Description
ICT account managers build business relationships with customers to facilitate the sale of hardware, software, telecommunications, or ICT services. They also identify opportunities and manage the sourcing and delivery of products to customers. They achieve sales targets and maintain profitability.
Duties
The duties of an ICT account manager typically include:
- Building and maintaining relationships with customers to understand their ICT needs.
- Identifying opportunities for sales and upselling ICT products or services.
- Collaborating with internal teams to develop customized solutions for customers.
- Providing technical expertise and support to customers.
- Managing accounts, including contract negotiations, pricing, and customer satisfaction.
Other titles
The following job titles also refer to ICT account manager:
IT account manager
ICT key account manager
IT key account manager
ICT account managers
Working conditions
ICT Account Managers typically work in office settings and may need to travel to meet with clients or attend industry events. They interact with clients and internal teams, balancing responsibilities related to account management, sales, and technical support. The role may involve occasional evening or weekend work to accommodate client needs.
Minimum qualifications
A bachelor’s degree in business, information technology, or a related field is often required for this role. Strong communication, interpersonal, and negotiation skills are essential. Previous experience in sales, account management, or the ICT industry is highly valuable. Familiarity with various ICT solutions, software, and technologies is important. Some companies may also require certifications related to sales or specific ICT products and services.
ISCO skill level
ISCO skill level is defined as a function of the complexity and range of tasks and duties to be performed in an occupation. It is measured on a scale from 1 to 4, with 1 the lowest level and 4 the highest, by considering:
- the nature of the work performed in an occupation in relation to the characteristic tasks and duties
- the level of formal education required for competent performance of the tasks and duties involved and
- the amount of informal on-the-job training and/or previous experience in a related occupation required for competent performance of these tasks and duties.
ICT account manager is a Skill level 4 occupation.
ICT account manager career path
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Essential knowledge and skills
Essential knowledge
This knowledge should be acquired through learning to fulfill the role of ICT account manager.
- Sales argumentation: Techniques and sales methods used in order to present a product or service to customers in a persuasive manner and to meet their expectations and needs.
- Service-oriented modelling: The principles and fundamentals of service-oriented modelling for business and software systems that allow the design and specification of service-oriented business systems within a variety of architectural styles, such as enterprise architecture and application architecture.
- Accounting techniques: The techniques of recording and summarising business and financial transactions and analysing, verifying, and reporting the results.
- Channel marketing: The strategies and practices, including channel sales, that involve distributing products directly and indirectly through partners in order to bring the products to the end consumer.
- Product comprehension: The offered products, their functionalities, properties and legal and regulatory requirements.
- Sales strategies: The principles concerning customer behaviour and target markets with the aim of promotion and sales of a product or a service.
Essential skills and competences
These skills are necessary for the role of ICT account manager.
- Guarantee customer satisfaction: Handle customer expectations in a professional manner, anticipating and addressing their needs and desires. Provide flexible customer service to ensure customer satisfaction and loyalty.
- Apply company policies: Apply the principles and rules that govern the activities and processes of an organisation.
- Implement marketing strategies: Implement strategies that aim to promote a specific product or service, using the developed marketing strategies.
- Maintain relationship with customers: Build a lasting and meaningful relationship with customers in order to ensure satisfaction and fidelity by providing accurate and friendly advice and support, by delivering quality products and services and by supplying after-sales information and service.
- Perform data analysis: Collect data and statistics to test and evaluate in order to generate assertions and pattern predictions, with the aim of discovering useful information in a decision-making process.
- Perform customers’ needs analysis: Analyse the habits and needs of customers and target groups in order to devise and apply new marketing strategies and to sell more goods in a more effective way.
- Implement customer follow-up: Implement strategies that ensures post-sale follow up of customer satisfaction or loyalty regarding one’s product or service.
- Manage contracts: Negotiate the terms, conditions, costs and other specifications of a contract while making sure they comply with legal requirements and are legally enforceable. Oversee the execution of the contract, agree on and document any changes.
- Use customer relationship management software: Use specialised software to manage company’s interactions with current and future customers. Organise, automate and synchronise sales, marketing, customer service, and technical support, to increase targeted sales.
- Maximise sales revenues: Increase possible sales volumes and avoid losses through cross-selling, upselling or promotion of additional services.
- Produce sales reports: Maintain records of calls made and products sold over a given time frame, including data regarding sales volumes, number of new accounts contacted and the costs involved.
- Develop account strategy: Create the strategic goals and actions for future interaction with an account for the organisation.
- Implement sales strategies: Carry out the plan to gain competitive advantage on the market by positioning the company’s brand or product and by targeting the right audience to sell this brand or product to.
- Identify new business opportunities: Pursue potential customers or products in order to generate additional sales and ensure growth.
- Keep records on sales: Keep records of the activities of the sales of products and services, tracking which products and services were sold when and maintaining customer records, in order to facilitate improvements in the sales department.
Optional knowledge and skills
Optional knowledge
This knowledge is sometimes, but not always, required for the role of ICT account manager. However, mastering this knowledge allows you to have more opportunities for career development.
- Outsourcing model: The outsourcing model consists of principles and fundamentals of service-oriented modelling for business and software systems that allow the design and specification of service-oriented business systems within a variety of architectural styles, such as enterprise architecture.
- Hybrid model: The hybrid model consists of principles and fundamentals of service-oriented modelling for business and software systems that allow the design and specification of service-oriented business systems within a variety of architectural styles, such as enterprise architecture.
- Open source model: The open source model consists of principles and fundamentals of service-oriented modelling for business and software systems that allow the design and specification of service-oriented business systems within a variety of architectural styles, such as enterprise architecture.
- Saas (service-oriented modelling): The SaaS model consists of principles and fundamentals of service-oriented modelling for business and software systems that allow the design and specification of service-oriented business systems within a variety of architectural styles, such as enterprise architecture.
Optional skills and competences
These skills and competences are sometimes, but not always, required for the role of ICT account manager. However, mastering these skills and competences allows you to have more opportunities for career development.
- Study sales levels of products: Collect and analyse sales levels of products and services in order to use this information for determining the quantities to be produced in the following batches, customer feedback, price trends, and the efficiency of sales methods.
- Ensure compliance with legal requirements: Guarantee compliance with established and applicable standards and legal requirements such as specifications, policies, standards or law for the goal that organisations aspire to achieve in their efforts.
- Deliver a sales pitch: Prepare and deliver an understandably constructed sales talk for a product or a service, identifying and using persuasive argumentation.
- Perform data mining: Explore large datasets to reveal patterns using statistics, database systems or artificial intelligence and present the information in a comprehensible way.
- Forecast account metrics: Make predictions on the movement of account measurements and data that give insight into an organisation’s financial state in order to aid analyses and evaluate potential risks.
- Adhere to organisational guidelines: Adhere to organisational or department-specific standards and guidelines. Understand the motives of the organisation and the common agreements and act accordingly.
- Coordinate technological activities: Give instructions to colleagues and other cooperating parties in order to reach the desired outcome of a technological project or achieve set goals within an organisation dealing with technology.
- Achieve sales targets: Reach set sales goals, measured in revenue or sold units. Reach the target within a specific timeframe, prioritise sold products and services accordingly and plan in advance.
- Maintain customer records: Keep and store structured data and records about customers in accordance with customer data protection and privacy regulations.
- Set sales goals: Set sales goals and objectives to be reached by a sales team within a period of time such as the target amount of sales made and new customers found.
- Build business relationships: Establish a positive, long-term relationship between organisations and interested third parties such as suppliers, distributors, shareholders and other stakeholders in order to inform them of the organisation and its objectives.
- Identify ict user needs: Determine the needs and requirements of ICT users of a specific system by applying analytical methods, such as target group analysis.
- Implement strategic planning: Take action on the goals and procedures defined at a strategic level in order to mobilise resources and pursue the established strategies.
- Perform market research: Gather, assess and represent data about target market and customers in order to facilitate strategic development and feasibility studies. Identify market trends.
ISCO group and title
2434 – Information and communications technology sales professionals
References
- ICT account manager – ESCO