Very average pay (SERIOUSLY, I know they painted a beautiful picture, but keep reading the full review).
In the interview, when they show you "AVERAGE PAY" for a marketing rep, you MUST KNOW THIS: There are a handful of reps who make about millions/year and this throws off the numbers CONSIDERABLY.
I was told that one of these "super reps" lives in the same neighborhood as Prince.
You need to have 3 things to make that "average" number. EVEN IF YOU ARE AN "ABOVE AVERAGE" rep.
I earned Chairman's Council many years in a row and made less than HALF of the AVERAGE pay that they tout in the interviews.
You need THREE things to make the real money. 1) Activity 2) Talent 3) Luck... yes, you need to be in a territory that has the right kinds of large accounts that will end up paying the large commissions. Some have it, most don't.
Think that's garbage or sour grapes? If I hadn't lived it, I would think that was garbage too. We make our own luck in sales, right? Yes.... but you can't make petroleum accounts appear where there are not any within a territory. You can't make million dollar premium machine shops appear where there are not any. There ARE differences from territory to territory.
You need an above average territory for above average pay... it was a tough lesson for me to learn, even after earning multiple Chairman's Councils in a row. I made a fraction of the "average pay" for a rep.
Also, know that the underwriting appetite changes constantly. You might be hot on a type of business and able to write it consistently for a few months, before underwriting panics and decides they no longer want that type of business (they will say they DO want it, just at a MUCH, MUCH higher price...). But in reality, they don't want it and they quote an unrealistic price and unrealistic RENEWAL pricing for your existing accounts, just to get them off the books.
They say everything is a cycle. I tripled the size of my territory in 5 years. Then in the course of just over a year, underwriting walked away from 65% of all of that business that I had written, cutting my income by tens of thousands of dollars. I don't want to ride that "cycle." It would be fine if I earned that "average" money they talk about, but I didn't.
If you jump in and expect to get rich, you should work to take over a territory of a guy who is retiring and is rich already. If they say there aren't any of those territories open... well, of course there aren't. The open territory they are offering is open because it wasn't that desirable. The rich guys stay in their territory to keep making money!
