Hybrid Area Manager - Kolkata presso CENGAGE

Job Title: Sales Manager/Area Sales Manager – East India

Business Unit: Gale Sales India

Department: Gale Sales

Reporting to: Sales Head – Gale India

Line Reports: None

Based: Kolkata, India

Date last reviewed: February 2025

Purpose:

To achieve financial targets through developing and maintaining sales of Gale electronic, print and microform products to academic, public and school libraries in – East India region (West Bengal, Odisha, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Sikkim, Tripura, Nagaland, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Manipur, Assam, Arunachal Pradesh) as well as other strategic accounts.

Key Accountabilities:

Develop sales strategies and plan of the entire activities to develop maximum business for the company.

Plan and attend customer meetings both on site and via Zoom, prioritise opportunities and efficiently follow through all stages of the sales cycle to conclusion.

Improve sales by identifying customers' needs, matching Gale products to those needs, preparing and delivering sales presentations, writing proposals, and closing sales

Maximise sales through extensive faculty research and regular meetings with academics

Represent Gale at key industry events such as conferences, exhibitions and trade shows

Cultivate and maintain extensive product knowledge of a large and growing product list

Provide detailed sales reports and maintain customer and sales information via CRM systems

Uncover opportunities and solicit information from public, school and academic librarians, subject librarians, academic instructing staff and researchers through effective questioning and listening

Required to submit a weekly report to the Reporting Manager, summarizing the key highlights of the week.

Work closely with the rest of the sales team and with other departments such as marketing, customer services, customer care, sales support and product development by offering market feedback and intelligence

Key Relationships:

Internal:

Peers in the sales team, line manager and leadership as well as business unit relationships with product development and marketing

External:

Librarians and academics, University leadership, faculty leadership, agents and government bodies like consortia

Travel Requirements:

This role requires frequent travel to customers within the territory.

Essential Role Requirements:

Skills/knowledge

Candidate with minimum 5-8 years of experience.

Proficiency in English, Hindi and other regional languages.

A customer-focused attitude with a consultative approach to selling

Excellent interpersonal skills with the ability to manage relationships between key stakeholders such as academics and librarians

The ability to communicate with all levels of personnel both internally and externally

Flexibility to adapt sales approach to suit the customer and product

Strong organisational skills with an enthusiastic and self-motivated approach

Excellent presentation skills

Ability to absorb and maintain extensive product knowledge

Proficient MS Office skills

Qualifications:

Educated to degree level

Full driving license

Desirable Role Requirements:

Experience/Achievements:

Field sales experience – consistently hitting plan

Field sales experience within the library market

Experience of and confidence in negotiating large contracts on a national basis

Skills/knowledge:

Good understanding of the world of academia with knowledge of or qualification in History

Compensation

At Cengage Group, we take great pride in our commitment to providing a comprehensive and rewarding Total Rewards package designed to support and empower our employees. Click here to learn more about our Total Rewards Philosophy.

The full base pay range has been provided for this position. Individual base pay will vary based on work schedule, qualifications, experience, internal equity, and geographic location.  Sales roles often incorporate a significant incentive compensation program beyond this base pay range.