Want to be an account manager? We explore account management job descriptions, responsibilities, and the top skills you need to impress hiring teams now:
Is an account management job description the best way to gauge whether an account manager role is right for you?
What does an account manager even do?
Job descriptions usually provide a thorough rundown of the tasks, daily duties, and responsibilities of the position. But companies don’t always supply a list of the top skills, abilities, or traits they’d like their ideal candidates to possess.
So we’re going to help fill in the gaps.
You’ll learn what hiring teams are looking for in account managers, what it takes to thrive in this position, and how to show companies what you bring to the table to land your dream gig.
Account Management Job Description: The Basics
Account managers act as liaisons between the agency they work for and the clients they serve.
For clients, account managers are their main point of contact. Any questions, concerns, ideas, important details, etc., get routed directly to the account manager for assistance and action.
Account managers then report back to their team to see how they can best serve their clients and provide value.
Because account managers work with both clients and their coworkers, they tend to wear many hats and juggle different types of responsibilities.
When it comes to clients, you’ll need to act as the “face” of your company. You’ll be representing your company’s brand as the main point of contact, so you’ll need stellar customer service skills.
In this customer-facing role, account managers must build rapport with clients, keep them happy, and ensure their needs are met.
Your clients’ goals will become your goals, which means helping them reach targets will also be one of your main focuses. As an account manager, when your clients succeed, so do you.
When it comes to your company, you’ll need to manage team members effectively to ensure they’re doing everything possible to meet your clients’ expectations.
You may need to stay on top of interns, coworkers, team leaders, or external freelancers to make sure work gets done on time and projects move along as planned.
You’ll also be responsible for unpacking campaign analytics and creating reports to show clients and your team how everything is performing.
Don’t be surprised if you also need to help cross-sell or up-sell products when it makes sense to help your clients and company both.
So, as you can see, account managers need a mix of technical, sales, and social skills, which is excellent news if you have the talent and love interacting with people.
Utilizing all these skills keeps the job interesting and makes each day unique, especially if you get the chance to work with various types of clients.
Now that you have a better idea of what account managers do, let’s explore their day-to-day responsibilities and what companies expect of someone in this position.
Account Manager Job Responsibilities
While no two account manager roles are the same, the job responsibilities, work-related tasks, and daily duties are often pretty cut and dry.
Here are the most common account manager job responsibilities you’re likely to see in a job posting:
- Manage existing clients
- Dive deep into clients’ existing processes and struggles
- Set up, onboard, and train new clients (on your process, software, etc.)
- Understand the client’s industry inside and out to better problem-solve
- Create quarterly plans and strategies to reach targets each month
- Build repeatable processes to streamline efforts
- Facilitate design approval and make changes where necessary
- Coordinate meetings, schedules, and monthly deadlines
- Manage campaigns from start to finish
- Analyze results of campaigns
- Create reports that summarize everything that happened
- Oversee internal and external team members to meet deadlines and stay on schedule
- Regularly communicate with clients to keep them in the loop
- Help customers get more value from your services (up-sell and cross-sell)
- Meet with clients often to discuss goals, progress, hiccups, and more
Account managers must accomplish all these tasks not just for one client, but for each client they’re responsible for. Some manage a handful of clients, others over 10 at a time.
That’s why it takes someone with the right skill set to excel in this role.
Top 5 Skills Every Account Manager Should Have
Here’s a snapshot of the most sought-after skills account managers should have to do well in this role:
- People skills. Customer service and interpersonal skills play a huge role in account management. You must have active listening skills, empathy, and emotional intelligence to meet client demands and work well with your team.
- Stellar communication. To thrive as an account manager, you need to be a pro at verbal, written, and nonverbal communication. You’ll be communicating with your clients and your team multiple times throughout the day, every day.
- Organization. You’ll be handling multiple clients (anywhere from 2-3 “big” fish to 5-10+ smaller ones, depending on where you work), so your organizational skills must be top-notch.
You’ll need to ensure nothing slips through the cracks and everything stays on track. This often requires high-level analytical skills, a keen eye, and sharp attention to detail.
- Problem-solving. You must understand your clients’ goals and quickly come up with solutions to solve them and help them through issues. You may also need to uncover roadblocks in your team’s processes and strategize creative workarounds to streamline success.
- Time management. You’ll need excellent time management skills to create project milestone dates, meet deadlines, and manage schedules for your team. You’ll also be responsible for following up with monthly reports and recaps to ensure your team’s time is being well-spent.
So how many of these skills do you possess?
Having most (if not all) of them means you should be a shoo-in for any account manager roles you apply for. Even better? You may actually enjoy working in this position and feel like it’s tailor-made for your strengths and traits.
Make sure to highlight these skills on your resume and cover letter.
If you’re less than confident about your abilities in these five key areas, take the time now to create a game plan for improvement. You can easily level up any of these skills to become a candidate companies will fight over.
So Where Can You Find the Best Account Manager Roles?
After reading our rundown of a typical account management job description, and the responsibilities and skills you’ll need in this role, you should have a better idea of whether you want to pursue this career path.
If you’re still on the fence, start browsing open account manager positions to see if any spark your interest.
Many account managers like utilizing their unique skill set to help their organizations keep clients happy. They also dig the fact that no two days are ever the same.
So if you check some or most of the boxes outlined in this post, you may just find an account manager role to be quite rewarding and fulfilling.
Psst! We have the best account management job listings in Canada (not to brag 😎). Go see for yourself now!