Business Development Manager

Job Description:

Rakuten International is a division of Rakuten Group, Inc., a Japanese global technology leader in services that empower individuals, communities, businesses and society. Headquartered in San Mateo, California with more than 4,000 employees worldwide, the Rakuten International business portfolio includes market leaders in e-commerce, digital marketing, advertising, communications and entertainment. We create products and services that provide exceptional value by aligning members and the businesses that want to engage them in a shared community.

Rakuten Advertising provides advertising technology and consumer insights to the world's leading brands and retailers. Working with agencies and brands around the world, Rakuten Advertising unites technology, client strategy and consumer insights to deliver advertising experiences that drive increased brand awareness and marketing performance. With access to Rakuten's diverse media properties and audiences, combined with an award-winning performance network and proprietary consumer research, Rakuten Advertising creates the right conditions to reach new customers and sustain long-lasting loyalty.

Job Summary:
 

The Business Development Manager will be part of Rakuten Advertising's Retail Sales team. Business Development Managers are accountable for exceeding assigned quotas by securing and maintaining relationships with key decision-makers at the world's largest brands.

As an experienced seller, the Business Development Manager will focus on new customer acquisition for Rakuten Advertising's affiliate marketing channel in the primary Retail verticals, which includes Mass Merchants, Apparel & Footwear, Health & Beauty, Luxury, Home Goods, Consumer Electronics, Auto Parts, and Sports/Outdoors. You will develop new relationships with C-suite, VP, and Director level contacts in the Marketing, Acquisition, and Digital teams of the top brands in industry and you will present solutions through consultative selling that enable our clients to acquire new customers and achieve their acquisition and growth goals.

In this role, you will collaborate with prospective clients to understand their needs, develop tailored solutions, and leverage state-of-the-art sales strategies to maximize impact. 

Key Responsibilities:

• Act as a specialist in the Retail vertical, focused on affiliate channel sales.
• Coordinate externally with clients and partners, ensuring that prospect needs are met and maintain strong, professional relationships to drive client satisfaction and long-term partnerships. 
• Resolve complex issues during the sales process with a focus on maintaining strong relationships and achieving mutually beneficial outcomes for both prospective clients and the organization.
• Represent Rakuten Advertising at trade shows, seminars and industry events.
• Work closely with internal team members during the RFP process to define a sale strategy that meets client and Rakuten Advertising needs.
• Understand our competitive landscape to effectively sell against competitors and
  position Rakuten Advertising as the market leader.
• Use the MEDICC sales methodology to qualify prospective client deals across a full-cycle sales pipeline.
• Accurately forecasts pipeline using Salesforce and Gong while also utilizing Gong to improve all facets of the sales process.
• Utilize in place strategic sales systems to track pipeline performance and progress, ensuring that sales targets and KPIs are met while maintaining high-quality customer service.
• Consult on complex sales strategies and solutions, collaborating with stakeholders across acquisition to provide guidance on best practices and develop customized approaches for prospective clients.
• Some business travel required. 

Qualifications:

To perform this job successfully, an individual must be able to perform each essential duty satisfactorily. The requirements listed below are representative of the knowledge, skill, and/or ability required. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.

• 5-10 years of successful sales experience in a consultative sales environment.
• Experience selling SaaS B2B solutions with a preference to affiliate marketing.
• Experience selling to senior level marketing contacts at IR ranked retail brands required.
• Experience understanding complexities of SaaS contracts as it relates to the sales process is required.
• Proven record of generating new logo revenue and exceeding sales quota.
• Experience using Gong preferred.
• Experience working within MEDICC sales qualification methodology preferred.
• Understanding of sales processes with sales training courses completed preferred. Excellent presentation skills, ability to work across many internal teams.

Minimum Requirements:

• 5 - 10 years of successful sales experience in a consultative sales environment.
• Bachelor's Degree Required

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Five Principles for Success
Our worldwide practices describe specific behaviors that make Rakuten unique and united across the world. We expect Rakuten employees to model these 5 Shugi Principles of Success.

Always improve, Always Advance - Only be satisfied with complete success - Kaizen
Passionately Professional - Take an uncompromising approach to your work and be determined to be the best
Hypothesize - Practice - Validate – Shikumika - Use the Rakuten Cycle to succeed in unknown territory
Maximize Customer Satisfaction - The greatest satisfaction for our teams is seeing their customers smile
Speed Speed Speed - Always be conscious of time - take charge, set clear goals, and engage your team

Rakuten provides equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type. Rakuten considers applicants for employment without regard to race, color, religion, age, sex, national origin, disability status, genetic information, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity or expression, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state, provincial or local laws.

At the time of posting, Rakuten expects the base compensation for this role to be within the range shown below. Individual compensation will vary based on job-related factors, including the skills, qualifications, and experience of the successful candidate as well as business need and geographic location. The successful applicant for this role will be eligible for discretionary bonus, health, vision, dental insurance, 401k matching, PTO, Volunteer Time Off (VTO), and other employee benefits as the company implements.