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The differences between senior sales specialists and sales representatives can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. While it typically takes 1-2 years to become a senior sales specialist, becoming a sales representative takes usually requires 2-4 years. Additionally, a senior sales specialist has an average salary of $74,361, which is higher than the $56,591 average annual salary of a sales representative.
The top three skills for a senior sales specialist include customer service, sales training and customer satisfaction. The most important skills for a sales representative are sales process, product knowledge, and customer service.
| Senior Sales Specialist | Sales Representative | |
| Yearly salary | $74,361 | $56,591 |
| Hourly rate | $35.75 | $27.21 |
| Growth rate | 4% | 4% |
| Number of jobs | 109,882 | 205,456 |
| Job satisfaction | - | 4.33 |
| Most common degree | Bachelor's Degree, 80% | Bachelor's Degree, 54% |
| Average age | 47 | 47 |
| Years of experience | 2 | 4 |
A senior sales specialist oversees and provides solutions to improve a company's sales operations. It is their responsibility to conduct market research and analysis, establish budgets and guidelines, generate leads, and develop sales strategies and sales forecasts. They also liaise and build positive relationships with vendors and suppliers, set sales targets, and resolve customer issues and complaints. Moreover, being a senior sales specialist, it is essential to lead and serve as a mentor to junior sales specialists while implementing and promoting the company's policies and regulations.
Sales representatives primarily sell the company's products and services to businesses or organizations. They should be adept at closing out sales, negotiating, and providing customer service. They should be knowledgeable about the products or services of the manufacturer or producer they represent. They must also have strong analytical skills that would help them in coming up with cost-benefit analysis in assessing the current roster of clients and even prospective ones. Sales representatives should also be able to maintain good working relationships with all involved stakeholders, especially clients.
Senior sales specialists and sales representatives have different pay scales, as shown below.
| Senior Sales Specialist | Sales Representative | |
| Average salary | $74,361 | $56,591 |
| Salary range | Between $50,000 And $108,000 | Between $33,000 And $94,000 |
| Highest paying City | San Francisco, CA | Boston, MA |
| Highest paying state | California | Massachusetts |
| Best paying company | VMware | |
| Best paying industry | Pharmaceutical | Pharmaceutical |
There are a few differences between a senior sales specialist and a sales representative in terms of educational background:
| Senior Sales Specialist | Sales Representative | |
| Most common degree | Bachelor's Degree, 80% | Bachelor's Degree, 54% |
| Most common major | Business | Business |
| Most common college | University of Pennsylvania | SUNY College of Technology at Alfred |
Here are the differences between senior sales specialists' and sales representatives' demographics:
| Senior Sales Specialist | Sales Representative | |
| Average age | 47 | 47 |
| Gender ratio | Male, 53.5% Female, 46.5% | Male, 58.1% Female, 41.9% |
| Race ratio | Black or African American, 3.9% Unknown, 3.7% Hispanic or Latino, 14.6% Asian, 5.2% White, 72.4% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.2% | Black or African American, 3.9% Unknown, 3.7% Hispanic or Latino, 14.5% Asian, 5.2% White, 72.5% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.2% |
| LGBT Percentage | 6% | 6% |