A sales consultant is responsible for meeting with existing and new clients in a sales approach. Your goal as a sales consultant is to effectively sell products. Well, in a way.
The clients you meet with will come to you with certain problems concerning their business, your job is to figure out how to sell those products or services in a way that increases the company's sales as a whole.
To become a sales consultant, you'll want to earn a bachelor's degree. Generally speaking, an advanced degree will help you in the long run, especially when it comes to meeting sales goals. And everyone knows that more sales means more money.
Sales Consultant Overview
Working as a Sales Consultant
There is more than meets the eye when it comes to being a sales consultant. For example, did you know that they make an average of $26.92 an hour? That's $55,996 a year!
Between 2018 and 2028, the career is expected to grow 2% and produce 35,400 job opportunities across the U.S.
What Does a Sales Consultant Do
There are certain skills that many sales consultants have in order to accomplish their responsibilities. By taking a look through resumes, we were able to narrow down the most common skills for a person in this position. We discovered that a lot of resumes listed customer-service skills, interpersonal skills and physical stamina.
When it comes to the most important skills required to be a sales consultant, we found that a lot of resumes listed 21.6% of sales consultants included communication, while 12.7% of resumes included sales process, and 9.5% of resumes included consultants. Hard skills like these are helpful to have when it comes to performing essential job responsibilities.
When it comes to searching for a job, many search for a key term or phrase. Instead, it might be more helpful to search by industry, as you might be missing jobs that you never thought about in industries that you didn't even think offered positions related to the sales consultant job title. But what industry to start with? Most sales consultants actually find jobs in the retail and manufacturing industries.
How To Become a Sales Consultant
If you're interested in becoming a sales consultant, one of the first things to consider is how much education you need. We've determined that 44.4% of sales consultants have a bachelor's degree. In terms of higher education levels, we found that 7.2% of sales consultants have master's degrees. Even though most sales consultants have a college degree, it's possible to become one with only a high school degree or GED.
Choosing the right major is always an important step when researching how to become a sales consultant. When we researched the most common majors for a sales consultant, we found that they most commonly earn bachelor's degree degrees or high school diploma degrees. Other degrees that we often see on sales consultant resumes include associate degree degrees or master's degree degrees.
You may find that experience in other jobs will help you become a sales consultant. In fact, many sales consultant jobs require experience in a role such as sales associate. Meanwhile, many sales consultants also have previous career experience in roles such as sales representative or cashier.
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Sales Consultant Career Paths
As you move along in your career, you may start taking on more responsibilities or notice that you've taken on a leadership role. Using our career map, a sales consultant can determine their career goals through the career progression. For example, they could start out with a role such as account executive, progress to a title such as sales manager and then eventually end up with the title senior sales manager.
Sales Consultant
Senior Sales Manager
7 Years
Senior Sales Executive
8 Years
Director, Inside Sales
6 Years
Senior Territory Manager
8 Years
National Sales Director
11 Years
Major Account Manager
7 Years
Show More
What is the right job for my career path?
Tell us your goals and we'll match you with the rights job to get there.
Average Salary for a Sales Consultant
Sales Consultants in America make an average salary of $55,996 per year or $27 per hour. The top 10 percent makes over $102,000 per year, while the bottom 10 percent under $30,000 per year.
Average Salary
$55,996
Best Paying Cities
City
Average Salary
$31k
$132k
Recently Added Salaries
Job TitleCompany  | Company | Start Date | Salary |
|---|---|---|---|
Carhop Auto Sales & Finance Sales Consultant Sales Consultant | Carhop Auto Sales & Finance Carhop Auto Sales & Finance | 01/30/2021 01/30/2021 | $38,61001/30/2021 $38,610 |
MCI Sales Consultant Sales Consultant | MCI MCI | 01/30/2021 01/30/2021 | $29,21801/30/2021 $29,218 |
Penske Automotive Sales Consultant Sales Consultant | Penske Automotive Penske Automotive | 01/29/2021 01/29/2021 | $60,00001/29/2021 $60,000 |
Clearchoice Dental Implant Sales Consultant Dental Implant Sales Consultant | Clearchoice Clearchoice | 01/29/2021 01/29/2021 | $60,00001/29/2021 $60,000 |
Clearchoice Dental Implant Sales Consultant Dental Implant Sales Consultant | Clearchoice Clearchoice | 01/29/2021 01/29/2021 | $60,00001/29/2021 $60,000 |
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Sales Consultant Resumes
Designing and figuring out what to include on your resume can be tough, not to mention time-consuming. That's why we put together a guide that is designed to help you craft the perfect resume for becoming a Sales Consultant. If you're needing extra inspiration, take a look through our selection of templates that are specific to your job.
Learn How To Write a Sales Consultant Resume
At Zippia, we went through countless Sales Consultant resumes and compiled some information about how best to optimize them. Here are some suggestions based on what we found, divided by the individual sections of the resume itself.
View Detailed InformationTop Colleges for Sales Consultants
1. SUNY College of Technology at Alfred
Alfred, NY • Public
In-State Tuition
$8,570
Enrollment
3,721
2. University of Pennsylvania
Philadelphia, PA • Private
In-State Tuition
$55,584
Enrollment
10,764
3. University of Minnesota - Twin Cities
Minneapolis, MN • Public
In-State Tuition
$14,760
Enrollment
31,451
4. Stanford University
Stanford, CA • Private
In-State Tuition
$51,354
Enrollment
7,083
5. California State University - Bakersfield
Bakersfield, CA • Public
In-State Tuition
$7,309
Enrollment
9,142
6. Baylor University
Waco, TX • Private
In-State Tuition
$45,542
Enrollment
14,159
7. Ball State University
Muncie, IN • Public
In-State Tuition
$9,896
Enrollment
15,529
8. University of Wisconsin - Madison
Madison, WI • Public
In-State Tuition
$10,555
Enrollment
30,360
9. SUNY College of Technology at Delhi
Delhi, NY • Public
In-State Tuition
$8,360
Enrollment
3,142
10. Bentley University
Waltham, MA • Private
In-State Tuition
$49,880
Enrollment
4,177
Job type you want
Full Time
Part Time
Internship
Temporary
Top Skills For a Sales Consultant
The skills section on your resume can be almost as important as the experience section, so you want it to be an accurate portrayal of what you can do. Luckily, we've found all of the skills you'll need so even if you don't have these skills yet, you know what you need to work on. Out of all the resumes we looked through, 21.6% of sales consultants listed communication on their resume, but soft skills such as customer-service skills and interpersonal skills are important as well.
- Communication, 21.6%
- Sales Process, 12.7%
- Consultants, 9.5%
- Product Knowledge, 8.5%
- POS, 8.4%
- Other Skills, 39.3% See All Sales Consultant Skills
Best States For a Sales Consultant
Some places are better than others when it comes to starting a career as a sales consultant. The best states for people in this position are California, Hawaii, Wyoming, and Michigan. Sales consultants make the most in California with an average salary of $83,571. Whereas in Hawaii and Wyoming, they would average $73,160 and $69,817, respectively. While sales consultants would only make an average of $63,620 in Michigan, you would still make more there than in the rest of the country. We determined these as the best states based on job availability and pay. By finding the median salary, cost of living, and using the Bureau of Labor Statistics' Location Quotient, we narrowed down our list of states to these four.
1. Wyoming
Total Sales Consultant Jobs:
262
Highest 10% Earn:
$133,000
Location Quotient:
1.21
Location Quotient is a measure used by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) to determine how concentrated a certain industry is in a single state compared to the nation as a whole. You can read more about how BLS calculates location quotients here
$69,818
Avg. Salary
2. Hawaii
Total Sales Consultant Jobs:
427
Highest 10% Earn:
$133,000
Location Quotient:
1.27
Location Quotient is a measure used by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) to determine how concentrated a certain industry is in a single state compared to the nation as a whole. You can read more about how BLS calculates location quotients here
$73,160
Avg. Salary
3. Oregon
Total Sales Consultant Jobs:
1,998
Highest 10% Earn:
$123,000
Location Quotient:
1.25
Location Quotient is a measure used by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) to determine how concentrated a certain industry is in a single state compared to the nation as a whole. You can read more about how BLS calculates location quotients here
$62,505
Avg. Salary
How Do Sales Consultant Rate Their Jobs?
4.0
GREAT, but can be unstable • July +0000
4.0
GREAT, but can be unstable • July +0000What do you like the most about working as Sales Consultant?
Working with a diverse clientele and helping people Show MoreTop Sales Consultant Employers
We've made finding a great employer to work for easy by doing the hard work for you. We looked into employers that employ sales consultants and discovered their number of sales consultant opportunities and average salary. Through our research, we concluded that Best Buy was the best, especially with an average salary of $55,394. AT&T follows up with an average salary of $99,019, and then comes Sears Holdings with an average of $56,383. In addition, we know most people would rather work from home. So instead of having to change careers, we identified the best employers for remote work as a sales consultant. The employers include CHG Healthcare, Becton Dickinson, and Windstream
Sales Consultant Videos
Automotive Sales Consultant, Career Video from drkit.org
CarMax Sales Consultant: Income Potential