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Business Development Representative Must-Have Resume Skills and Keywords

Are you interested in improving your job outlook and increasing your salary? How can you demonstrate that you are the most qualified candidate for a Business Development Representative position? Of course continuing to gain experience working as a Business Development Representative may be your best qualification, but there are other ways you can also develop your skills, like continuing education or volunteer opportunities. More immediately, however, you can be ready for your next opportunity or promotion by educating yourself about the duties, responsibilities, and required skills of a Business Development Representative and making sure your resume reflects your experience properly.

In order to do so, you’ll want to know that employers commonly feature Business Developement and Communication Skills as the most prominent terms in their Business Development Representative job descriptions, yet those who have held the position of Business Development Representative and list it on their resume indicate Customer Service and CRM more predominantly. Do you know what you would list?

We designed the ZipRecruiter Career Keyword Mapper to help you solve this problem and hopefully improve your resume. Using machine learning tools paired with industry research, our Marketplace Research Team helped analyze millions of job postings and resumes to identify the most important keywords related to Business Development Representative jobs. Our goal is to help you discover opportunities to improve your resume or to help you understand what skills and qualifications you need to be a Business Development Representative or to advance your career into beyond this role.

Top Skills Mentioned in Job Descriptions

Top
10
Job Skills
Employers require a broad range of skills and qualifications in their descriptions of Business Development Representative positions. The top three keywords make up 44.16% of the total set of top terms. Look to the Resume Checklist below to see how Business Developement, Communication Skills, and Collaboration shares stack up against the share from resumes. CRM, Customer Service and Innovation represent an additionally healthy share of the employer Business Development Representative job postings with their combined total of 30.87%. At 24.97%, Sales Experience, Lead Generation, Scheduling, and Relationship Management appear far less frequently, but are still a significant portion of the 10 top Business Development Representative skills and requirements according to employers.

Top Skills Mentioned in Resumes

Top
10
Job Skills
Job seeker resumes showcase a broad range of skills and qualifications in their descriptions of Business Development Representative positions. The top three keywords represent 40.47% of the total set of top resume listed keywords. Look to the Resume Checklist below to investigate how Customer Service, CRM, and MS Office match up to employer job descriptions. Collaboration, Scheduling, and Social Media represent a very decent share of skills found on resumes for Business Development Representative with 29.63% of the total. At 29.92%, Business Developement, Accountable, Communication Skills, and Technical appear far less frequently, but are still a significant portion of the 10 top Business Development Representative skills and qualifications found on resumes.

Most Important Skills Required to Be a Business Development Representative as Listed by Employers and Employees

Here is a simple table of the top 10 skills and qualifications as listed by employers in Business Development Representative job postings since January of 2018, followed by the top 10 skills and qualifications most commonly listed by people who held the title of Business Development Representative on their resumes.
Top Business Development Representative Skills
Skills Required by Employers Share
Business Developement 20.02%
Communication Skills 12.96%
Collaboration 11.18%
CRM 10.97%
Customer Service 10.05%
Innovation 9.85%
Sales Experience 6.80%
Lead Generation 6.52%
Scheduling 6.33%
Relationship Management 5.32%
Skills Listed by Employees Share
Customer Service 18.04%
CRM 11.24%
MS Office 11.19%
Collaboration 10.49%
Scheduling 9.87%
Social Media 9.27%
Business Developement 8.24%
Accountable 7.51%
Communication Skills 7.32%
Technical 6.85%

Business Development Representative Resume Checklist

Our Resume Keyword Checklist is based upon an analysis of the most commonly found terms within both job descriptions and resumes for Business Development Representative positions. Our algorithm helps isolate phrases and patterns to identify the most frequently recurring and reused keywords from each data source, while correcting for uncommon and outlier results. Various heuristic methodologies are then applied to ultimately create two top 20 lists of the most important and significant skills, certificates and requirements found within Business Development Representative job postings and resumes. We then merge the two lists together and use a combination of statistics and rules-based scenarios to create a list that is audited by the Marketplace Research team, and finally turned into the checklist you see below. Our hope is that knowing this information can help you make your best impression with your next potential employer.
Uncommon Keywords on Business Development Representative Resumes
Job Descriptions
Resumes
25%
50%
75%
100%
Innovation
Business Developement
Sales Experience
Employer job listings tend to list Innovation, Business Developement or Sales Experience as requirements in Business Development Representative job descriptions; however, candidates mention them far less frequently on their resumes. If you possess any or all of these experiences, including these keywords prominently on your resume when applying for a Business Development Representative position may help you stand out more to hiring managers.
Common Keywords on Business Development Representative Resumes
Job Descriptions
Resumes
25%
50%
75%
100%
Entrepreneurship
Communication Skills
Proactive
SaaS
Qualifying Leads
Digital
Collaboration
Inside Sales
Lead Generation
CRM
Relationship Management
Detail Oriented
Technical
Scheduling
Database
Customer Service
Both employer job listings and resumes from people who’ve held the position of Business Development Representative tend to always include skills and requirements found in this list. Whether you’ve only got Entrepreneurship, Communication Skills, Proactive, SaaS, Qualifying Leads, Digital, Collaboration, Inside Sales, Lead Generation, CRM, Relationship Management, Detail Oriented, Technical, Scheduling, Database or Customer Service in your background and experience, make sure to highlight the term prominently on your resume. As a candidate you’ll be competing with many others who are bound to have as many as you (or more!) of these common resume keywords highlighted in their application for a job as a Business Development Representative.
Uncommon Keywords on Business Development Representative Job Descriptions
Job Descriptions
Resumes
25%
50%
75%
100%
Social Media
MS Office
Facilitation
Account Management
Analysis
Project Management
Accountable
Employer job listings infrequently list Social Media, MS Office, Facilitation, Account Management, Analysis, Project Management or Accountable as important skills or qualifications in Business Development Representative job descriptions. Nevertheless, candidates mention them much more commonly in their resumes. If you possess any or all of these experiences, including these keywords prominently on your resume when applying for a Business Development Representative position may go unnoticed or even discounted by hiring managers.

FAQs about Business Development Representative Skills and Resume Keywords

What are the most important Business Development Representative job skills to have on my resume?

The most common important skills required by employers are Entrepreneurship, Communication Skills, Proactive, SaaS, Qualifying Leads, Digital and Collaboration. These skills and requirements are just as likely to be mentioned by employers as well as on resumes of people that held a position as a Business Development Representative, suggesting that having these keywords on a resume are important for success as a Business Development Representative. Additionally, employer Business Development Representative job descriptions list Innovation as a desirable experience, even though Innovation appears 2.79 times less on resumes, suggesting that it's worth considering including this skill if you possess the experience.

What are the least important Business Development Representative job skills to have on my resume?

Although you'd probably love to load up your resume with every possible keyword you can, employers tend to look for the things they specify in the job description. Our analysis suggests that highlighting too prominently terms like Social Media, MS Office, Facilitation, Account Management, Analysis, Project Management and Accountable may be something to reconsider. These 7 terms appear 2.23, 2.34, 2.37, 2.73, 4.21, 4.33 and 4.57 times less frequently, respectively, than in job descriptions for a Business Development Representative position. This implies that highlighting any of these keywords on your resume may not be a great way to get noticed by a potential employer.

How do I make sure my resume has all of the right keywords for a Business Development Representative position?

Unless your resume has a good density of the following skills and experience listed, you may not be considered for the role of Business Development Representative. Make sure to include a strong showing for the following keywords on your resume:
  • Entrepreneurship
  • Communication Skills
  • Proactive
  • SaaS
  • Qualifying Leads
  • Digital
  • Collaboration
  • Inside Sales
  • Lead Generation
  • CRM
  • Relationship Management
  • Detail Oriented
  • Technical
  • Scheduling
  • Database
Additionally employers frequently list the following as desirable qualities in a Business Development Representative candidate, but they are far less common on most resumes:
  • Innovation
  • Business Developement
  • Sales Experience
Finally people who held the position of a Business Development Representative and list it on their resume are adding these terms that are less likely to be noticed by employers. You may want to consider downplaying these terms on your Business Development Representative application:
  • Social Media
  • MS Office
  • Facilitation
  • Account Management
  • Analysis
  • Project Management
  • Accountable

Before applying for a Business Development Representative job

At ZipRecruiter, we understand better than anyone the importance of using the right keywords to describe your experience — it’s crucial to attracting the right employers! We built our business on the ability to effectively match job seekers with employers using AI-technology that understands your resume and how likely you are to be noticed by a potential future employer. Having a ZipRecruiter profile that showcases your most relevant skills and abilities can help you get recruited into a new role as a Business Development Representative. Get started on your journey with a new ZipRecruiter Profile today!