Job Seeking
Start your Seattle sales search with the customer, sales motion and responsibilities—not just the title. Cloud, SaaS and e-commerce can be useful search categories, but confirm current opportunities through live postings rather than assuming any sector is hiring broadly.
Customer fit matters too. Selling to technical evaluators, small-business owners and enterprise procurement teams calls for different evidence. Choose roles where your experience—or a credible learning plan—matches the buyer and buying process.
Keep three location filters separate: Seattle city roles, surrounding Puget Sound metro roles and remote jobs covering a defined territory. A posting labeled “Seattle” does not necessarily mean a city office or a Seattle-only customer base.
Browse sales jobs on Salesfolks, then check the employer’s current careers page before investing in an application. To verify local demand, track unique employers and active roles over two weeks. Remove duplicate listings and distinguish newly opened roles from reposts. Ask recruiters whether a vacancy is approved, actively interviewing and new headcount or a replacement.
Your resume should make your contribution understandable without inflated claims. Include the product, customer segment, sales motion and your responsibilities. Use performance numbers only when you can explain the period, denominator and source; do not imply that team revenue was entirely yours.
Prepare one relevant, anonymized work example. For an SDR role, show a target-account rationale, a short outreach sequence and qualification questions. For an AE role, show a discovery outline and opportunity plan. For account management, show a renewal-risk assessment and expansion hypothesis.
Hypothetical example: A retail salesperson applying to a software SDR position could explain how they uncovered customer needs and handled objections, then present a fictional prospecting exercise. Label the exercise clearly; do not present it as a real customer win. Remove confidential names, pricing and customer data from every sample.
On-target earnings, or OTE, generally combines base pay with variable compensation at target performance. It is not a guaranteed paycheck. Ask for the compensation plan and clarify what must happen before commission is earned and paid.
For wage context, use the BLS occupational wage tables. Match duties to the appropriate occupation, select the relevant available geography and check the reference year and wage definitions. Do not treat a broad national occupation as a Seattle salary quote or assume its wage measure equals a sales offer’s OTE.
Use interviews to investigate how results are produced. Ask for concrete examples rather than accepting “great product” or “strong pipeline” as sufficient answers.
Request a conversation with a prospective peer. Compare their description with the manager’s account, allowing for differences in tenure and territory. For remote coverage, confirm time-zone expectations and travel separately from office attendance.
An unanswered question is not automatically proof of a bad employer. However, repeated evasiveness about essential terms is a reason to pause and investigate.
Record each offer against the same criteria. Mark missing information as unknown rather than giving optimistic credit.
Hypothetical comparison: Offer A has higher advertised OTE but an undefined territory and no clear ramp explanation. Offer B has lower OTE, documented account coverage and scheduled coaching. Neither automatically wins. Request the missing terms from A and test whether B’s base supports your budget. Compare realistic downside scenarios—not just target earnings—and get material promises documented before deciding.
That depends on the employer. Confirm the actual office, attendance requirements, permitted work locations and territory before assuming relocation is necessary.
Target roles where your customer knowledge and transferable skills are relevant. Demonstrate discovery, follow-through and learning through an honest work example rather than claiming experience you lack.
You can explore the role, but clarify the base range and variable structure early. Avoid completing a lengthy interview process before learning whether the package could meet your needs.
Use O*NET to research occupation tasks and skills, then compare those descriptions with actual job duties. Consult BLS wage tables for occupation-, geography- and year-specific context, not a promised offer.
For your next step, browse sales openings or create a Salesfolks account. Verify changing details—vacancy status, work location, compensation and territory—with the employer before relying on them.