Business Development Specialist
Career Area: Sales
Occupation Group: Non-Technical Sales
Salary
Percentile wages tell how much a certain percentage of an overall population in a geographic area or within a given industry or field makes. The percentile wage estimate is the value of a wage below which a certain percent of workers fall.
An example would be the 25th percentile, 25 percent of workers employed in that occupation earn less and 75 percent earn more than the estimated wage value. At the 75th percentile, 75 percent of workers employed in that occupation earn less and 25 percent earn more than the estimated wage value.
A typical Business Development Specialist earns the following wages (national and state):
State
The average salary in North Carolina for those pursuing this career is $59,883
National
The average salary in the United States for those pursuing this career is $60,522
What Does a Professional in this Career Do?
Identifies new business opportunities and clients for a company, identifies new products, services and lines of business, and develops marketing and sales strategies to help grow a company's business. Collects and manages data on sales and business processes, does market research, and stays informed of industry trends and dynamics. Builds customer relationships and partnerships. Reports to a Business Development Manager or Director.
Employment Trends
The job demand and job growth statistics shown here were derived from job posts over the past year. Expected job growth projections are extrapolated from year-over-year job post listing history.
Job demand and job growth is expected at the following rates:
| Location | Growth | |
|---|---|---|
| North Carolina | 2126 | +6.3% |
| Nationwide | 54581 | +7.2% |
Skills
A professional in this position typically utilizes the following skills in the course of everyday work in this exciting and challenging field:
Baseline Skills
The following are baseline skills every Business Development Specialist is expected to have in order to experience success in this field:
- Communication Skills: The ability to convey information to another effectively and efficiently.
- Teamwork / Collaboration: Experience working in collaborative efforts with a team to achieve a common goal or to complete a task in the most effective and efficient way.
- Building Effective Relationships: Building relationships is about your ability to identify and initiate working relationships and to develop and maintain them in a way that is of mutual benefit to both yourself and the other party. Good relationships are the key to getting things done and are essential when your success is dependent on others.
- Organizational Skills: Experience with a systematic process of structuring, integrating, co-ordinating task goals, and activities to resources in order to attain objectives.
- Research: Experience performing creative and systematic work to understand a product, market, or customer, either before building a new solution, or to troubleshoot an existing issue
Specialized Skills
These skills are specific to working in this career:
- Sales: Experience selling products or services to consumers.
- Business Development: Business development entails tasks and processes to develop and implement growth opportunities within and between organizations.
- Prospective Clients: Working with Prospective Clients, which are indivuals who are not yet customers, but who have the potential of becoming one.
- Lead Generation: In marketing, lead generation is the initiation of consumer interest or enquiry into products or services of a business.
- Sales Development: Sales development is an organization that sits between the marketing and sales functions of a business and is in charge of the front-end of the sales cycle: identifying, connecting with, and qualifying leads.
Distinguishing Skills
Any Business Development Specialist that possesses the following skills will stand out against the competition:
- Account Management: Account management is the management of sales and relationships with particular customers of a company.
- Sales Cycle: The sales cycle is the process that companies undergo when selling a product to a customer. It encompasses all activities associated with closing sale.
- Sales Calls: A sales call is a phone call made by a sales representative of a company to a person's home with the purpose of selling goods, services, etc.
- Direct Sales: Direct selling is the marketing and selling of products directly to consumers away from a fixed retail location.
- Sales Strategy: A sales strategy is a plan by a business or individual on how to go about selling products and services and increasing profits.
Experience
This position typically requires the following level of experience. The numbers presented in the pie charts below were derived from actual job posts over the past year. Not all job postings list experience requirements.
| Experience Required | % |
| 0 to 2 years | 63% |
| 3 to 5 years | 31% |
| 6 to 8 years | 3% |
Many of the programs offered through NC State are designed for working professionals who need additional credentials to enhance existing work experience.
Students who do not have the expected level of experience may wish to look into internship and employment opportunities.
Common Job Titles
It is possible to find work in this field in positions commonly listed as the following job titles:
- Business Development Representative
- Business Development Specialist
- Sales Representative
- Sales Development Representative
- Business Development
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