Talk to me about the nitty-gritty of a home working sales job..

[marzipanfruits]

I have just got a job as a business development manager. Homeworking with sales visits. Basic salary plus commission starting in a couple of weeks.

This is a complete about turn of career for me. Before having ds I worked in the education sector for 10 years and although part of that was income generation, it was of a very different nature. Again- pre ds part of my previous role included working from home/library etc but this was research rather than sales.

I'm incredibly excited about this new direction and the potential for the role but wanted to see if anyone can talk to me about the actual nitty gritty of how business development /sales from home actually works. I know it's building relationships, calls, emails and will be visits out (and forgive me that this is just skating on the surface- I do know that it's a lot more than that), but I'd be really grateful for any insights into this career path that might help me when I'm starting out. Thanks

Is there anything specific you would like to know?

Expect to spend most of your time face-to-face with customers. Having previously worked in medical sales and marketing, I reckon I spent about 80% of my time with my customers and 20% planning, prospecting, writing presentations etc. Depends on what you are selling to some extent though. How big is your territory geographically? You might spend a lot of time in your car! Are you responsible for account management, implementation, training etc, or do you have support in those functions?