Inside Sales & Customer Account Manager

Pro-Active Engineering; Town of Sun Prairie (WI); On-site; USD 70,000 - 110,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health insurance

Dental insurance

Vision insurance

Life insurance

Short/Long-term disability

Retirement plan with company match

FSA

Paid vacation

Sick days

Holidays

Gain Sharing bonuses

Job summary

Pro-Active Engineering in Wisconsin is seeking a hands-on Inside Sales & Customer Account Manager to lead a team of five across inside sales, account management, and customer service while directly managing a portfolio of key customer accounts.

This player-coach role emphasizes developing people, improving sales and service performance, and maintaining strong relationships with customers, with accountability for team results, growth, retention, and satisfaction.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Business Administration or related field.
• 5+ years of progressive inside sales, account management, customer service, or business development.
• 2+ years leading or developing sales/account/customer service teams.
• Proven experience managing customer accounts and growing existing accounts.
• Experience managing pipelines, quotes, opportunities, and follow-up.
• Cross-functional collaboration with operations, engineering, quality, finance, or other teams.
• Strong ability to analyze sales activity, pipeline, retention, and performance metrics.
• Proficiency with Microsoft Office, ERP systems, and sales software.

Responsibilities

• Lead a team of five inside sales, account management and customer service employees.
• Drive sales activity, manage leads, opportunities, quotes, and accounts.
• Serve as primary contact for assigned customers; build long-term relationships.
• Manage customer inquiries, orders, issues, and follow-up.
• Improve processes for sales effectiveness and customer retention.

Skills

Inside sales experience

Account management

Customer service

Education

Bachelor's degree in Business Administration or related field

Tools

Microsoft Office Suite

ERP Systems

Sales Software

Job description

Summary

We are seeking a hands-on Inside Sales & Customer Account Manager to lead a team of five employees across inside sales, account management, and customer service while also directly managing a portfolio of key customer accounts.

This is a player-coach role designed for someone who enjoys developing people, improving sales and service performance, and maintaining strong customer relationships. The successful candidate will be accountable for both the performance of the team and the growth, retention, and satisfaction of their assigned accounts.

Essential Functions

1. Team Leadership & Management
   • Lead, coach, and develop a team of approximately five inside sales, account management, and customer service employees.
   • Establish clear expectations, priorities, and performance standards for each team member.
   • Conduct regular one-on-one meetings, team meetings, coaching sessions, and performance reviews.
   • Monitor individual and team performance against sales, service, retention, and activity goals.
   • Provide ongoing coaching on sales techniques, customer communication, account management, problem-solving, and follow-through.
   • Help employees prioritize workloads and ensure customers receive timely and professional service.
   • Identify training and development needs and create plans to improve individual and team performance.
   • Foster a culture of accountability, teamwork, responsiveness, and customer focus.
   • Participate in hiring, onboarding, training, and performance management as needed.
2. Sales & Business Development
   • Drive inside sales activity and ensure the team consistently follows up on leads, opportunities, quotes, and existing customer needs.
   • Establish and monitor sales goals, activity expectations, and key performance indicators.
   • Coach the team on identifying opportunities to grow existing accounts and develop new business.
   • Review sales pipelines and help move opportunities through the sales process.
   • Work collaboratively with company leadership and other departments to identify growth opportunities.
   • Help develop and implement processes that improve sales effectiveness, customer retention, and overall account penetration.
3. Direct Account Management
   • Serve as the primary point of contact for assigned customers.
   • Develop strong, long-term relationships with key contacts and decision-makers.
   • Understand each customer's business, needs, priorities, and opportunities.
   • Proactively identify opportunities to expand business within existing accounts.
   • Manage customer inquiries, quotes, orders, issues, and follow-up.
   • Conduct regular account reviews and maintain consistent communication with customers.
   • Coordinate internally to ensure commitments are met and customer expectations are managed appropriately.
   • Address customer concerns and elevate issues when necessary.
   • Maintain accurate account information, opportunities, activities, and follow-up within the company's CRM or other systems.
   • Take ownership of account retention, customer satisfaction, and revenue growth within the assigned portfolio.
4. Customer Service & Operational Oversight
   • Ensure the team provides responsive, accurate, and professional customer service.
   • Assist with resolving complex or escalated customer situations.
   • Monitor response times, open issues, and customer follow-up.
   • Improve processes and workflows between sales, account management, customer service, and other departments.
   • Identify recurring customer issues and work with leadership to address root causes.
   • Ensure consistent communication and a high level of professionalism throughout the customer experience.

Competencies

1. Leadership
2. Customer Focus
3. Building Relationships
4. Business Acumen
5. Problem Solving
6. Collaboration
7. Communication and Listening Proficiency
8. Attention to Detail & Organizational Skills
9. Continuous Improvement

Supervisory Responsibility

This position oversees various positions on the Customer Account Specialist team and is responsible for the employee life cycle and performance management of these employees.

Work Environment

This job operates in a professional office environment. This role routinely uses standard office equipment such as computers, phones, photocopiers, filing cabinets and fax machines. The performance of this job may require occasional exposure to the manufacturing area. The noise level in the work environment is usually low to moderate.

Physical Demands

While performing the duties of this job, the employee is regularly required to sit, use hands, reach with hands and arms, use fine hand motor skills/dexterity, use repetitive motions, and lift and/or move up to 15 lbs. Specific vision abilities required by this job include close vision, distance vision, color vision, peripheral vision, depth perception and ability to adjust focus.

Travel

Some travel to customers or events is expected for this position (approximately 20%).

Required Education and Experience

1. Bachelor's Degree in Business Administration or related field.
2. 5+ years of progressive experience in inside sales, account management, customer service, or business development.
3. 2+ years of experience leading, supervising, or developing a sales, account management, or customer service team.
4. Proven experience managing customer accounts and developing long-term customer relationships.
5. Demonstrated experience growing existing accounts, identifying sales opportunities, and supporting customer retention.
6. Experience managing sales pipelines, quotes, opportunities, and customer follow-up.
7. Experience working cross-functionally with operations, engineering, quality, finance, or other internal teams.
8. Ability to analyze sales activity, pipeline, customer retention, and performance metrics.
9. Proficient with Microsoft Office (Outlook, Excel, PowerPoint), ERP Systems, and Sales Software.

Preferred Education and Experience

1. Manufacturing and/or Electronics experience.
2. Experience working with Sales Force.
3. Mechanical aptitude.

Compensation and Benefits

Pro-Active Engineering offers a competitive wage based on experience and a generous benefits package to include health, dental, vision, life insurance, short and long-term disability, retirement plan with a company match, FSA, paid vacation, sick days, holidays and Gain Sharing bonuses.

• health
• dental
• vision
• life insurance
• short and long-term disability
• retirement plan with a company match
• FSA
• paid vacation
• sick days
• holidays
• Gain Sharing bonuses

Pro-Active Engineering is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, age, disability, or any other category protected by law.