SMB Account Executives "SMB AEs" act as Account Executives and the face of GitLab for SMB prospects and customers. They are the primary point of contact for companies that employ between 1 to 99 employees. These GitLab team members are responsible for working new business in their territory as well as handling the customer journey for new and existing customers. SMB Account Executives will assist prospects through their evaluation and buying process and will be the customer’s point of contact for any renewal and expansion discussions

Responsibilities

The SMB Account Executive job family includes four distinct positions:

• SMB First Order Account Executive
• SMB Pooled Account Executive
• SMB Expansion Account Executive
• SMB Named Account Executive

All positions will include the following responsibilities:

• Experience managing an inbound request queue and assisting prospects and customers with online chat, email, and phone correspondence.
• Familiarity with the needs of software development and IT operations teams.
• Basic understanding of application lifecycle management including the technology commonly used in application lifecycle management.
• Basic understanding of DevOps practices, including the cultural shift it represents and the benefits to building and shipping software upon adopting those practices.
• Experience in a role that puts customer needs above all else.
• Product demo experience.
• Working knowledge of software development methodologies such as Waterfall, Agile, and Conversational Development.
• Comfortable with frequent client phone calls to explain hard-to-understand concepts and deployment options.

Specific responsibilities per role are outlined below

SMB First Order Account Executive

As an SMB First Order Account Executive, you will be one of the first interactions a future customer has with GitLab. Your ability to successfully help them evaluate our product for their need and clearly define their buying process is critical to ensuring a good first experience with GitLab, which typically leads to higher customer retention and continued growth.

SMB Pooled Account Executive

As an SMB Pooled Account Executive, you will work with customers renewing their subscription with GitLab to ensure they have a successful renewal as well as helping them evaluate any additional product evaluations that they need. Responsibilities include engaging with customers prior to their renewal, evaluating their current utilization of GitLab and making recommendations to ensure a successful renewal and continued adoption of GitLab based on their needs. Acquiring new customers can cost up to five times more than retaining existing customers, and your ability to help our customers renew their subscription and get the support they need will be critical to our long term success.

SMB Expansion Account Executive

As an SMB Expansion Account Executive, you will work with customers immediately following their first purchase through their first renewal. Your ability to support them to successfully implement their recent purchase, helping them get answers to product related questions as well as understand their immediate and longer term company goals is critical to ensuring their experience with GitLab is successful and will lead to a successful renewal and/or expanded use of GitLab products and services.

SMB Named Account Executive

As an SMB Named Account Executive you will be responsible for managing customers who have previously renewed with GitLab and expect to continue growing their adoption of our products and services to meet their business needs. You will need to be able to build out intricate customer success plans and have a good understanding of our customers business needs and what GitLab products can support them at each stage of their business lifecycle. Your ability to make strategic recommendations and help them understand how to continue growing by using GitLab is critical to ensuring their continued success as an organization.

Requirements

• Excellent spoken and written English
• You are obsessed with making customers happy. You know that the slightest trouble in getting started with a product can ruin customer happiness.
• Affinity with software and the software development process
• Passionate about technology and learning more about GitLab
• Demonstrated progressive experience in sales, marketing, or customer service
• Experience with CRM and email automation software is highly preferred
• An understanding of B2B software, Open Source software, and the developer product space is preferred
• Be ready to learn how to use GitLab and Git
• You share our values, and work in accordance with those values
• Ability to use GitLab

Hiring Process

Avoid the confidence gap; you do not have to match all the listed requirements exactly to apply. Our hiring process is described in more detail in our hiring handbook.

Candidates for this position can expect the hiring process to follow the order below. Please keep in mind that candidates can be declined from the position at any stage of the process. To learn more about someone who may be conducting the interview, find their job title on our team page.

• Selected candidates will be invited to the following:
  1. A phone or video conference screen with the recruiter. This takes 30 minutes and helps our recruiting team align your interests and qualifications with the right opening on the sales team.
  2. A video conversation with a potential colleague. This takes 45 minutes and helps us understand your sales experience, style, and skills.
  3. A video conversation with the hiring manager. This takes 30 minutes and helps the sales manager understand what you want to do next in your career and how that might intersect with GitLab and the Commercial sales team.
  4. A video conversation reviewing your professional experience chronologically. This takes from 45 min to an hour and allows your hiring manager to understand the similarities and differences of past roles you’ve had to the role we are considering for you
  5. A mock GitLab customer call. The mock call itself is limited to 15 minutes. You are given a few minutes to ask any final questions before going into the mock call. After the mock call, we use the remainder of the half hour to understand feedback, how it felt to sell GitLab, and ask any questions we have remaining about your candidacy.

Additional details about our process can be found on our hiring page.