Top 16 Sales Jobs [sorted by search volume] (2023)

What are the best roles for sales and business development? If you want more traffic to your job postings, one way to respond is to look at what sales positions candidates are looking for.

The differences can be dramatic.

For example, the title "Sales Rep" gets 4x the search traffic of "Sales Rep".

Below are the top 16 best-selling titles based on the number of searches they receive on Google. For the search query data, I used a combination of search engine optimization (SEO) tools.Ahrefsand Google Keyword Planner

Note: Do you want more work data? Check out our ongoing series calledJob Titles: The Definitive Guide(what includesThe 25 Best Marketing Jobs,The 35 Best IT JobsmiTop 50 Software Jobs).

The total number of candidates seeking the 16 positions below is much higher than what I list. For example, I didn't count long-tail searches like "Sales manager jobs in Dallas" or "Best sales manager jobs." My data also doesn't include sales job searches on job boards (Actually LinkedIn, Glassdoor, Facebook, etc.) or searches on company job sites.

Finally, as a sanity check, we leverage Ongig's own datajob description software.

Additionally, we found a large outlier in sales headlines. It turns out that the #1 most searched title is "Sales Associate". Its most common use is in retail. Since many of you are not in retail, I have included 2 pie charts below (one without retail and one with retail). The only difference is that the first chart excludes the sales representative.

Leverage!

Sales Job Candidates Are Most Seeking (Non-Retail)

Disclaimer: Many of the sales roles overlap, they are not separate roles. Also, the data below is quantitative and is not always better. For example, if you're hiring someone who sells exclusively in the field, you might want to try "External Sales Rep" instead of "Sales Rep." The latter can get higher quality candidates. To help you understand what other employers are using for sales positions, I'm also including the number of existing job postings on Indeed.com. There is, of course, an arbitration play here. I explain it at the end of the article. Another note: I have not included account management roles (Account Manager, Customer Relationship Manager, Customer Success Manager, etc.) for finding new customers).

Sales Titles That Candidates Seek Most (with Retail)

1. Sales Associate

The Sales Associate job title is used primarily in retail.

Take Walmart, for example: 666 of their sales job titles currently contain "Sales Associate."

Retailers use Sales Associate for many in-store sales titles. Job duties include:

• greeting customers
• find products
• Do price checks
• Operate cash registers

Number of Google searches per month: 37,900

Number of non-Indeed.com results: 148,582

2. Sales representative

The sales representative title is typically used for a general sales role whose job is to show and sell solutions to organizations. They can sell from inside the office or in the field.

If you want to be more specific, you'll see below that there are many alternative sales titles for sales reps, including some with modifiers likeInside/outside sales representative(#9 and #12 below!).

Warning: You might be tempted to use "Sales Rep" since it's shorter, but candidates are searching for "Sales Rep" 4 times more often than "Sales Rep." You can see the search volume for “Sales Rep” further down this list at #8.

Number of Google searches per month: 15,800

Number of non-Indeed.com results: 42,775

3. Account executive

The Account Executive role is used for sales roles that:

• Create new business (prospecting); Is
• Expand existing business

At Salesforce.com, for example, Account Executive is the most common sales title they use (438 AE positions are open as I write this). Salesforce uses the Account Executive title for sales titles related to new deals and growing existing deals.

Salesforce has EA roles by product/line of business (Account Executive - Marketing Cloud), customer size (Account Executive - SMB), and location (Account Executive - Pennsylvania).

Number of Google searches per month: 13,300

Number of non-Indeed.com results: 16,312

4. Sales Manager

A sales manager usually leads a sales team. They are responsible for recruiting and retaining the sales force and reporting to Directors/VP of Sales.

In smaller organizations, a sales manager may still do the sales alone (this combination is sometimes called a "player-coach").

Number of Google searches per month: 9,200

Number of non-Indeed.com results: 26,894

5. Business Development Manager

The term "Business Development" is used in many sales titles. The most popular business development sales title is Business Development Manager, which is typically:

• A classic sales position (similar to sales representative or account executive); either
• A strategic partnership position (this is more common in the high-tech space). Sales skills are still useful here, but partnership deals usually don't involve the exchange of money, so cold calling sales skills aren't critical.

Number of Google searches per month: 8,000

Number of non-Indeed.com results: 4,638

6. Seller

It may sound boring, but many companies still use "Salesperson" for sales titles. In general, it is complemented with a qualifying word, such as if they sell inside or outside the office:

• Insideseller
• Forseller

…or what they are selling. For example.:

• Energyseller
• Toyotaseller
• Announcementseller

The salesperson role is generally a broad term to identify a role that closes new business.

Number of Google searches per month: 6,700

Number of non-Indeed.com results: 5,229

7. Sales Consultant

Some of you may be surprised to see that Sales Consultant is in the top 10 sales jobs.

Most employers use the title Sales Consultant to describe a general sales position that requires aadvisorygetting closer.

Number of Google searches per month: 4,950

Number of Non-Indeed.com Results: 19,821

8. Sales Development Representative

The Sales Development Representative (or SDR) role is an inside salesperson focused on outreach, prospecting, andlead rating. This sales role typically focuses on prospecting for external leads. They qualify the lead and pass it on to another salesperson to close.

The title of Sales Development Representative has some overlap with that of Business Development Representative (a title mentioned further down this list below).

Number of Google searches per month: 3,850

Number of non-Indeed.com results: 1,889

9. Sales representative

"Sales Representative" is a shortened version of "Sales Representative" (the #1 previously searched sales job title).

Number of Google searches per month: 3,500

Number of non-Indeed.com results: 4,497

10. Inside sales representative

An inside sales representative typically worksinsidein the office (or at home) instead of in the field. They sell by phone, email, or the Internet instead of an outside sales representative selling in person.

An inside sales representative is often used to close SMB (small and medium business) businesses or consumers.

For example, Yelp uses the title Inside Sales Representative for sellers who visit restaurants and cafes to purchase advertising on Yelp.com.

Number of Google searches per month: 3,450

Number of non-Indeed.com results: 3,639

11. Business Development Representative

There are several uses of the title "Business Development Representative" in sales jobs. Titles in sales, including some overlap with the title of Sales Development Representative (SDR).

Both the BDR and SDR titles are typically used for entry-level sales career positions. Both tend to be focused on generating new business.

sales talent agencydefines BDR as focused on:

“inbound marketing lead qualification”. (as opposed to SDR's focus on outbound leads)

Sales automation expert Jessica Magoch ​​highlights:

“Traditionally, business development representatives have been responsible for creating high-level strategic alliances with other organizations that can cross-sell and promote. They don't necessarily close deals, but they are good at building long-term relationships. For example, they could develop a relationship with a SaaS marketplace to promote their product.”

Fuente:What is the difference between an SDR, LDR and BDR?.

Number of Google searches per month: 3,299

Number of non-Indeed.com results: 2,119

12. Sales executive

Sales Executive is a title used primarily to describe a general sales position. This sales headline often includes the growth of existing and/or new business.

Aetna, for example, uses Sales Executive for a variety of sales roles, from "Sales Executive" (1-5 years of experience required) to Senior Sales Executive (8+ years).

Number of Google searches per month: 2,650

Number of non-Indeed.com results: 4,494

13. Outside Sales Representative

An outside sales representative does face-to-face sales in the field. This sales title typically includes selling to new and existing customers.

Number of Google searches per month: 2,450

Number of non-Indeed.com results: 5,444

14. Director of Revenue

The Chief Revenue Officer (or CRO) isusually at the top of the sales title hierarchy. they are rResponsible for all revenue generation, whether from sales, marketing or partnerships. CROs often manage teams/departments beyond the classic vendors, such as marketing and customer success.

The CFO title has been around for decades, but Silicon Valley made it super popular starting in 2015.)fuente:The Rise of the CFO: Silicon Valley's New Secret Sauce(Jim Herbold).

More recently, at companies like Splunk and Namely, the CRO manages sales.mimarketing.

Jim Herbold, a CRO, points out that CROs often work closely with the Product team.

The Director of Revenue title easily surpassed Director of Sales (1,210 searches per month), Director of Sales (1,250), Vice President of Sales (750), Vice President of Sales (520) and Head of Sales (270).

Number of Google searches per month: 2,080

Number of Non-Indeed.com Results: 28

15. Director of Business Development

The Director of Business Development is among the countless sales positions used for a combination of one or both of the following responsibilities:

• Sell ​​to new accounts
• Closure of strategic alliances

The "Director" part could mean that the person manages other people (for example, they are higher up in the sales position hierarchy than the Business Development Manager or Business Development Representatives listed above). But Business Development Directors are sometimes also individual contributors.

Number of Google searches per month: 2,040

Number of Non-Indeed.com Results: 584

16. Account representative

Account representative is sometimes used for a sales role (although it can also be a title limited to account management).

State Farm Insurance, for example, uses the title account representative for sales agents. A key responsibility in your account representative job descriptions states:

“Develop leads, schedule appointments, identify customer needs, and market appropriate products and services.”

And Amazon uses "Account Representative" for various sales roles where the primary requirement is:

“Candidates should be comfortable prospecting, making calls, and negotiating brand-based transactional and strategic deals over the phone.”

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The Account Representative sales titles are also used as an alternative to Account Manager, in which case the Account Representative focuses on maintaining and growingexistbusiness accounts.

Number of Google searches per month: 2,000

Number of non-Indeed.com results: 4,684

Sales titles by region

A key difference in sales roles compared to most other departments (such as IT, marketing, and finance) is that many sales titles are based on regions (especially at the vice president, director, and manager levels).

A large organization that does business around the world might have a vice president/head of sales for global regions such as:

• APAC (Asia Pacific)
• EMEA (Europe, Middle East, Asia)
• North America (United States)
• LATAM (Latin America) or South America

And a company might have the following types of job titles for a single country, such as these titles for North America:

• Vice President of North American Sales
• National Sales Director
• Territory Sales Manager (Northern California)
• Account Executive (Midwest)

Sales Jobs by Industry

In a B2B organization, there may also be industry-based vertical sales titles. Examples include:

• Business Development Manager (Aerospace)
• Senior Account Executive (Retail)
• Key Account Sales Manager (Fashion Wholesale)

Creative sales jobs are fun (but candidates aren't looking for them).

One of my favorite blogs is Hubspot and they had a great article (A representative with another name: 7 companies that changed the name of their salespeople) about companies that are creative with their sales roles. They provided examples like:

• Kate Spade using "Muse" for her sales associate titles; Is
• Sephora using "cast members" for their associated sales titles

These can be great INSIDE sales titles, and employees are often delighted to have a non-traditional title.

But keep in mind that if you use these creative sales headlines for job postings, you'll have very few candidates searching for those terms.

Save your creative sales headlines for business cards (not job postings).

Death of a “seller” title?

The seller phrase continues to be among the best-selling titles. For example, Indeed shows 275 job postings with "Salesperson" in the title.

And 1,800 people Googled "car salesman jobs" and 300 people Googled "retail salesman jobs" in the most recent month. But the Salesperson job title is something of an endangered breed because it's masculine. It is no longer used by progressive employers.

de ongtext parser"Seller" signs and other male-oriented titles (seeTop 25 Job Titles That Still Use the Word "Man".

I hope this list of sales job titles is helpful in naming your own job titles. I welcome your feedback and ideas for other titles for my team and I to investigate.

Sales office arbitration game? Take advantage of “supply and demand”

As I mentioned earlier, you don't always want to choose sales titles with the highest search volume. The # fetch is simply the request. You have to look at job postings with that title as well.

In some cases, there may be an arbitrage opportunity where you use certain sales titles because there is limited supply of those jobs (for example, by your rivals).

That's where Indeed numbers come in handy.

Take the Sales Consultant, for example. It is the #7 ranked sales job on my list above. But it's also one of the most common selling titles on Indeed.com (19,821 jobs use that title there). Your title of sales consultant can be lost in such a sea on a job board. In this case, you might consider using a less searched but relatively lower job title on Indeed (for example, Sales Representative, Business Development Representative, or Sales Executive).

Note: If you liked this article, check out ourTop 50 Software Jobspiece!

Why did I write this?

Ongig's mission is to transform job descriptions. One way to do this is to provide information on how to optimize her work. Meet Ongi'sjob description softwareand click our demo request button if you'd like to meet with my team to help you transform YOUR work pages.

November 19, 2019byrobar kellytheyjob titles