Senior Business Development Manager

Senior Business Development Manager

Location: Bangalore / Whitefield Work Mode: Remote Employment Type: Part-Time Experience: 5+ Years Department: Business Development / Sales Reporting To: Head of Business / Business Head

About the Role

We are looking for an experienced Senior Business Development Manager with a strong background in the EdTech, upskilling, professional education, online learning, or career-development industry.

The ideal candidate should have a deep understanding of the Indian EdTech market, including B2C/B2B education sales, lead generation, inside sales, counselling-led sales, conversion strategies, revenue management, partnerships, and customer acquisition.

Candidates with experience in organizations such as Hero Vired, GrowthSchool, NextLeap, MyCaptain, Scaler, upGrad, Simplilearn, Great Learning, Emeritus, Physics Wallah, Unacademy, or similar EdTech companies will be preferred.

This role requires someone who can build and execute sales strategies, lead a sales team, develop new revenue channels, establish strategic partnerships, and consistently achieve aggressive revenue targets.

Key Responsibilities

1. Business Development & Revenue Growth

• Develop and execute business development strategies to achieve monthly, quarterly, and annual revenue targets.
• Identify new revenue opportunities across B2C, B2B, institutional, corporate, and partnership channels.
• Build and maintain a healthy sales pipeline.
• Own the complete business development lifecycle from lead generation to closure and revenue realization.
• Develop strategies for market expansion, customer acquisition, upselling, cross-selling, and repeat business.
• Identify emerging trends in the EdTech and professional-skilling ecosystem and convert them into business opportunities.

2. EdTech Sales Strategy

• Demonstrate a strong understanding of the Indian EdTech sales ecosystem and customer buying behaviour.
• Design effective sales funnels covering:

Lead Generation → Lead Qualification → Counselling → Demo/Webinar → Follow-up → Conversion → Payment → Upsell

• Develop pricing, offer, scholarship, discount, and promotional strategies in coordination with management.
• Analyze conversion rates at every stage of the sales funnel and identify improvement opportunities.
• Develop strategies for high-ticket and low-ticket education programs.
• Understand and optimize sales cycles, CAC, LTV, conversion rates, revenue per counsellor, and other key metrics.

3. Lead Generation & Customer Acquisition

• Work closely with Marketing to define and improve the MQL → SQL → Opportunity → Customer funnel.
• Identify high-performing lead-generation channels.
• Develop strategies around:
• Digital marketing leads
• Organic acquisition
• Webinars
• Workshops
• Events
• Campus partnerships
• Corporate partnerships
• Referral programs
• Community-led growth
• Strategic alliances
• Outbound sales
• Continuously evaluate lead quality and acquisition cost.

4. Sales Team Leadership

• Lead, mentor, and manage Business Development Executives, Sales Managers, Counsellors, and Inside Sales teams.
• Set individual and team sales targets.
• Establish daily, weekly, and monthly sales KPIs.
• Monitor individual performance and pipeline activity.
• Conduct sales reviews, performance meetings, and pipeline reviews.
• Build sales scripts, objection-handling frameworks, follow-up processes, and conversion playbooks.
• Coach team members on consultative selling and education counselling.

5. Sales Process & CRM Management

• Establish a structured CRM-driven sales process.
• Ensure accurate lead tracking and follow-ups.
• Monitor:
• Lead-to-call ratio
• Contact rate
• Counselling/demo attendance
• Demo-to-enrolment conversion
• Lead-to-enrolment conversion
• Average ticket size
• Revenue per salesperson
• Sales cycle
• CAC
• LTV
• Churn/refund rate
• Use CRM and sales analytics to identify bottlenecks and improve conversion.

6. Strategic Partnerships

Build relationships with:

• Colleges and universities
• Corporate HR/L&D teams
• Startups and technology companies
• Training organizations
• Industry professionals
• Communities
• Educational institutions
• Career platforms
• EdTech partners

Develop partnership models that create sustainable revenue opportunities.

7. Market Intelligence

• Continuously monitor competitors and the EdTech market.
• Analyze competitor programs, pricing, positioning, sales models, and customer acquisition strategies.
• Track companies such as Hero Vired, GrowthSchool, NextLeap, MyCaptain, Scaler, upGrad, Great Learning, Simplilearn, Emeritus, and other relevant players.
• Identify market gaps and opportunities for new programs.
• Provide management with actionable market intelligence.

8. Product & Program Feedback

Work closely with the Product, Academic, Marketing, and Leadership teams to:

• Understand learner requirements.
• Identify market demand for new programs.
• Improve course positioning.
• Recommend pricing and packaging.
• Develop new program concepts based on market demand.
• Improve learner acquisition and retention.

Required Experience

Must Have

• 5+ years of experience in Business Development / Sales.
• Strong experience specifically within EdTech, Upskilling, Online Education, Professional Training, Career Education, or related industries.
• Proven experience in achieving aggressive sales/revenue targets.
• Experience managing and scaling a sales team.
• Strong understanding of B2C EdTech sales and counselling-led sales models.
• Strong understanding of the Indian education and upskilling market.
• Experience working with CRM and sales analytics.
• Strong negotiation, presentation, communication, and closing skills.

Preferred Background

Candidates who have worked with organizations such as:

• Hero Vired
• GrowthSchool
• NextLeap
• MyCaptain
• Scaler
• upGrad
• Great Learning
• Simplilearn
• Emeritus
• Unacademy
• Physics Wallah
• Coursera
• Udemy
• Internshala
• Imarticus Learning
• Skill-Lync
• Masai School
• or comparable EdTech / upskilling companies

will be strongly preferred.

Key Skills

Business Skills

• EdTech Business Development
• B2C Sales
• B2B Sales
• Inside Sales
• Consultative Selling
• High-Ticket Sales
• Lead Conversion
• Revenue Growth
• Sales Funnel Management
• Strategic Partnerships
• Market Expansion
• Customer Acquisition
• Account Management

Analytical Skills

• Sales Forecasting
• Funnel Analytics
• Conversion Rate Optimization
• CAC & LTV Analysis
• Revenue Forecasting
• Sales Performance Analytics
• Market & Competitor Analysis

Leadership Skills

• Team Management
• Sales Coaching
• Target Management
• Performance Management
• Sales Process Development
• Hiring & Training
• Motivation & Incentive Planning

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

The candidate will be evaluated on:

KPI	Expected Focus
Revenue Achievement	Monthly / Quarterly Target
Sales Conversion	Lead → Enrolment
Pipeline Value	3–4× Monthly Target
Average Ticket Size	Program-wise growth
CAC	Controlled acquisition cost
Sales Productivity	Revenue per salesperson
Lead Response Time	Faster lead engagement
Sales Cycle	Reduction in closure time
Team Achievement	% of team reaching target
Retention / Upsell	Repeat & additional revenue
Partnership Revenue	New strategic channels

Ideal Candidate Profile

We are looking for someone who is not just a salesperson, but a business builder.

The ideal candidate should be able to answer questions such as:

• How would you launch a new EdTech program in a competitive market?
• How would you generate the first 1,000 qualified leads?
• How would you improve a 5% conversion rate to 8–10%?
• How would you build a 10-member sales team?
• How do Hero Vired, GrowthSchool, NextLeap and MyCaptain position their offerings differently?
• What makes an EdTech customer convert?
• How should an EdTech sales funnel be structured?
• How do you calculate CAC and LTV?
• How would you design an incentive plan for sales counsellors?
• How would you reduce lead leakage and improve follow-ups?
• Which channels would you use for B2C vs B2B acquisition?
• How would you identify whether a sales problem is caused by lead quality, product positioning, pricing, counselling, or follow-up?

The candidate should demonstrate commercial thinking, strong ownership, data-driven decision-making, and the ability to build scalable sales systems.