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The differences between sales engineers and senior sales managers can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. While it typically takes 4-6 years to become a sales engineer, becoming a senior sales manager takes usually requires 6-8 years. Additionally, a senior sales manager has an average salary of $140,662, which is higher than the $93,727 average annual salary of a sales engineer.
The top three skills for a sales engineer include pre sales, customer service and sales process. The most important skills for a senior sales manager are customer satisfaction, sales process, and customer service.
| Sales Engineer | Senior Sales Manager | |
| Yearly salary | $93,727 | $140,662 |
| Hourly rate | $45.06 | $67.63 |
| Growth rate | 6% | 5% |
| Number of jobs | 132,324 | 115,070 |
| Job satisfaction | 5 | - |
| Most common degree | Bachelor's Degree, 74% | Bachelor's Degree, 73% |
| Average age | 44 | 46 |
| Years of experience | 6 | 8 |
A sales engineer is responsible for assisting customers with their technical equipment and advanced scientific product needs. Sales engineers must have excellent knowledge of the scientific processes and component functions of the products they're selling to deliver presentations and orient the customers. Sales engineers' duties also include troubleshooting, identifying product defects, and upgrading systems for better optimization. They are also responsible for analyzing cost estimates documents, performing adjustments as needed, process payments, arranging deliveries, and settling customers' complaints by replacing damaged items or doing refunds.
Senior sales managers take the lead in handling sales operations in the organization. They supervise the activities performed by the junior sales management team. It is their responsibility to maximize the potential of the sales team, establish sales plans, and justify these plans to superior management. They aim to expand the customer base of the company and its strong presence in the market. The skills these managers should have include leadership, organization, communication, and the ability to recruit talented sales agents.
Sales engineers and senior sales managers have different pay scales, as shown below.
| Sales Engineer | Senior Sales Manager | |
| Average salary | $93,727 | $140,662 |
| Salary range | Between $66,000 And $132,000 | Between $95,000 And $206,000 |
| Highest paying City | Washington, DC | Washington, DC |
| Highest paying state | Virginia | Maine |
| Best paying company | Meta | Leprino Foods |
| Best paying industry | Technology | Professional |
There are a few differences between a sales engineer and a senior sales manager in terms of educational background:
| Sales Engineer | Senior Sales Manager | |
| Most common degree | Bachelor's Degree, 74% | Bachelor's Degree, 73% |
| Most common major | Business | Business |
| Most common college | Northwestern University | University of Southern California |
Here are the differences between sales engineers' and senior sales managers' demographics:
| Sales Engineer | Senior Sales Manager | |
| Average age | 44 | 46 |
| Gender ratio | Male, 90.1% Female, 9.9% | Male, 61.4% Female, 38.6% |
| Race ratio | Black or African American, 1.7% Unknown, 6.2% Hispanic or Latino, 8.0% Asian, 7.1% White, 76.8% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.3% | Black or African American, 3.2% Unknown, 4.4% Hispanic or Latino, 9.8% Asian, 4.1% White, 78.2% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.2% |
| LGBT Percentage | 7% | 7% |