/want to do virtual/remote business better.

Do you want to know more?

List of national account manager skills to add to your resume

The most important skills for a national account manager resume and required skills for a national account manager to have include:

Account Management
Customer Service
National Accounts
Healthcare
CRM
Customer Relationships
Business Development
Sales Growth
Product Development
Relationship Building
Trade Shows
Business Relationships
Product Line
Business Reviews
Project Management
Customer Satisfaction
Distributors

Sales Objectives
Sales Strategies
POS
Sales Quota
Client Relationships
ROI
Cold Calls
R
Territory Development
Product Knowledge
Sales Presentations
Sales Process
Revenue Growth
C-Level
Sales Plan
GPO
Sales Volume

Direct Sales
RFP
Brand Marketing
Develop Strong Relationships
IP
Sales Reps
Ip Networks
Corporate Accounts
Channel Marketing
Structured Cabling
Sales Training
Opportunity Management
OEM
Strong Negotiation
Develop Rapport

Updated January 8, 2025

Zippia Team

Editorial Staff

The Zippia Research Team has spent countless hours reviewing resumes, job postings, and government data to determine what goes into getting a job in each phase of life. Professional writers and data scientists comprise the Zippia Research Team.

Updated January 8, 2025

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