How to become Sales Engineer in 2024

Sales Engineer Sell business goods or services, the selling of which requires a technical background equivalent to a baccalaureate degree in engineering.

Sales Engineer is Also Know as

In different settings, Sales Engineer is titled as

  • Business Development Engineer
  • Inside Sales Engineer
  • Product Sales Engineer
  • Sales Applications Engineer
  • Sales Engineer
  • Technical Marketing Engineer
  • Technical Sales Engineer

Education and Training of Sales Engineer

Sales Engineer is categorized in Job Zone Four: Considerable Preparation Needed

Experience Required for Sales Engineer

A considerable amount of work-related skill, knowledge, or experience is needed for these occupations. For example, an accountant must complete four years of college and work for several years in accounting to be considered qualified.

Education Required for Sales Engineer

Most of these occupations require a four-year bachelor's degree, but some do not.

Degrees Related to Sales Engineer

Training Required for Sales Engineer

Employees in these occupations usually need several years of work-related experience, on-the-job training, and/or vocational training.

Related Ocuupations

Some Ocuupations related to Sales Engineer in different industries are

What Do Sales Engineer do?

  • Plan and modify product configurations to meet customer needs.
  • Confer with customers and engineers to assess equipment needs and to determine system requirements.
  • Collaborate with sales teams to understand customer requirements, to promote the sale of company products, and to provide sales support.
  • Secure and renew orders and arrange delivery.
  • Develop, present, or respond to proposals for specific customer requirements, including request for proposal responses and industry-specific solutions.
  • Sell products requiring extensive technical expertise and support for installation and use, such as material handling equipment, numerical-control machinery, or computer systems.
  • Diagnose problems with installed equipment.
  • Recommend improved materials or machinery to customers, documenting how such changes will lower costs or increase production.
  • Prepare and deliver technical presentations that explain products or services to customers and prospective customers.
  • Provide technical and non-technical support and services to clients or other staff members regarding the use, operation, and maintenance of equipment.
  • Research and identify potential customers for products or services.
  • Visit prospective buyers at commercial, industrial, or other establishments to show samples or catalogs, and to inform them about product pricing, availability, and advantages.
  • Create sales or service contracts for products or services.
  • Arrange for demonstrations or trial installations of equipment.
  • Keep informed on industry news and trends, products, services, competitors, relevant information about legacy, existing, and emerging technologies, and the latest product-line developments.
  • Attend company training seminars to become familiar with product lines.
  • Provide information needed for the development of custom-made machinery.
  • Write technical documentation for products.
  • Develop sales plans to introduce products in new markets.
  • Identify resale opportunities and support them to achieve sales plans.
  • Document account activities, generate reports, and keep records of business transactions with customers and suppliers.
  • Train team members in the customer applications of technologies.
  • Maintain sales forecasting reports.
  • Attend trade shows and seminars to promote products or to learn about industry developments.
  • Report to supervisors about prospective firms' credit ratings.

Qualities of Good Sales Engineer

  • Speech Clarity: The ability to speak clearly so others can understand you.
  • Oral Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in speaking so others will understand.
  • Written Comprehension: The ability to read and understand information and ideas presented in writing.
  • Speech Recognition: The ability to identify and understand the speech of another person.
  • Inductive Reasoning: The ability to combine pieces of information to form general rules or conclusions (includes finding a relationship among seemingly unrelated events).
  • Deductive Reasoning: The ability to apply general rules to specific problems to produce answers that make sense.
  • Oral Comprehension: The ability to listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.
  • Written Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in writing so others will understand.
  • Problem Sensitivity: The ability to tell when something is wrong or is likely to go wrong. It does not involve solving the problem, only recognizing that there is a problem.
  • Information Ordering: The ability to arrange things or actions in a certain order or pattern according to a specific rule or set of rules (e.g., patterns of numbers, letters, words, pictures, mathematical operations).
  • Fluency of Ideas: The ability to come up with a number of ideas about a topic (the number of ideas is important, not their quality, correctness, or creativity).
  • Category Flexibility: The ability to generate or use different sets of rules for combining or grouping things in different ways.
  • Near Vision: The ability to see details at close range (within a few feet of the observer).
  • Originality: The ability to come up with unusual or clever ideas about a given topic or situation, or to develop creative ways to solve a problem.
  • Number Facility: The ability to add, subtract, multiply, or divide quickly and correctly.
  • Mathematical Reasoning: The ability to choose the right mathematical methods or formulas to solve a problem.
  • Speed of Closure: The ability to quickly make sense of, combine, and organize information into meaningful patterns.
  • Memorization: The ability to remember information such as words, numbers, pictures, and procedures.
  • Flexibility of Closure: The ability to identify or detect a known pattern (a figure, object, word, or sound) that is hidden in other distracting material.
  • Selective Attention: The ability to concentrate on a task over a period of time without being distracted.
  • Visualization: The ability to imagine how something will look after it is moved around or when its parts are moved or rearranged.
  • Perceptual Speed: The ability to quickly and accurately compare similarities and differences among sets of letters, numbers, objects, pictures, or patterns. The things to be compared may be presented at the same time or one after the other. This ability also includes comparing a presented object with a remembered object.
  • Far Vision: The ability to see details at a distance.
  • Time Sharing: The ability to shift back and forth between two or more activities or sources of information (such as speech, sounds, touch, or other sources).
  • Visual Color Discrimination: The ability to match or detect differences between colors, including shades of color and brightness.
  • Depth Perception: The ability to judge which of several objects is closer or farther away from you, or to judge the distance between you and an object.
  • Finger Dexterity: The ability to make precisely coordinated movements of the fingers of one or both hands to grasp, manipulate, or assemble very small objects.
  • Auditory Attention: The ability to focus on a single source of sound in the presence of other distracting sounds.
  • Arm-Hand Steadiness: The ability to keep your hand and arm steady while moving your arm or while holding your arm and hand in one position.
  • Hearing Sensitivity: The ability to detect or tell the differences between sounds that vary in pitch and loudness.
  • Manual Dexterity: The ability to quickly move your hand, your hand together with your arm, or your two hands to grasp, manipulate, or assemble objects.
  • Control Precision: The ability to quickly and repeatedly adjust the controls of a machine or a vehicle to exact positions.
  • Trunk Strength: The ability to use your abdominal and lower back muscles to support part of the body repeatedly or continuously over time without "giving out" or fatiguing.
  • Wrist-Finger Speed: The ability to make fast, simple, repeated movements of the fingers, hands, and wrists.
  • Multilimb Coordination: The ability to coordinate two or more limbs (for example, two arms, two legs, or one leg and one arm) while sitting, standing, or lying down. It does not involve performing the activities while the whole body is in motion.
  • Night Vision: The ability to see under low-light conditions.
  • Response Orientation: The ability to choose quickly between two or more movements in response to two or more different signals (lights, sounds, pictures). It includes the speed with which the correct response is started with the hand, foot, or other body part.
  • Spatial Orientation: The ability to know your location in relation to the environment or to know where other objects are in relation to you.
  • Sound Localization: The ability to tell the direction from which a sound originated.
  • Rate Control: The ability to time your movements or the movement of a piece of equipment in anticipation of changes in the speed and/or direction of a moving object or scene.
  • Reaction Time: The ability to quickly respond (with the hand, finger, or foot) to a signal (sound, light, picture) when it appears.
  • Glare Sensitivity: The ability to see objects in the presence of a glare or bright lighting.
  • Speed of Limb Movement: The ability to quickly move the arms and legs.
  • Peripheral Vision: The ability to see objects or movement of objects to one's side when the eyes are looking ahead.
  • Stamina: The ability to exert yourself physically over long periods of time without getting winded or out of breath.
  • Static Strength: The ability to exert maximum muscle force to lift, push, pull, or carry objects.
  • Explosive Strength: The ability to use short bursts of muscle force to propel oneself (as in jumping or sprinting), or to throw an object.
  • Dynamic Strength: The ability to exert muscle force repeatedly or continuously over time. This involves muscular endurance and resistance to muscle fatigue.
  • Gross Body Equilibrium: The ability to keep or regain your body balance or stay upright when in an unstable position.
  • Gross Body Coordination: The ability to coordinate the movement of your arms, legs, and torso together when the whole body is in motion.
  • Dynamic Flexibility: The ability to quickly and repeatedly bend, stretch, twist, or reach out with your body, arms, and/or legs.
  • Extent Flexibility: The ability to bend, stretch, twist, or reach with your body, arms, and/or legs.

Tools Used by Sales Engineer

  • Desktop computers
  • Laptop computers
  • Mainframe computers
  • Personal computers

Technology Skills required for Sales Engineer

  • Ab Initio
  • Amazon Web Services AWS software
  • Ansible software
  • Apache Cassandra
  • Apache Hadoop
  • Apache HBase
  • Apache Pig
  • Apache Struts
  • Apple iOS
  • Atlassian JIRA
  • Autodesk AutoCAD
  • Border Gateway Protocol BGP
  • C
  • C++
  • Cisco Systems CiscoWorks
  • Cisco Systems VPN Client
  • Citrix cloud computing software
  • Customer relationship management CRM software
  • Dassault Systemes SolidWorks
  • Database management software
  • Docker
  • Enterprise application integration EAI software
  • Enterprise JavaBeans
  • Extensible hypertext markup language XHTML
  • Extensible markup language XML
  • Firewall software
  • Google Cloud software
  • Google Workspace software
  • Graphics software
  • Hewlett Packard HP-UX
  • Hyperion Solutions Hyperion System 9 Bi+
  • IBM Cognos Business Intelligence
  • IBM Cognos Impromptu
  • IBM DB2
  • IBM Domino
  • Informatica Corporation PowerCenter
  • JavaScript
  • Kubernetes
  • Linux
  • Management information systems MIS
  • MapReduce big data software
  • McAfee
  • Microsoft Access
  • Microsoft Active Directory
  • Microsoft Azure software
  • Microsoft Dynamics
  • Microsoft Excel
  • Microsoft Exchange
  • Microsoft Office Live Meeting
  • Microsoft Office software
  • Microsoft Outlook
  • Microsoft PowerPoint
  • Microsoft Project
  • Microsoft SharePoint
  • Microsoft SQL Server
  • Microsoft Teams
  • Microsoft Visio
  • Microsoft Windows Server
  • Microsoft Word
  • MicroStrategy
  • MicroStrategy Desktop
  • Network directory services software
  • NortonLifeLock cybersecurity software
  • Operating system software
  • Oracle Database
  • Oracle Java
  • Oracle PeopleSoft
  • Oracle Solaris
  • Perl
  • PHP
  • Platform as a service PaaS
  • Python
  • R
  • React
  • RESTful API
  • Ruby
  • Sales analysis software
  • Salesforce software
  • SAP Adaptive Server Enterprise
  • SAP Business Objects
  • SAP Business One
  • SAP BusinessObjects Crystal Reports
  • SAP software
  • Scheduling software
  • Security assertion markup language SAML
  • Shell script
  • Single sign-on SSO
  • Software as a service SaaS
  • Splunk Enterprise
  • Structured query language SQL
  • Teradata Database
  • UNIX
  • Virtual private networking VPN software
  • Voice over internet protocol VoIP system software
  • Web browser software
  • WebEx Sales Center
  • Wireshark