Mid Market Sales Executive - Products Vertical

Overview

You sell NetSuite's cloud ERP system to mid-market companies ($10M-$500M revenue) in the Products vertical - think manufacturers, distributors, wholesalers, and product-based businesses in the Western US. You own the full sales cycle from first call through contract signature, typically talking to CFOs, Controllers, VPs of Operations, and IT Directors who are trying to replace QuickBooks, Sage, or legacy on-prem systems.

Role Snapshot

Company Context

Stage: Public (Oracle acquired NetSuite in 2016 for $9.3B)

Size: 16,437 employees globally

Growth: NetSuite is Oracle's cloud ERP product - mature, stable, enterprise-backed. Not a startup hustle, but steady growth with established processes.

Market Position: Market leader in cloud ERP for mid-market. Competing against Sage Intacct, Acumatica, SAP Business One, and legacy on-prem systems.

GTM Reality

Pipeline Sources:

• 40% Inbound - MQLs from Oracle/NetSuite marketing (webinars, content downloads, search). Quality varies - some are tire-kickers, some are actively looking to replace their system.
• 50% Outbound - You prospect into your territory. List building, cold calling, LinkedIn outreach to CFOs and Controllers at companies in your vertical.
• 10% Referrals/Partners - Some deals come through Oracle's partner network or existing customer referrals.

SDR/AE Structure: No dedicated SDR support at this level. You qualify your own inbound leads and do your own prospecting. There's a BDR team that feeds some leads, but you can't rely on them to fill your pipe.

SE Support: You get a dedicated Sales Engineer (called Solutions Consultants at NetSuite) who joins for demos, scoping calls, and technical Q&A. They handle product deep-dives while you manage the business conversation and deal strategy.

Competitive Landscape

Main Competitors:

• Sage Intacct (most common head-to-head for mid-market)
• Acumatica (strong in distribution/manufacturing)
• SAP Business One / SAP Business ByDesign
• Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central
• Staying with QuickBooks or legacy systems (status quo is your biggest competitor)

How They Differentiate: NetSuite is a true unified suite - financials, inventory, order management, CRM, ecommerce all in one system. Oracle backing means it won't go away. Strong in products vertical with industry-specific features.

Common Objections:

• "Too expensive compared to QuickBooks/Sage"
• "Implementation seems long and risky"
• "We don't need all those modules"
• "Can we just add bolt-ons to our current system?"
• "Oracle feels like overkill for our size"

Win Themes: Single source of truth (vs cobbled-together systems), real-time visibility, scales with growth, industry-specific functionality, strong partner ecosystem for implementation.

What You'll Actually Do

Time Breakdown

Prospecting (25%) | Active Deals (45%) | Demos/Discovery (20%) | Internal (10%)

Key Activities

• Prospecting your territory: You spend mornings building lists of Products companies in your region, cold calling CFOs and Controllers, sending LinkedIn messages, and following up on old leads. You're trying to find companies outgrowing their current system or dealing with pain around inventory, multi-location, or lack of real-time data.

• Running discovery calls: You qualify opportunities - understanding their current tech stack, pain points, budget authority, timeline. You're figuring out if they're a real opportunity or just exploring. Most discovery calls reveal they're 6-12 months out from a decision.

• Coordinating demos: You bring in your SE to run product demos. You handle the business conversation while they drive the screen. You're customizing each demo to show how NetSuite solves their specific problems. Demos are 60-90 minutes and you'll do 2-3 per deal.

• Navigating procurement: Mid-market deals involve multiple stakeholders. You're chasing down the CFO, getting buy-in from the Controller who'll use it daily, looping in IT, sometimes presenting to the CEO. Deals stall in legal, slip quarters, get postponed because they want to close fiscal year first.

• Building business cases: You spend time creating ROI models showing cost savings and efficiency gains. You're justifying a $150K investment to a CFO who's skeptical about cloud migration.

• Internal coordination: Weekly forecast calls with your manager, deal reviews, partnering with the implementation team on scoping, coordinating with the partner who might do the implementation.

The Honest Reality

What's Hard

• Long, complex sales cycles: Deals take 6-8 months on average. You're managing 15-20 active opportunities at various stages. Most will slip quarters. You spend a lot of time waiting on prospects to get internal alignment or budget approval.

• Implementation concerns kill deals: Prospects are scared of ripping out their current system. Implementation can take 4-6 months and cost as much as the software. You lose deals to "stay with what we have" because the risk feels too high.

• You're competing on price against cheaper options: QuickBooks is $2K/year. Sage Intacct is often $40K. NetSuite is $50K-$300K. You have to sell the value of a unified platform vs the sticker shock.

• Quota pressure in a mature product: Oracle is a public company. There are aggressive targets. You're expected to be at 100%+ of quota. Misses are scrutinized. The comp plan can be complicated.

What Success Looks Like

• You close 8-12 deals per year in the $50K-$300K range
• You maintain a pipeline of 3-4x your quarterly quota
• You hit 90-100%+ of your annual number ($1.2M-$1.5M)
• You build a territory reputation and get referrals from happy customers

Who You're Selling To

Primary Buyers:

• CFOs and Controllers at $10M-$500M revenue companies
• VPs of Operations / Supply Chain in manufacturing and distribution
• IT Directors (influencers on technical fit and implementation)

What They Care About:

• Real-time financial visibility: They're running their business on spreadsheets and month-end closes take 2 weeks
• Inventory accuracy: They have stock-outs or overstock because they can't see inventory across locations
• System integration headaches: They have QuickBooks + Shopify + a WMS + spreadsheets all held together with duct tape
• Scalability: They're growing (new locations, new channels, international expansion) and their current system won't scale
• Risk mitigation: They need to prove ROI and derisk the implementation

Requirements

• 3-5 years of B2B software sales experience, ideally in ERP, financial software, or enterprise SaaS
• Experience selling to finance leaders (CFOs, Controllers) and navigating multi-stakeholder enterprise deals
• Comfortable with 6+ month sales cycles and managing complex deal processes
• Understanding of the Products vertical (manufacturing, distribution, wholesale) and their operational challenges
• Track record of hitting quota in a mid-market or enterprise sales role
• Ability to build pipeline through both inbound lead management and outbound prospecting
• Oracle/NetSuite experience helpful but not required - vertical expertise matters more