you will make more money in tech sales than in software engineering

[@romewillriseagain]

No, YOU will make more money in sales than in software engineering. If I was in sales I probably wouldn't make enough to cover my rent, I think this applies to most software engineers

[@evanswildrants]

best sales people i've worked with are actually quiet and introverted. just great at figuring out how to drive value for customers. you don't want to hear this, but the money is in revenue generating positions

[@romewillriseagain]

⁠@@evanswildrantsI know that’s where the money is, just doubt I’d be good at it. Maybe I am projecting on other developers though

[@evanswildrants]

Think you’d be surprised. Many of the best technical sales people I’ve come across stumbled into it and were extremely effective. Totally personal and subjective with what you want to do with your career and life tho. So that’s part is totally real!

[@sonderexpeditions]

It's stressful though. One of my friends took a 30% pay cut to be a pm instead of sales. He was tired of long hours, stress and uncertainty. Sales takes a special type of talent

[@evanswildrants]

Probably another topic I should cover is its extremely important to be selling something that there is actual demand for. There is NOTHING more stressful than staring down an impossible quota and realizing that no one even can derive value from the vaporware SaaS the firm is pushing. Negative bonus points if there has been tremendous fundraising so the firm is marching towards spending all the monies. Of course the real world is shades of grey and there are many scenarios you can find yourself in. Some great, some terrible. Most in between. P.S. I love how authentic your channel is. Small youtuber gang gangg! Subbed :)

[@sonderexpeditions]

​@@evanswildrantsI hear you. Thx 🙏🏿 subbed as well 😊

[@hdhdushsvsyshshshs]

Crazy my only job since I graduated was PM and I feel like. Being a PM it's so hard, I can't imagine how sales should be

[@evanswildrants]

The difference is you get paid more if it works. Pm you’re stressing for free or really a fixed rate 😅

[@sonderexpeditions]

@@hdhdushsvsyshshshs I'm a dev and I just think it's a different type of work. At my company pms and devs on average have a 35-40hr work week when not on crunch time. 50hrs max unless in cloud or bad team. I prefer being a dev because I can choose when I get nmy work done in a day vs a pm that has to be at so many meetings. Sales are guaranteed 10+ hr days.

[@Slowly_We_Rot]

It's pretty clear they're trying to depress wages for tech positions in the US.

[@DomGarzaSR]

I moved from tech sales to code for more money too but as an entrepreneur not a software engineer employee

[@evanswildrants]

This is what I’m doing now. The ultimate path imo 🫡

[@ryancxe]

I was also working in a techhy role in a big4 company and making crap all money lmao, that’s why I’m trying to break into presales now

[@evanswildrants]

pre sales you can make a ton of money. The biggest money is in the pure sales/ account exec roles tho. a few folks transitioned from pre sales to raw sales and made a TON of money where i was working. YMMV tho depending on your territory, what you're selling etc. Another unspoken benefit of working in pre sales is you will support multiple account execs and get to see a wide range of what "works". This is insanely valuable if you want to be an entrepreneur later in life. You NEED to either do this stuff by yourself to sell OR hire the people that do...

[@ryancxe]

@ what’s the difference do you reckon? Like 150k-200k vs ..

[@evanswildrants]

@@ryancxe top AE's at the mega corp i was working at were clearing 500k in mid market sales easy with accelerators. Some 800+. Remember you're getting crushed in taxes with this style of income tho unfortunately cuz commission. Presales, you kind of top out at 250k OTE ish as an IC and most firms structure the compensation as a group quota vs. a individual style quota so as a top contributor you're not really in the boat so to speak. Management a little more, but not much. The real money is in commission based IC work, but keep in mind - you will also be fired for being to successful.

[@evanswildrants]

A lot of the people were on a 225 OTE (50/50 split) for account exec roles just if they blow the quota out of the water (think 4x or 5x it. they can clear a wild amount of extra commission)

[@randommage1]

@@evanswildrantsthats not more money than big tech though, a big tech senior engineer can also hit way over 500k tc after their first equity refresher.

[@tonyh1345]

Totally depends. The average autistic person could learn selling as well as anybody else but probably never make themselves authentically likeable enough to be a top performer. I did SaaS sales (along with selling in other industries) for many years but I’m not able to authentically feel human emotions so I couldn’t actually engage in relationship building that was truthfully genuine. Every interaction was always contingent on me slapping on a mask and I went insane from it.

[@evanswildrants]

Take care of yourself man. All the best.

[@cio8574-m1h]

bean soup effect

[@aakarshan4644]

Interesting perspective! So sales in tech basically a tech consultant? A solutions engineer? Or maybe DevRel ? Please do expand on this topic!

[@evanswildrants]

in my experience its a sliding scale with risk. If you are in a raw sales role, closing deals with a quota and making commission, you have the best opportunity to make a ton of money, but also are at the highest risk of being fired (if you miss quota OR make too much :D). Solutions engineering or sales engineering is somewhere in the middle. Less risk than a raw sales job, but more risk than say working in a specialized engineering position. FWIW i have seen entire organizations of developers get laid off short notice when the project is "finished" and the maintenance part is a we will worry about that tomorrow. So in some capacity stability is an illusion in the corporate world. You are always at risk, so might as well try and capture as much upside as possible.

[@shawnsh]

Hey Ryan - I'm a TPM... Nearly all my friends are PM's... Given your background, could you do a "how to get into tech sales" video please?

[@evanswildrants]

Sure why not. Couple different paths in and a couple different roles to take so maybe I’ll split em up and try to stay focused on each individual position from my perspective.

[@shawnsh]

@thank you - much appreciated 🙏

[@kannonpatterson]

I have 10+ years in luxury sales , think Gucci , ysl etc … but I’m not sure how to break into tech sales . How do you even get in is the problem

[@evanswildrants]

@@kannonpatterson read the qualified sales leader by John McMahon. Book will detail a sales methodology/framework that more than half of big tech companies are leveraging. Then start networking with people in tech sales, throw em a bone or two in your networking chats that you understand meddpic style sales and I guarantee you will get a few interviews and eventually hired. Was in technical side of sales and many stories like yours on the raw tech sales account executive side…

[@kannonpatterson]

@@evanswildrantsthank you for your detailed response . Will dive into that book . But on linked in I should be searching for “tech sales account executive “ ?

[@evanswildrants]

I think anyone with a title of account executive at a company you know sells software would fit here. If you've been in sales for a while, I'd try hard to skip the sales development representative and business development representative positions as they're for inbound and outbound marketing efforts respectively. They are classic feeder positions into closing sales roles, but if you have 10+ years of sales experience I'd try hard to leverage that into a closing role and sink or swim. If you sink, you probably want it to happen quickly so you can just keep moving...

[@Mdieiwnsndke]

No thanks. Having quota stress isn’t worth it.

[@evanswildrants]

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[@dillonkermani3852]

Hey Evan! Been really appreciating your videos the past couple weeks. Do you have a LinkedIn profile you can share here? I’d like to take a peek at your career history.

[@evanswildrants]

meh F it. I just found and viewed your linkedin profile so you can see it. YOLO

[@jamesb7389]

Don't know why this video landed in my feed but I bless the gods of the algorithm. Do you have any way of reaching out Evan? Like could I send you an email?

[@evanswildrants]

What if I set up a discord server? Trying hard to stay reasonably anonymous, but would be happy to connect. Appreciate the kind words!

[@jamesb7389]

@@evanswildrants hahah may be kind of difficult considering the multiple angles of your face but I do appreciate the sentiment. Discord is cool. tbh I just want to share some of my own personal details and don't want to do it in the comments section. Happy to go with whatever works for you!

[@evanswildrants]

@@jamesb7389 totally get it. give me a day or two to setup a discord server and ill throw the link to join it in the comments here. This isn't meant to be an anonymous channel or anything, its just getting more attention than i thought it would so I'd like to route any comms from it from specific channels rather than leak my gmail (lol)