VP Sales in Cybersecurity: A Small Market with Premium Comp

Cybersecurity sales leadership is a niche inside a niche. Of the 1,349 executive sales postings we track weekly at The CRO Report, 56 are tagged to cybersecurity or infosec. That's 4.2% of the total market. And yet the comp runs higher, the remote percentage leads every other vertical, and the methodology requirements skew heavily toward complex enterprise deals.

Here's the full breakdown of what the data shows, who's hiring, what they're paying, and how the cybersecurity VP Sales market differs from the broader executive sales landscape.

56 Roles. That's the Entire Market.

Let that number sit. Fifty-six.

Across the 1,349 executive sales postings we're tracking, only 56 carry cybersecurity or infosec tags. That's 4.2% of the total dataset. If you're a VP Sales operating in cybersecurity right now, you probably already know most of the companies with open seats. You might know who left the role you're looking at.

The seniority breakdown tells you who's doing the hiring:

Seniority Level	Roles	% of Cyber Postings
VP	41	73.2%
SVP	10	17.9%
C-Level	5	8.9%

VP dominates at 41 of 56. That's consistent with the broader market, where VP is the default title for the first dedicated sales leader. SVP at 10 suggests companies that already have a VP layer and are adding a senior layer above it, or companies large enough to use SVP as their primary sales leader title. C-level at 5 means there are exactly five CRO or Chief Revenue Officer roles open in cybersecurity right now in our dataset.

A market this small operates on reputation. Referrals carry more weight than applications. One bad exit follows you for years because the network is tight enough that people compare notes. The flip side: one strong run at a known cybersecurity company opens doors to nearly every other player in the space.

The Comp Premium Is Real

Twenty-nine of the 56 cybersecurity postings include disclosed salary data. Here's what they show.

Metric	Cybersecurity	Overall Dataset
Avg Base Range	$191,307 - $260,371	~$170,000 - $251,000
Median Base Range	$170,255 - $210,000	--
P25-P75 Range	$170,255 - $320,000	--
Max Disclosed Base	$558,600	--

The average base range of $191,307 to $260,371 sits above the overall dataset average of roughly $170,000 to $251,000. The premium isn't massive, somewhere in the $10,000 to $20,000 range depending on which end you measure. But it's consistent.

The P75 mark at $320,000 and the ceiling at $558,600 tell the fuller story. The top quartile of cybersecurity sales leadership comp pulls well above the average, driven by a handful of established public companies paying for proven leaders who've scaled security go-to-market before.

Why the premium exists:

• Specialized knowledge. The buyer personas in cybersecurity (CISOs, security architects, IT directors) require a sales leader who can speak credibly about threat landscapes, compliance frameworks, and technical architecture. That specialization narrows the talent pool.
• Smaller candidate universe. 56 roles chasing a limited number of executives with cybersecurity sales leadership experience. Supply and demand.
• High-stakes buying decisions. Security purchases are driven by risk mitigation, compliance mandates, and board-level priorities. The consequences of a breach create urgency and budget that other verticals don't always have. Companies pay more for leaders who can navigate that environment.
• Long enterprise cycles. Cybersecurity deals often involve IT, security, compliance, legal, and finance stakeholders. Multi-threaded, multi-quarter deals require experienced leaders, and experienced leaders cost more.

Enterprise Sales Is the Dominant Methodology

The methodology data for cybersecurity postings shows a clear hierarchy.

Methodology	Roles	% of Cyber Postings
Enterprise Sales	22	39.3%
Consultative Selling	14	25.0%
MEDDIC/MEDDPICC	12	21.4%
Value Selling	10	17.9%
PLG	10	17.9%
Channel/Partner	7	12.5%
ABM	2	3.6%

Enterprise Sales at 22 of 56 roles (39.3%) leads by a wide margin. Not a surprise. Cybersecurity products are sold to enterprises, and those deals are complex. They involve proof-of-concept deployments, security team evaluations, compliance sign-offs, and procurement processes that can stretch across multiple quarters.

MEDDIC/MEDDPICC at 12 roles (21.4%) is actually well-represented compared to other verticals. MEDDIC's emphasis on decision criteria, paper processes, and champion identification maps directly onto how enterprise security purchases happen. If you're selling a $500K endpoint detection platform to a Fortune 500, you need a framework for tracking multi-stakeholder decisions. MEDDIC is that framework.

Consultative Selling at 14 roles (25.0%) reflects the nature of security buying. CISOs don't want to be sold to. They want a partner who understands their threat model, their architecture, and their compliance obligations. The sales leader who can run a consultative discovery process, identifying pain points the buyer hasn't fully articulated, wins in this market.

Value Selling at 10 roles (17.9%) reinforces the same theme. Security ROI isn't always obvious. The value of preventing a breach is theoretical until it happens. Value Selling frameworks help articulate risk reduction in financial terms that CFOs and board members understand.

Channel and PLG: Two Diverging Motions

Two numbers in the methodology data stand out for different reasons. Channel/Partner at 7 roles (12.5%) and PLG at 10 roles (17.9%).

Channel makes intuitive sense. Cybersecurity has one of the strongest channel ecosystems in enterprise tech. MSSPs (managed security service providers), VARs (value-added resellers), and distributors like Optiv, CDW, and Pax8 move a large share of security software. Companies like Fortinet and SonicWall built their businesses on channel-first models. Seven of 56 roles specifically calling out channel or partner experience reflects the continued pull of that motion, even as direct sales grows.

PLG at 10 roles (17.9%) is the more interesting number. Product-led growth in cybersecurity felt like a fringe concept five years ago. Now it's embedded in how a growing segment of the market goes to market. Think about the developer-first security tools: Snyk for code security, Wiz for cloud security, Semgrep for static analysis. These products get adopted by engineering teams through free tiers and self-serve trials, then expand into enterprise contracts when the security team formalizes the tooling.

The PLG motion creates a different kind of VP Sales role. Instead of pure top-down enterprise selling, you're layering an enterprise sales motion on top of existing product adoption. The discovery call starts with "I see your engineering team has 400 active users on our free tier" rather than a cold pitch about threat detection. That requires a sales leader comfortable with product data, usage metrics, and conversion funnels alongside traditional enterprise deal management.

These two motions, channel and PLG, represent the old and new of cybersecurity go-to-market. Both are growing. Both require distinct skill sets. The VP Sales who can run both simultaneously is a rare profile, which partially explains the comp premium.

64.3% Remote: Highest of Any Vertical

Thirty-six of 56 cybersecurity VP Sales roles are remote. That's 64.3%, the highest remote percentage of any industry vertical in our dataset.

Three factors drive this.

First, cybersecurity buyers are technical. CISOs and security engineers are comfortable evaluating products through virtual demos, POC environments, and recorded presentations. The shift to virtual selling that other industries resisted post-pandemic was already natural for cybersecurity buyers who'd been evaluating security tools through online trials for years.

Second, the threat landscape is global. A cybersecurity company headquartered in San Francisco sells to enterprises in Singapore, London, and Sao Paulo. The sales leader overseeing those regions doesn't need to be in any single office. The work is distributed by default.

Third, many cybersecurity companies were remote-first before 2020. Companies like CrowdStrike, SentinelOne, and smaller startups in the space built distributed teams early. When they hire a VP Sales, remote is the default because the rest of the organization already operates that way.

The exception: federal and government contracts. Companies selling to the Department of Defense, intelligence agencies, or federal civilian agencies often require on-site presence, security clearances, and proximity to D.C. Those roles account for a disproportionate share of the 35.7% that aren't remote.

If you're targeting cybersecurity VP Sales roles and flexibility matters to you, the data is favorable. Nearly two-thirds of the market is remote. That's not the case in most other verticals.

The Enterprise Tilt

Company stage data tells you where the hiring is concentrated.

Company Stage	Roles	% of Cyber Postings
Enterprise/Public	19	33.9%
Unknown	14	25.0%
Series A/B	7	12.5%
Series B/C	4	7.1%
Late Stage	3	5.4%
Seed/Series A	2	3.6%

Enterprise/Public companies account for 19 of 56 roles, the largest identifiable category at 33.9%. Cybersecurity has consolidated aggressively through M&A over the past decade. CrowdStrike acquired Humio, LogScale, and Bionic. Palo Alto Networks bought Demisto, Expanse, Bridgecrew, and Cider Security. Fortinet, Zscaler, and SentinelOne have all been active acquirers. The result is a market where a handful of large platforms dominate hiring volume.

The "Unknown" category at 14 roles deserves a note. These are postings where company stage data wasn't available in our tracking. Many are likely mid-market private companies that haven't disclosed recent funding rounds.

Startups are present but thin. Seed/Series A at 2 roles and Series A/B at 7 roles combine for 9 early-stage postings. That's 16.1% of the cybersecurity market. If you're looking for an early-stage cybersecurity VP Sales opportunity, the options are limited. The trade-off: early-stage security companies that reach the point of hiring a dedicated VP Sales tend to have genuine product-market fit, because the security market punishes products that don't actually work.

Series B/C at 4 roles and Late Stage at 3 roles represent the growth-stage middle. These companies have revenue, product, and customers, and they're hiring sales leaders to scale what's working. Seven roles total across those two categories. Not a lot of seats.

The CRM data reinforces the enterprise lean. Salesforce shows up in 9 of 56 cybersecurity postings (16.1%). HubSpot in 1. ZoomInfo in 1. Salesforce's dominance here tracks with the enterprise/public company tilt. Companies at that stage run Salesforce. Startups in the Seed-to-Series-B range may use HubSpot or other tools, but they're a small slice of the hiring market.

What This Means If You're Targeting Cybersecurity

The data paints a specific picture of the cybersecurity VP Sales market. Small, specialized, well-compensated, and dominated by enterprise selling at established companies. Here's how that translates if you're actively targeting this space.

Technical Credibility Is the Entry Barrier

More than most verticals, cybersecurity sales leadership requires fluency with the domain. You don't need to have been a security engineer or a SOC analyst. But you need to hold your own in a room with CISOs and security architects. You need to understand zero trust architecture, endpoint detection and response, threat intelligence platforms, and compliance frameworks like SOC 2, FedRAMP, and ISO 27001. Not at an engineering level. At the level where you can ask intelligent questions, understand the technical evaluation criteria, and position your product against alternatives without deferring every technical question to an SE.

This is what keeps the talent pool small. A VP Sales from healthcare SaaS or fintech can't easily cross into cybersecurity without a ramp-up period. The vocabulary, the buyer personas, and the competitive landscape are distinct enough that industry-specific experience carries real weight in hiring decisions.

The Network Is the Job Board

Fifty-six roles. In a market that small, the most effective way to find your next role is through the people you've already worked with. Former colleagues who went to competitors. CISOs you've sold to who now advise cybersecurity startups. Channel partners who hear about openings before they're posted. The traditional approach of scanning job boards and submitting applications works, but it's the less efficient path in a market where hiring managers already have a short list of known candidates.

Methodology Matters More Than You Think

With 39.3% of roles calling out Enterprise Sales and 21.4% referencing MEDDIC/MEDDPICC, cybersecurity hiring managers are specific about how they want deals run. If you're coming from a transactional or velocity sales background, the transition to cybersecurity's multi-quarter, multi-stakeholder deals requires genuine retooling. Consultative Selling at 25.0% and Value Selling at 17.9% further reinforce that point. These aren't boxes to check on a resume. They're the operating system for how cybersecurity deals close.

PLG Experience Is a Differentiator

With PLG appearing in 10 of 56 roles (17.9%), a growing slice of the cybersecurity market wants leaders who can bridge product-led adoption and enterprise sales. This is relatively new territory for the industry. VP Sales candidates who've run PLG-to-enterprise motions at other B2B software companies, especially developer tools, have a transferable skill set that cybersecurity companies are actively seeking.

Remote Opens the Geography

At 64.3% remote, location is less of a constraint than in other verticals. You don't need to relocate to the Bay Area or the D.C. corridor to be competitive, though both remain concentrations of cybersecurity companies. The exception, again, is federal. If you want to sell to government, proximity to D.C. and willingness to navigate clearance requirements will matter.