Head of Sales
Stowmarket, Suffolk | Full-time | Hybrid – up to 2 days per week from home
Join the UK’s leading independent agricultural media brand
For more than 46 years, Farmers Guide has been at the heart of British agriculture, delivered free every month directly to farmers and agricultural decision-makers across the UK.
With a growing circulation, strong sales performance and an average customer retention rate of 96%, we're an established business – but we're ambitious about what comes next.
We're now looking for an experienced and driven Head of Sales to take ownership of our sales operation, lead our established team and deliver the next stage of revenue growth.
The Role
This is a hands-on leadership role for someone who enjoys taking responsibility.
You'll manage an established sales team, setting clear expectations, improving efficiency and ensuring the team consistently delivers against its targets.
We don't need someone to simply maintain what we already have. We want someone who will understand the business, identify opportunities, challenge us where things could be better and make them happen.
You'll have the autonomy to bring your own management style, ideas and experience to the role. In return, we'll expect you to take real ownership of sales performance.
Our commercial portfolio includes Farmers Guide, Fruit & Vine, our digital platforms and FarmAds, our agricultural classified advertising platform. You'll make sure we're maximising the opportunities across all of them.
What You'll Be Responsible For
- Lead, manage and develop our existing sales team.
- Take ownership of sales performance and revenue growth across the business.
- Set clear individual and team targets and ensure they are achieved.
- Improve the efficiency, structure and effectiveness of the sales operation.
- Monitor performance, pipelines and forecasts, identifying problems and opportunities early.
- Coach the team to improve their sales skills, confidence and results.
- Create accountability while maintaining a positive and motivated sales environment.
- Develop strategies to grow existing accounts and win new business.
- Ensure our commission structures and incentives support the wider aims of the business.
- Build and maintain relationships with key local and national clients.
- Work closely with marketing, editorial and management to develop new commercial opportunities.
- Bring forward new ideas for products, packages and revenue streams.
- Ensure multiple publications, platforms and sales deadlines remain firmly on track.
About You
We're looking for someone who naturally takes ownership.
You'll be a self-starter who doesn't need to wait to be told what needs doing. You'll be comfortable making decisions, solving problems and keeping a team moving.
You'll have managed salespeople before and know how to get the best from different personalities. You'll be supportive when people need help, but equally comfortable having difficult conversations and holding people accountable.
Most importantly, you'll be someone we can trust to take responsibility for the sales department and deliver.
You'll Ideally Have
- At least 3 years' experience managing a successful sales team.
- A proven record of increasing sales and delivering revenue growth.
- Experience within media, advertising or B2B sales.
- Strong people-management and coaching skills.
- Excellent commercial awareness.
- Strong negotiation and presentation skills.
- Experience using targets, KPIs, pipelines and forecasting to manage performance.
- The ability to identify inefficiencies and implement improvements.
- Experience across print and digital advertising would be highly advantageous.
- A genuine interest in agriculture, or the enthusiasm to quickly learn the industry.
Agricultural experience isn't essential. Energy, commercial ability and leadership are.
What We Offer
- Competitive salary plus performance-related commission/bonus.
- The opportunity to lead an established and successful sales team.
- Real autonomy to shape how the department operates.
- An established brand with a highly loyal client base.
- The opportunity to play a significant role in the future direction of a growing independent business.
- Hybrid working, with up to 2 days per week working from home once established in the role.
- Company pension.
- Free on-site parking.
- Modern offices and staff facilities – including a proper coffee machine.
We're a relatively small business, which means this isn't a role where you'll disappear into a large management structure. You'll work directly with the people making the decisions and have the freedom to make a noticeable difference.
If you're the sort of person who sees something that could be better and gets on with improving it, we'd like to hear from you.
Ready to take ownership of a successful sales operation and make it even better?
Send your CV and a short covering note to [email protected] with the subject line Head of Sales – Farmers Guide.
Job type: Full-time
Location: Stowmarket, Suffolk
Working pattern: Office-based with up to 2 days per week working from home
Pay: £45,000.00-£65,000.00 per year
Work Location: In person
