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Key Responsibilities and Required Skills for Ad Sales Representative

💰 $40,000 - $120,000

SalesAdvertisingMediaAccount ManagementDigital Advertising

🎯 Role Definition

The Ad Sales Representative is a revenue-focused, client-facing seller responsible for identifying, developing and closing advertising opportunities across digital and/or linear platforms. This role blends consultative selling, media strategy, campaign execution coordination with ad operations, and ongoing performance optimization to deliver measurable results and sustained publisher/agency relationships. Success requires pipeline discipline, commercial negotiation, product knowledge (programmatic, display, video, native), and collaborative execution with marketing, creative, and ad ops teams.

📈 Career Progression

Typical Career Path

Entry Point From:

  • Sales Development Representative (SDR) or Business Development Representative (BDR)
  • Account Coordinator / Junior Account Executive
  • Marketing Coordinator or Media Planner

Advancement To:

  • Senior Account Executive
  • Account Director / Head of Sales
  • Regional Sales Manager / Director of Sales
  • Strategic Partnerships Manager

Lateral Moves:

  • Client Success / Account Management
  • Ad Operations / Campaign Manager
  • Programmatic Specialist / Trading Desk

Core Responsibilities

Primary Functions

  • Prospect, research, and qualify new advertiser and agency leads using a multi-channel approach (cold outreach, referrals, events, LinkedIn, industry lists), build a healthy funnel and convert leads into new ad revenue.
  • Manage the full sales cycle from initial outreach through discovery, proposal development, creative briefing, negotiation, closing contracts, and onboarding to ad ops.
  • Develop and present tailored media proposals and integrated advertising solutions (display, video, native, audio, out-of-home, programmatic/private marketplace) that align with client KPIs and budgets.
  • Meet and exceed individual quota and revenue targets through consistent pipeline management, deal progression and upsell/cross-sell of premium ad products and sponsorships.
  • Negotiate commercial terms, insertion orders (IOs), contracts, and rate cards while protecting margin and adhering to pricing guidelines and legal/compliance requirements.
  • Build and maintain strong long-term relationships with agency buyers, brand marketers and internal stakeholders to drive repeat business and increase share-of-wallet.
  • Collaborate closely with ad operations and trafficking teams to ensure creative specs, tags, targeting, pacing and delivery are properly implemented and validated prior to campaign launch.
  • Monitor campaign performance (impressions, CTR, viewability, VCR, conversions, CPA) and proactively optimize creative, targeting and pacing to maximize ROI and contractual KPIs.
  • Provide clients and internal teams with clear, actionable campaign reporting, post-campaign analysis, and insights that demonstrate business impact and inform future buys.
  • Maintain up-to-date knowledge of product offerings, ad formats, programmatic capabilities (DSP/SSP), private marketplaces (PMPs), header bidding, and industry trends to position solutions effectively.
  • Use CRM (Salesforce, HubSpot or equivalent) to capture activities, update opportunities, forecast revenue, and produce accurate pipeline and weekly/monthly sales reports.
  • Create compelling sales collateral, one-sheets, media kits, RFP responses and case studies tailored to target verticals and buyer needs.
  • Coordinate internal cross-functional resources — creative, analytics, legal, finance, and marketing — to ensure seamless campaign delivery and client satisfaction.
  • Execute renewal strategies, negotiate contract renewals and pricing adjustments, and identify expansion opportunities within existing accounts.
  • Conduct competitive analysis and territory/vertical research to identify white space opportunities, pricing strategies and messaging that differentiate your offerings.
  • Attend industry events, trade shows, and local/regional client meetings to generate leads, present product capabilities and strengthen brand presence.
  • Support revenue forecasting and monthly/quarterly business reviews with pipeline analyses, win/loss insights and action plans to accelerate deals.
  • Manage billing and ad ops escalations; coordinate with finance to resolve invoicing discrepancies and ensure timely payment collection.
  • Train and mentor junior sales colleagues, share best practices, and document playbooks for prospecting, proposal templates and objection handling.
  • Develop and execute targeted outbound campaigns (email sequences, ABM tactics, executive outreach) in coordination with marketing to accelerate enterprise opportunities.
  • Ensure adherence to privacy regulations (GDPR, CCPA where applicable), brand safety policies and ad verification standards in all buys.
  • Drive innovation by capturing client feedback on product features, reporting, and packaging to inform roadmap and new revenue streams.
  • Identify opportunities for sponsorships, branded content, and premium placements; coordinate creative and production resources to deliver end-to-end solutions.

Secondary Functions

  • Support marketing initiatives by contributing to demand generation campaigns, webinars, and thought leadership pieces.
  • Participate in product beta tests and provide market feedback to product and engineering teams.
  • Assist with competitive benchmarking and pricing updates for internal playbooks.
  • Support ad-hoc reporting requests and campaign audits to help resolve client escalations.
  • Represent the company at industry networking events and local community engagements.
  • Help maintain and update sales enablement materials and content libraries.
  • Collaborate with analytics to run A/B tests on creative and targeting recommendations, feeding learnings back into the sales process.

Required Skills & Competencies

Hard Skills (Technical)

  • CRM proficiency: Salesforce, HubSpot or similar — pipeline discipline, accurate forecasting and opportunity management.
  • Ad product knowledge: Google Ad Manager (GAM), Google Ads, DV360, The Trade Desk or other DSPs; familiarity with SSPs and programmatic ecosystems.
  • Analytics and reporting: Google Analytics, Looker, Tableau, or Excel (pivot tables, VLOOKUPs) to analyze campaign performance and prepare client-facing reports.
  • Ad ops basics: creative trafficking, VAST/VPAID for video, HTML5 creative guidelines, click trackers and tag implementation.
  • Negotiation & contract management: experience preparing IOs, legal/commercial terms, and pricing strategies.
  • Media planning and buying fundamentals across digital channels (display, video, mobile, connected TV, native, audio).
  • Familiarity with ad verification, viewability metrics, brand safety tools (IAS, MOAT), and fraud detection concepts.
  • Basic SQL or ability to work with data teams for ad performance pulls (preferred for advanced roles).
  • Presentation & pitch deck creation: Microsoft PowerPoint, Google Slides, and creating compelling visual proposals.
  • Forecasting and quota management using CRM and internal BI tools.
  • Understanding of attribution models, conversion tracking, and key measurement frameworks.

Soft Skills

  • Consultative selling mindset with strong commercial acumen; ability to translate client business objectives to measurable ad strategies.
  • Excellent verbal and written communication, presentation, and storytelling skills tailored to both agency and brand audiences.
  • Strong relationship-building and customer service orientation — trusted advisor approach.
  • Negotiation, persuasion and closing skills underpinned by resilience and a results-driven attitude.
  • Problem solving and analytical thinking — diagnose performance issues and prescribe optimizations.
  • Time management, prioritization and organization in a fast-paced, quota-driven environment.
  • Collaborative team player comfortable working cross-functionally and aligning stakeholders.
  • Adaptability to changing product offerings, market dynamics and client priorities.
  • Attention to detail when managing IOs, specs, billing and compliance requirements.
  • Initiative and entrepreneurial drive: proactive hunter mentality combined with account expansion discipline.

Education & Experience

Educational Background

Minimum Education:

  • Bachelor's degree in Business, Marketing, Communications, Advertising, or equivalent professional experience.

Preferred Education:

  • Bachelor's or Master's degree in Marketing, Business Administration, Media Studies, or similar.
  • Professional certifications (Google Ads, Display & Video 360, HubSpot, sales training programs) are a plus.

Relevant Fields of Study:

  • Marketing
  • Advertising
  • Communications
  • Business Administration
  • Media Studies
  • Data Analytics (helpful for advanced measurement-focused roles)

Experience Requirements

Typical Experience Range: 2–5 years in media sales, digital advertising sales, or agency-side buying; junior roles may be 0–2 years with strong internship/SDR background.

Preferred: 3+ years proven quota-carrying experience in digital ad sales or media sales with a track record of closing enterprise deals, managing agency relationships, and driving year-over-year revenue growth. Experience with programmatic/private marketplace selling, cross-channel campaign packaging, and working alongside ad operations/measurement teams is highly desirable.

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