Nail your AE interview with our interview prep kit

For most SDRs the desire to move to a full AE role is strong.

You might have been promised it when you took your SDR role, you might have seen colleagues being promoted before you, or you might want this next step to give you the opportunity to move team or location.

On this page you’ll learn some strategies to plan for and nail that transition, but before we start here are two important bits of advice

Stay as an SDR for longer than you want to

Being an SDR teaches you the foundational aspects of the AE role, and gives you time to understand how the business works, who is who in the organisation, and to see which AEs are successful and what they do differently.

And if you think becoming an AE lifts you out of having to prospect over phone or email…think again.

Move to an AE role in your current company

You might think that an AE role in another company gives you the opportunity to short cut the process.

But the new AE role comes with it a huge list of new skills to learn, and adding new products, new customers, new managers and colleagues to the mix just makes your job even harder. Stick with what you know for now.

Find your hiring manager early

With those points in mind, you can track down your future hiring manager early in your time as an SDR.

They are likely a manager of an SMB sales team, either in your region, or if you are considering using this opportunity for a geographical move, look further afield.

Depending on how your company is structured there may be a team called Enterprise Corporate Sales (ECS) who transact smaller deals in the largest companies. If you have ambitions to get into selling large strategic programmes this can be a good place to start.

  1. Connect with them on LinkedIn

  2. Use your HR system to find out who all their team members are

  3. Connect with all their current team members on LinkedIn

  4. Take a look at your reporting system/CRM to work out who the top performers in the team are

What is the hiring manager thinking about?

“Is this person going to smash their target?”
“How quickly can this person get up to speed (and hit their target?)”
“Is this person going to fit in well with the other team members (while smashing their target)?”
“What is the risk/cost if this person doesn’t smash their target?”

When a hiring manager is filling an open spot in their team they are thinking about their own goals….

You want to think of yourself as a salesperson and not a candidate, and use your time in your SDR role to build up a strong and trusted relationship with your future hiring manager, so that when that spot opens up in their team they can answer all of these questions positively.

Think forwards not backwards

Most candidates (especially external candidates) spend their time describing what they have done in the past:

  • I sold to customer X

  • I was top performer

  • I achieved this certification

Instead, focus your planning around what you will do:

  • I will focus on these products/services

  • This is where I think the biggest opportunity lies

  • These are the partners I’m planning to work with

  • Here is where I would find potential leads

  • These competitors are the biggest potential threats

Most interviews are painful.

The interviewer asks standard questions:

“What are your strengths?”

“Tell me about your last job?”

“Describe a time when you have been a team player”

Blah, blah, blah. The interviewer doesn’t really care and the interviewee churns out some nonsense about being “goal orientated”. No-one learns anything.

Take control of your interview

Instead you are going to take control by politely starting to ask your own questions as soon as possible.

This will have a number of benefits:

  • The interviewer with thank their lucky stars because you are going to do the hard work of driving the conversation

  • The interviewer is going to get to talk about themselves, the company and their team which will make them feel great

  • The interviewer is going to know that you care about this decision (and that you have other options if this isn’t the right fit)

  • The interviewer is going to see exactly how you would work in a sales situation

  • You will know what is coming up - so no awkward pauses while you try to think of an answer to “Tell me about a time when you disappointed a team member.”

Plan your interview questions

Your questions will vary depending on the company you work for, your relationship with your hiring manager and your tenure at the company - so make them your own.

If you’ve worked at your company for a while, then you should be expected to know the answers to the industry, company and team questions, so preface them with “What is your opinion?” to hear what the hiring manager thinks.

The Industry

  • What is the future of the XYZ industry?

  • Where are the new competitors going to come from?

  • How do you think consolidation will affect our industry?

The Company

  • What does ACME look like in five years?

  • Who are the largest clients? Why?

  • Who is not a good fit?

  • Why does ACME lose deals?

  • What is ACME’s biggest threat?

  • What do customers think about ACME?

The Team

  • How many people are in the team?

  • How long do people stay at the company?

  • How many of the team are hitting target?

  • Why do people leave the team?

  • How is the team structured?

  • What does the extended team look like (supporting roles)?

The Role

Marketing

  • How are leads generated?

  • What do top performers do to drive pipeline?

  • What is a typical lead to opportunity cycle? Nurture programmes?

  • Which channels work best for driving pipeline? Events, Content, Referrals from other clients?

  • Which verticals have the biggest opportunity?

  • What is the typical customer journey?

Selling

  • What does a typical deal look like?

  • How is forecasting done? In CRM?

  • What is the cycle of the business - monthly/quarterly?

  • How are top salespeople driving a compelling event?

  • Who from the client is the typical buyer? Who else are typical decision makers?

  • What are the most common objections?

  • What are the most common packages sold?

  • How does pricing work? How much do customers negotiate?

  • How are competitors priced compared to ACME?

  • How do competitors position themselves against ACME?

  • Do we have to get involved in RFP’s? Any lessons learned?

Contracting

  • What is a typical contract length?

  • What is the legal process? Where is our legal team based? How is redlining done?

  • What terms in contracts are most contentious?

  • What payment terms are offered - annual, quarterly, delayed invoicing?

Implementing

  • What Professional Services are involved - mainly direct or with partners?

  • Which partners do we prefer to work with? Why?

Customer Support

  • What issues (if any) draw salespeople back into deals after they have closed?

  • What is the implementation process like?

  • What causes customers to churn?

  • How is Customer Success handled? What is the cadence of meetings?

  • How do we manage/report if customers are using our product and getting value?

The Tools

  • What is the CRM system like? Are managers using it?

  • How do people collaborate in documents?

  • How extensively is video used in internal/external calls?

  • What is the biggest gap in the tools you have to do your job?

Questions to expect

Not every interviewer is unprepared, and some may arrive with very specific questions they need to have answered in order to report back to the recruiter.

In that scenario you obviously don’t want to have a battle over who is asking the questions, but you can definitely push for asking one question in return for every one of theirs as long as they are a sensible follow up.

Planned questions will normally be built around trying to find out your capabilities, experience and attitude:

Can you do the job?

Where have you done the job before?

Will you fit in with the team?

Some common examples might be:

  • Describe any sales experience you have

  • Why are you leaving your current role/job?

  • What would your current manager say about you?

  • What do you like about ACME/this role?

  • What do you think ACME’s biggest challenges are?

  • What’s your big vision - where do you see yourself in five year’s time?

  • What’s the most appealing aspect of this potential role?

  • What’s something interesting/cool/exciting you’ve read about this past month?

  • What do you want to learn about next?

  • Tell me about the pace of work and decision making in your current team/employer?

  • What type of work environment do you like best?

  • How does this potential role align to your career goals?

  • How do you like to balance working remotely versus in an office?

  • What have you done in the last month to learn something new about technology?

  • Tell me about a time when you’ve had to work under pressure

  • If I asked your manager to list three things about you - what would be on that list?

  • Describe a time when you have failed. What did you do to fix this and what did you learn?

  • What are your long term career goals?

  • What challenges do you face in acheiveing your goals?

Follow Up

Later that day you’ll want to put in a personal note to the interviewer to follow up and request next steps.

Hi xxxxxx,

It was great to meet you today and thanks for helping me understand more about the role. I’m excited to learn more and hope that we’ll get to speak again further along in this process,

Regards, xxxx

How can I help you?

If you have found this useful then dive in deeper with the full 68 page ebook or online course in which I’ll walk you through these tips and more.