Market update – Sales recruitment in Australia

2023 has certainly been an interesting time in the recruitment sector and especially in sales recruitment. We have seen a lot of redundancies on the tech side, the financial sales side has slowed right down, consumer spending has eased off as interest rates increase, putting pressure on the consumer sectors, there seems to be a construction company going under every week and inflation is not really moving down too much!

So, what’s been going on in sales recruitment?

Well, its been OK actually, there are and will always be roles for great sales professionals, but are there as many? Are they paying the same as mid-2022 when the market was crazy?

No, but there are still great roles available and great candidates are still being rewarded very well.

We have hopefully seen most of the market correction from the over-hiring that a lot of the tech companies said they did in 2021 and 2022. We are starting to see some green shoots of new roles being created and not just backfill roles in the market. It is still a disjoined market at the moment and will be for the rest of 2023, however, we are seeing positivity out there.

What is still to be reset is candidates and client expectations.

Client’s expectations are pretty easy to figure out in this market, they only want to see candidates who have excellent sales experience, have not jumped from job to job, and have experience selling similar products into a certain sector. The number one reason we are seeing clients not interview candidates is because of the frequency of movements on their cv. If you are a sales candidate who changes jobs every year, you are going to find it hard to secure the next role!

Candidate expectations are harder to figure out. Some candidates are only interested in the salary, others are open to every role in every sector, others only want management roles, others want fully remote, and so on… it all depends on your situation.

Here is a snapshot of what we are seeing in the market:

• Management roles are hard to find and there are a lot of senior candidates either actively looking for them or passively waiting for them (most roles are being filled internally)
• Hunter BDM roles are available, but you need to have experience in selling into the client’s target sectors and companies
• Account Management roles are harder to find but available, and again you need sector experience
• Salaries have dropped back from last year
• Recruitment processes are longer, clients are taking their time to make sure they get it right
• Most clients are a minimum of 3 days in the office and 2 days from home, however, we are starting to see a few more companies moving to 4 days in the office
• Junior sales candidates are in demand, especially in Consumer, Media and Tech sectors.

The new financial year has seen an uptick in roles in the market. In some areas it is impossible to find candidates with relevant experience, in other areas there is an abundance of candidates.

Roles/sectors that currently have strong demand in market:

• Service Sales roles, selling into the Banking and Financial Service sector
• Senior Manager/BDM roles selling FinTech into the Banking sector
• Business Development Manager – selling SaaS solutions into various markets
• Junior digital sales/inside sales role
• Business Development Manager role in the Market Research/Business Intelligence sector.

If you are looking to add a hunter BDM to bring in new logos or a rock star account manager to increase revenue of existing accounts please get in touch with Pearce Doorley, Executive Director and Head of APAC Carter Murray.

If you are a brilliant hunter BDM or a superstar Account Manager – lets chat!!