6 Reasons Mad Men’s Peggy Olson Made Me Pick Tech Sales as a Career

Disclaimer: Other than some tips on choosing a career in tech sales, I won’t spoil anything! Well maybe a bit of some of it, but I’ll be super vague about it. It’s been a few years since the last season of Mad Men, I think it’s safe to say you’ve seen it or don’t care enough to see it.

Listen, I know that Peggy's career is not in tech sales. She's in advertising. She worked on Madison Avenue in the 60s/70s. Mad Men is a dated reference and has been off the air since 2014.

HOWEVER, this article is going to be incredibly relevant and here’s why: I started watching the series only a year or so ago in a mid-pandemic haze. Though deeply flawed, not in sales and fictional, Peggy Olson has all the skills to be an exemplary sales rep.

Based on the very first episode alone, I can give you a thousand reasons to dive head first into sales. I won’t… but I could.

Sales is a phenomenal career regardless of your age, background, and ambitions. Similar to how advertising was in the early 60s, sales is the engine of the world economy. Without salespeople, no one would buy anything. You can design, build, service, and support the product, but if you don’t have anyone to promote it, you’ll never see it on the market.

Over the course of 7 seasons, we watch Peggy develop her seller’s intuition, but we also watch her craft a career in the face of huge adversity without major compromise. The modern sales industry is so inundated with opportunities that you won’t be dealing with any Roger Sterlings or Don Drapers. You can build your career around your ideal lifestyle and individual interests. It almost sounds too good to be true.

If you value bringing about positive change on a global scale, you can promote products that add value to pretty much any public or private sector around the world. There is not a single industry out there that hasn’t been touched by tech. There is a product out there that will align with your personal values and ethics, and when you find it you will be the PERFECT person to sell it. If you’re an independent, strategic, confident, motivated, and knowledgeable individual, you’ll succeed in any part of the sales industry.

And no matter who you are, we need your voice and your story!

Peggy is the only female copywriter in the office for a solid four or five seasons, and without her, we wouldn’t see huge strides in inclusivity within the Mad Men ad world. Without the real-life women that Peggy represents carving their place in the workforce, we wouldn’t have the same marketing sphere we have today. Your story is important. Simply by taking up space in a booming industry, you — no matter who you are or your story — give hiring managers and CEOs a better sense of the market as a whole and your unique story brings a flavor to the pitch that no one else has. No matter who you are, you can carve your path.

Advertising boomed in the 60s like nothing else. Everyone needed a TV spot, a magazine print, a full-page spread in whatever the heck was groovy” back then. It was the best way to sell a product. Right now, we’re looking at a similar boom when it comes to tech.

• The tech industry will reach a value of $5 trillion by the end of this year
• The USA represents 33% of the world’s technology market
• The pandemic caused 76% of companies to create long-term IT changes within their business, providing enormous opportunities for people in tech sales

Remote tech sales is the new Madison Ave. You need to get onto the ground floor.

Peggy Olson did it right: climbed her way up the corporate ladder and blazed a trail while she did. Here are just a few reasons why you should do the same!

A Career in Tech Sales Means Higher Pay

Watching one woman start at the salary of a 1960s secretary and move her way up the pay scale was satisfying if nothing else. Peggy was the original girlboss and she kicked ass and took names — and paychecks — consistently.

If you’re looking for a career that pays well and offers a fantastic financial future — honestly who isn’t — you’ll adore the salaries in the sales sector. The average salary in tech sales is $76,000 per year, and that will increase as you grow into your career. It’s possible to get to 6 figures as a graduate within 3 years, and if you work for some of the biggest tech companies, it’s possible to make 7 figures per year. Uhhhhh yeah, 7 figures.

The most Peggy made — adjusting for inflation — was around $130,000 and that took 7 seasons of TV and a butt-load of terrible luck. You could more than quintuple that in 3 years? That’s absurd!

If you take a page out of Ms. Olson’s book and are driven, determined, and willing to work long hours you could double your salary through commission alone. There’s room for upward growth in this industry and the beauty of it is that it’s nearly recession-proof. Tech will always be needed and people will always be looking to buy it both on a B2B and a B2C level.

More Opportunity in a Tech Sales Career

If you’re looking for industry opportunities, you’ll struggle to find more options than a career in tech sales. The industry spans various sectors, including software, IT, BioTech, EdTech, FoodTech, GreenTech, Fintech, CleanTech, OneTech, TwoTech, RedTech, and BlueTech, and only the last few of those are completely made up!

Once you have the soft skills to sell tech products and work with clients, you can transfer those skills into any sector. More than tech sales, more than sales sales: these are hugely necessary skills in any workplace which means you’ll be able to go where the wind — and the money — takes you.

Your talent is obviously there: You’re driven, and motivated and you know what you want. In tech sales you’ll build the foundations to move in any direction. Tech sales knowledge gives you the social proof to show any potential employer that you have what it takes to push a product and work hard.

Listen, the industry is growing to a value of $5 trillion in 2020, has global opportunities, and thousands of tech start-ups spring up every year in the U.S. alone. Even if you want to move overseas and build your career, you can. Recent studies show Germany is the world’s most technologically advanced country, closely followed by South Korea and Singapore. Pick up where you left off on Duolingo and take your career international.

Companies have had to build their technology platforms to enhance communication and support remote workers, leading to increased opportunities for anyone working in the tech industry. Think of what Peggy might have achieved with opportunities like that knocking down her door. The cigarette-to-word count ratio might’ve been much lower as well…

Use a career in tech sales for your personal development

Striving to become a better and more well-rounded person is part of being a human. Working in sales will mean you have to face rejection and failure and accept success. Peggy not only learned how to write ad-copy, but she also learned how to stand up for herself, and make herself heard in a room full of people who wanted to see her fail.

Objection handling specifically is a critical sales skill, and you’ll quickly learn to develop this skill when you start working in tech sales. It’s a skill you’ll use for your entire life in more than just your work environment. Think about how useful it would be to know how to handle rejection with grace on your next first date, or during a friend breakup.

More than that, you’ll learn to think fast, build strong relationships and make bold moves. You won’t even recognize the badass you’ve become by the time you’re ready to move out of sales and into the next phase of your life. It’s that beneficial to you!

Flexibility within the Tech Sales Industry

Hand-in-hand with the above, tech sales as a career isn’t a typical 9-5 job which means you can build your hours to fit your schedule and prioritize yourself and your growth. Many tech sales professionals will set their own daily schedules, and if they hit their targets and sales quotas, companies are more than happy to let them.

With various outbound sales roles, you can pretty much work as many hours as you want, depending on your goals, working style, and how much commission you’d like to make. It’s one of those get-out-what-you-put-in type deals which also gives you the ability to learn key prioritization and productivity skills. It’s a win-win. Tech companies receive devoted employees who WANT to work, and you receive the flexibility to live a balanced life.

A Tech Sales Career Gives You Key Transferable Skills

When you’re looking to build your dream future, you’ll need to create as many transferable skills as possible. The market today is looking for a jack of all soft skills and you want actual proof that your communication skills are top-notch.

Through any sales job, you’ll learn to communicate clearly. Being in contact with people all day is the key to success as a sales professional, so you’ll gain expert knowledge in communicating key information both within and outside the company you work with. This will help you when problems arise. In sales, you’ll come up against your own barriers and external ones almost daily, and those key problem-solving skills will be easily transferable in your career and life as well as negotiating, working with a team, and learning how best to research.

Sales Will Never Go Out of Style

We all need job security, but as long you're hitting your sales targets in tech-related industries then it's good to know that there are plenty of opportunities out there for people with skills like yours. That’s because businesses depend on passionate and driven individuals who can help make their company successful!

With strong leadership, interpersonal and problem skills, you are an invaluable asset to any sales team. Show a strong work ethic, and adaptability, and any exec would struggle to lay you off, even in a recession.

Even if you do lose your job, or choose to leave, sales gives you those invaluable skills that can transfer you to any other position. The product itself doesn’t matter as long as you know how to sell it. Peggy sold baby wipes in one episode and ketchup in another and pitched idea after idea that landed to the broadest client base you have ever seen. It’s those instincts and people skills that made her invaluable, even when there were financial losses within the company.

Whether you’re the new girl” or flying at the top of your game, getting into — or back into — tech sales is a huge win. No other industry will offer you this kind of flexibility or work-life balance that everyone is craving these days.

You can work hard and still avoid staying at the office over holidays like Peggy. You can balance living the life you want, holding true to your values, and spending time with your loved ones through a career in tech sales. That’s the beauty of it.

So cut off your ponytail and get the career equivalent of a season 2 flip-do and journalist boyfriend. It’s well worth the character development!