Top 12 Advertising Sales Manager Skills to Put on Your Resume

In advertising, the resume that wins often reads like a sharp sales pitch. Clear proof of strategic thinking, crisp analytics, and the kind of people skills that open doors and keep them open. Highlight the mix. Show impact. Make it easy to see how you grow revenue and deepen relationships.

Advertising Sales Manager Skills

1. Salesforce
2. Google Analytics
3. CRM Software
4. Market Analysis
5. SEO/SEM
6. AdWords
7. Social Media Platforms
8. Negotiation
9. Presentation
10. Lead Generation
11. Excel
12. Data Visualization

1. Salesforce

Salesforce is a cloud CRM that centralizes accounts, contacts, opportunities, pipelines, and campaign performance so sales leaders can forecast accurately, coordinate teams, and keep client data tidy and actionable.

Why It's Important

It anchors the revenue engine: faster follow-ups, cleaner data, automated workflows, and reporting that shows where to push, where to pause, and where the next upsell lives.

How to Improve Salesforce Skills

1. Build job-ready dashboards: Surface win rate, average deal size, velocity, pipeline coverage, and campaign ROI. Add filters by industry and rep for quick coaching.
2. Automate with Flow: Replace manual handoffs with Flows for lead routing, SLAs, renewal reminders, and stage-based tasks. Process Builder is being phased out—use Flow first.
3. Tighten data model: Add custom fields/objects for ad spend, impressions, CPM, CTR, flight dates, and make picklists enforce standards.
4. Enable CRM Analytics: Use Salesforce CRM Analytics (formerly Tableau CRM) for trend analysis, cohort views, and predictive signals like churn risk and upsell propensity.
5. Integrate the stack: Connect email, calendar, billing, support, and ad platforms so campaign outcomes map to revenue and renewals.
6. Enforce data hygiene: Validation rules, duplicates prevention, required fields at stage changes, and scheduled cleanup.
7. Drive adoption: Short, role-based training, quick reference guides, and pipeline review rituals that use the same dashboards you expect reps to maintain.

How to Display Salesforce Skills on Your Resume

2. Google Analytics

Google Analytics tracks site and app behavior. Today that means GA4: event-based, privacy-aware, built for cross-device journeys and conversion analysis.

Why It's Important

It reveals which audiences convert, which creatives pull weight, and which placements waste money—fuel for smarter pitches and stronger renewals.

How to Improve Google Analytics Skills

1. Set GA4 up right: Define conversions, map events, enable Enhanced Measurement, and verify consent mode if relevant.
2. Harden attribution: Use data-driven attribution and compare with last click for budgeting confidence.
3. Segment deep: Build audiences by source, behavior, and intent; analyze new vs. returning and high-value cohorts.
4. UTM discipline: Standardize source/medium/campaign naming so reports don’t splinter.
5. Explorations: Funnel, pathing, and segment overlap to spot drop-offs and friction.
6. Conversion alignment: Mirror sales goals—qualified lead, booked demo, proposal request—so media ladders to revenue.
7. Regular audits: Check tracking integrity after site updates; document your event schema.

How to Display Google Analytics Skills on Your Resume

3. CRM Software

CRM software stores customer data, logs interactions, tracks deals, and orchestrates tasks, giving sales managers a single source of truth for forecasting and client strategy.

Why It's Important

With accurate records and automated follow-ups, teams move faster, personalize outreach, and convert more—without dropping a thread.

How to Improve CRM Software Skills

1. Tailor the workflow: Customize stages, fields, and page layouts to match ad sales motions—RFPs, flights, makegoods, renewals.
2. Integrate your tools: Connect email, calendars, quoting/billing, support, marketing automation, and ad performance to the CRM.
3. Automate the boring: Lead scoring and routing, SLA alerts, renewal playbooks, and stage-based tasks.
4. Build actionable reporting: Pipeline health, forecast accuracy, activity-to-outcome ratios, renewal risk flags.
5. Governance and quality: Clear data standards, required fields, deduping, and ownership rules.
6. Coach to adoption: Make CRM the place where work happens and wins get recognized.

How to Display CRM Software Skills on Your Resume

4. Market Analysis

Market analysis maps demand, competition, and audience behavior. It blends category trends, price pressures, and performance signals to reveal where to hunt and how to win.

Why It's Important

It sharpens positioning, uncovers viable segments, and guides packages clients actually buy—fewer guesses, more closed deals.

How to Improve Market Analysis Skills

1. Triangulate demand: Combine first-party CRM data with platform insights (e.g., Meta, LinkedIn, TikTok) and search trends.
2. Track competitors: Monitor pricing, inventory, messaging, and placements using market intel tools and client chatter.
3. Segment with intent: Slice by industry, size, lifecycle, and outcomes sought (awareness vs. leads vs. sales).
4. Interview customers: Short calls beat assumptions—understand buying triggers, timelines, and objections.
5. Test and learn: A/B packages, pricing, and creative; keep a wins/losses log to codify what sticks.
6. Scan for shifts: Privacy changes, economic swings, and new channels can flip performance quickly—review quarterly.

How to Display Market Analysis Skills on Your Resume

5. SEO/SEM

SEO earns visibility through content, structure, and speed. SEM buys it through paid search and related formats. Together they capture demand at the moment of intent.

Why It's Important

Higher rankings and precise bids pull in qualified traffic, elevate conversion rates, and make your ad products look invaluable.

How to Improve SEO/SEM Skills

1. Keyword strategy: Map keywords to intent—informational, commercial, transactional. Group tightly for relevance.
2. On-page excellence: Strong titles, headers, internal links, and concise copy that answers the query fast.
3. Speed and UX: Optimize Core Web Vitals, mobile performance, and accessibility. Fast pages convert.
4. Authority building: Earn credible links and mentions with useful content, partnerships, and PR.
5. Smart bidding: Use value-based bidding where possible; align to conversions that mirror revenue quality.
6. Ad quality: Structured ad groups, responsive search ads, compelling CTAs, precise sitelinks and assets.
7. Measurement discipline: Clean conversion tracking, consistent UTM tagging, and regular query pruning.
8. Local and vertical tweaks: For location-bound buys, keep listings accurate and content localized.

How to Display SEO/SEM Skills on Your Resume

6. AdWords

AdWords—now Google Ads—runs search, display, YouTube, and Performance Max campaigns to reach high-intent audiences and drive measurable outcomes.

Why It's Important

It’s targeted, fast, and accountable. Done well, it prints pipeline and proves ROI.

How to Improve AdWords Skills

1. Account structure: Tightly themed campaigns and ad groups. Separate brand vs. non-brand. Keep budgets aligned to goals.
2. Keywords and negatives: Balance match types; mine search terms; add negatives weekly to protect spend.
3. Creative that earns clicks: Test headlines, benefit-driven copy, and clear offers. Use assets: sitelinks, callouts, images.
4. Landing pages that convert: Message match, fast load, simple forms, social proof, and visible next steps.
5. Bidding strategy: Use data-driven bids tied to qualified conversions; shift between tCPA, tROAS, and value rules as needed.
6. Measurement: Set up conversions, enhanced conversions, and (if applicable) offline conversion imports from your CRM.
7. Audience layering: Add remarketing, in-market, and custom segments to refine delivery and bid more for value.
8. Performance Max with guardrails: Supply strong assets and audience signals; monitor search term insights and brand traffic cannibalization.

How to Display AdWords Skills on Your Resume

7. Social Media Platforms

Social platforms—LinkedIn, Meta, TikTok, X, YouTube, Snapchat, and more—host audiences at scale, with targeting that can be startlingly precise.

Why It's Important

They deliver reach, fast feedback loops, and creative canvases that persuade. Perfect for full-funnel storytelling and lead capture.

How to Improve Social Media Platforms Skills

1. Audience precision: Layer demographics, interests, intent, and first-party lists; exclude to reduce waste.
2. Creative variety: Short video, carousels, vertical-first formats, UGC-style ads—rotate often to beat fatigue.
3. Signal-rich setups: Verified pixels, server-side events where appropriate, and standardized naming conventions.
4. Cross-channel choreography: Align offers and creative across platforms; retarget viewers and engagers with sequenced messages.
5. Iterate relentlessly: Creative is the lever—test hooks, openers, captions, CTAs every week.
6. Community and replies: Real conversations create trust, which lowers CPA and lifts lifetime value.

How to Display Social Media Platforms Skills on Your Resume

8. Negotiation

Negotiation is the back-and-forth that lands the right pricing, placement, and terms—protecting margin while solving the client’s real problem.

Why It's Important

It builds durable relationships and profitable deals. The art is balancing value, risk, and timing—then closing cleanly.

How to Improve Negotiation Skills

1. Prep like a pro: Know outcomes, walk-away points, alternatives, and gives/gets before you enter the room.
2. Diagnose, don’t pitch: Ask layered questions to uncover constraints, decision criteria, and who signs.
3. Quantify value: Tie packages to metrics the buyer cares about—qualified leads, CAC, ROAS, revenue.
4. Trade smart: Concede non-essentials for essentials; expand the pie with flighting, add-ons, or terms.
5. Manage pace: Use silence. Summarize agreements. Document decisions. Keep momentum without pressure tactics.
6. Close clearly: Recap scope, KPIs, timelines, and next steps. Then book the kickoff.

How to Display Negotiation Skills on Your Resume

9. Presentation

Presentations turn offerings into outcomes. It’s your narrative, numbers, and visuals working in sync to make buying feel obvious.

Why It's Important

Clarity wins trust. Trust wins budget. A strong deck shortens sales cycles and increases average deal size.

How to Improve Presentation Skills

1. Start with the buyer’s world: Define their goal, friction, and stakes in slide one.
2. Tell a tight story: Problem → insight → plan → proof → payoff. Fewer slides, sharper points.
3. Make the data sing: One chart per idea. Clear labels. Show before/after impact, not just numbers.
4. Design for attention: Big fonts, generous white space, brand-consistent visuals. Kill clutter.
5. Proof beats promises: Case studies, benchmarks, and credible references.
6. Rehearse the pauses: Vary pace, invite questions, and handle objections with calm specifics.
7. End with action: Spell out next steps, owners, and dates.

How to Display Presentation Skills on Your Resume

10. Lead Generation

Lead generation attracts, captures, and qualifies interest—turning strangers into pipeline, and pipeline into revenue.

Why It's Important

No leads, no deals. Healthy, well-scored leads power forecasts and keep reps focused on buyers who are ready to move.

How to Improve Lead Generation Skills

1. Define ICP and intent: Nail ideal customer profile, buying roles, and signals that predict purchase.
2. Own the offer: Useful lead magnets—benchmarks, calculators, templates, webinars—beat vague “learn more.”
3. Tight funnels: Landing pages with message match, minimal fields, social proof, and lightning-fast load time.
4. Smart routing: Speed-to-lead SLAs, round-robin or territory assignment, and instant follow-ups.
5. Lead scoring: Blend fit (firmographics) and behavior (engagement) to prioritize sales-ready names.
6. Retarget and nurture: Drip sequences, remarketing, and progressive profiling to warm colder interest.
7. Partnership plays: Co-marketing, events, and sponsorships to tap adjacent audiences.
8. Measure ruthlessly: Track cost per qualified lead, SQL rate, pipeline per channel, and closed-won by source.

How to Display Lead Generation Skills on Your Resume

11. Excel

Excel turns raw numbers into decisions—forecasts, pacing, pricing models, and performance snapshots that guide the next move.

Why It's Important

It’s the quickest way to analyze revenue, spot trends, and brief stakeholders with clarity.

How to Improve Excel Skills

1. Modern functions: Master XLOOKUP, FILTER, UNIQUE, SUMIFS, INDEX/MATCH, and dynamic arrays to shrink complex models.
2. Pivot mastery: Build PivotTables with slicers and timelines for fast, interactive analysis.
3. Power Query: Import, clean, and merge data from CRM, ad platforms, and billing without manual copy/paste.
4. Power Pivot and DAX: Create data models and measures for robust, refreshable reporting.
5. Visual clarity: Use clean charts, conditional formatting, and sparklines to highlight what matters.
6. Automate: Record simple macros or use Office Scripts to eliminate repetitive steps.
7. Collaborate: Share workbooks, protect ranges, and track changes for smoother team workflows.

How to Display Excel Skills on Your Resume

12. Data Visualization

Data visualization turns complexity into clarity—charts and dashboards that reveal patterns, persuade buyers, and align teams.

Why It's Important

Good visuals accelerate decisions. They make the story of performance unmistakable.

How to Improve Data Visualization Skills

1. Know your audience: Executives want outcomes; operators want levers. Design accordingly.
2. Pick the right chart: Bars for comparisons, lines for trends, scatter for relationships, maps for location.
3. Remove noise: Minimal colors, clear labels, consistent scales. Let the insight breathe.
4. Use emphasis: Color and annotations to spotlight the takeaway—don’t make viewers hunt.
5. Add context: Benchmarks, goals, and prior periods keep numbers grounded.
6. Build in tools: Create interactive dashboards in Tableau, Power BI, or Looker Studio for exploratory analysis.
7. Iterate: Share drafts, gather feedback, and refine until the story lands quickly.

How to Display Data Visualization Skills on Your Resume