Entry-Level Sales Jobs in Germany: How to Get Hired in 2026

You want a sales job in Germany but your CV is thin, and most postings ask for experience you do not have. That is normal at the start. The good news: the market is active, and employers here hire juniors if you show proof of ability in some other way.

What the German sales market looks like right now#

On 14 October 2026, the JobRise sales jobs hub for Germany showed 240 open sales listings. Of those, 211 were posted in the last 30 days and 188 in the last 7 days, so the feed is moving fast and old postings pile up less than you might expect.

Zoom out and the country picture is bigger. The JobRise Hiring Report for Germany lists 1,846 open listings across all categories, with 1,642 posted in the last 30 days. Sales is a meaningful slice of that, and it skews heavily full-time: 238 of the 240 sales listings are full-time, with one part-time and one contract role.

Where the jobs are matters for your search. Berlin leads with 65 listings, then Munich with 52, Frankfurt with 16, Hamburg with 13, and Stuttgart with 7. If you are outside these cities, expect more remote-hybrid talk than fully remote junior roles.

How many roles are actually entry-level#

Here is the uncomfortable number: 6 of 240 sales listings carried an entry-level-looking title such as intern, graduate, junior, or trainee. That is the honest picture of junior hiring in sales in Germany. Most open roles want someone who can carry a quota on day one.

Do not let that stop you. Two things soften it. First, titles lie in both directions: some "Sales Manager" roles are open to strong juniors, and some "Junior" roles want a year of experience. Second, the six junior listings show real variety in what counts as an entry door.

Junior titles to search for#

These are the entry-level-looking roles in the 14 October 2026 snapshot, listed exactly as they appear:

• "Junior Account Executive DACH (German-speaking)" at Workmotion
• "Junior New Business Manager (Neukundengewinnung)" at medialabel GmbH
• "(Junior) Business Development Manager (m/w/d)" at tecRacer Germany GmbH
• "Junior Customer Success Manager (w/m/d) | München" at fleetster
• "Sales & Business Development Manager (2026/27 Graduate)" at Netlight
• "Junior Sales Manager (w/m/div.) (befristet für 24 Monate)" at Bosch Group

Notice the range: account executive, new business, business development, customer success, graduate program, and a fixed-term junior manager role. Customer success and business development are the usual side doors into quota-carrying sales, so search those words too, not just "sales".

What employers in Germany expect from you#

German hiring managers are practical. They want to see that you can do the work, and they accept non-traditional proof when you have no employment history. The proof that carries weight:

• A completed sales-relevant certification, for example HubSpot Sales Software or a Challenger-style course. Free ones count if you finished them.
• A small portfolio: a one-page outbound sequence you wrote, a short Loom-style cold call structure, a target account list you built for a real company.
• Any revenue-adjacent experience, even unpaid: fundraising for a club, running a market stall, recruiting for a student society, selling event tickets.
• Language proof. "German-speaking" appears in junior titles like the Workmotion role, so state your German level honestly (B2, C1) and your English level next to it.
• Tool familiarity: CRM basics (HubSpot, Salesforce, Pipedrive), LinkedIn Sales Navigator, Excel or Google Sheets for pipeline tracking.

One more expectation people forget: German applications still often want a clean, structured CV, and increasingly a short cover note explaining why this company. Keep both tight.

Rewriting a zero-experience resume bullet#

Most fresh graduates write something like: "Responsible for selling tickets for the university summer festival." That tells an employer nothing about how you work. Here is the same experience rewritten the way a sales manager reads it.

Before: "Responsible for selling tickets for the university summer festival."

After: "Sold 420 festival tickets in 6 weeks as a volunteer, cold-calling 30 local businesses for group bookings and closing 11 sponsor deals worth €4,300; tracked every contact in a shared Google Sheet pipeline."

The rewrite names the activity (cold-calling), the volume (30 businesses), the result (11 deals, €4,300), and the tool (a pipeline sheet). Numbers you can defend in an interview beat adjectives every time. If you need more bullets like this, the free resume builder walks you through pulling numbers out of part-time and volunteer work.

Where entry-level sales openings get posted#

Start with the live feed on the JobRise sales jobs hub for Germany, because it shows what is open today, not what a job board cached last month. Then widen out: company career pages (Bosch Group, Netlight, and fleetster all run their own), LinkedIn with the "Easy Apply" filter plus a "junior" keyword, and the Bundesagentur für Arbeit job board for local roles.

Recruiter and staffing firms appear among the top listers too. In the 14 October 2026 snapshot, companies with the most open sales listings include Anthropic (9), Bosch Group (8), Mongodb (8), Figma (7), Treatwell (6), Red Bull (6), Salonkee (6), N8N (5), Stranger Soccer (5), and Mercier Consultancy (5). Some of these are recruiters or staffing firms, which is useful: one conversation with them can surface roles that never get posted publicly.

The 7-step plan#

1. Pick your lane. Choose between new business (hunter), account growth (farmer), and customer success. Read ten real postings and note the words that repeat.
2. Build one page of proof this week. Write an outbound email sequence, a cold-call opener, and a 20-account target list for a company you admire. Keep it in a PDF.
3. Get one certification you can name. HubSpot Sales Software is free and finishes in an afternoon. Put the date on your CV.
4. Rewrite three CV bullets using the activity-volume-result-tool pattern above. Numbers first, adjectives deleted.
5. Set a daily pipeline. Ten tailored applications and five warm outreach messages per weekday, tracked in a spreadsheet with date, company, contact, and next step.
6. Learn the German basics of the process. Applications here often include salary expectations ("Gehaltsvorstellung") and a notice period, so decide yours before you apply.
7. Prepare two stories for interviews: one where you convinced someone of something, and one where you failed and what you changed. Both must contain numbers.

On salary, be careful with what you read online. Only 3 of the 240 sales listings in the 14 October 2026 snapshot showed pay at all, and those were senior: "VP Sales, EMEA" at Cohere at $500K, $700K, "Senior Account Executive, Germany PUBSEC (Berlin, Germany)" at Cohere at €250K, €280K, and "Head of Sales EMEA, Public Sector" at Cohere at $0. Those are not entry-level numbers and you should not anchor to them. Entry-level base salaries in Germany vary widely by city, company size, and commission structure, so check the current official sources and ask directly in the first call.

Free tools#

• Sales jobs in Germany
• JobRise Hiring Report: Germany
• free resume builder

FAQ#

How many entry-level sales jobs are open in Germany right now?

In the JobRise snapshot of 14 October 2026, 6 of 240 open sales listings carried an entry-level-looking title such as junior, intern, graduate, or trainee. The snapshot is a count of live listings on one feed, not a market survey, so treat it as a directional signal rather than a national total.

Do I need German to get an entry-level sales job here?

For most junior roles in DACH, yes, at least B2, because you will call German-speaking customers. Some international SaaS teams run on English, but even those usually want conversational German for the local market.

Should I apply if a role asks for one to two years of experience?

Yes, if you match most of the requirements and can show proof like a portfolio or certification. Skip roles asking for three or more years plus an existing book of business, those are realistic rejections.

Are internships and working student roles a good route in?

They are one of the strongest routes, because German employers often convert good Werkstudent or Praktikum performance into a full-time offer. Check the contract length, since some junior roles like the Bosch Group listing are fixed-term by design.

What is a realistic entry-level salary for sales in Germany?

Reported entry-level base salaries vary a lot by city, company, and commission plan, so there is no single number to trust. Ask for the base, the on-target earnings, and the quota in the first call, and verify current figures on official or union sources before you negotiate.