Key Areas for SDRS to Focus on Beyond Meetings

Fact: Outbound sales is broken. Incentives and strategies are misaligned. Tools like Salesloft and Outreach didn’t cause it. They amplified it. Now marketing and sales need to work together to fix it. The real issue is that sales managers push SDRs to prioritize volume over quality, leading to generic outreach that no one wants to read. Fixing this starts with focus. Give SDRs a small set of accounts, 30 per quarter, and tier them into A, B, and C priorities (using tools like Clay, Tofu, Unify). This makes it clear who they’re targeting and allows them to spend their time understanding the industries, companies, and people they’re reaching out to. Instead of chasing volume, they can dive deep into the problems their prospects are trying to solve. With the right tools, resources and 𝘁𝗿𝗮𝗶𝗻𝗶𝗻𝗴, SDRs can educate themselves on the pain points, motivations, and challenges of their target audience. They can craft outreach that adds value and speaks directly to what matters most. Take me as an example. If you’re reaching out to someone like me at MoEngage, don’t send lazy, cookie-cutter emails like: “Does getting more pipeline keep you up at night” “Would you be interested in getting more qualified meetings” “Do you want customer lists of your competitors?” “Are you still interested?” “I haven’t heard back. I’ll assume this isn’t a priority.” These don’t work. They’re noise. If you want my attention, show me you’ve done your homework. Understand that I’m focused on growing in North America. Recognize the challenges of expanding into a crowded market. Tell me something valuable about how companies like mine are navigating those problems and how you can help. This approach may lead to fewer meetings overall, but the meetings you get will be better. SDRs and AEs will know their audience. They’ll understand the pain points. They’ll deliver messaging that lands because it’s relevant and thoughtful. And this isn’t just a sales problem. Marketing has to help. Marketing should train SDRs and AEs with insights about the market, the ICP, and the problems worth solving. Outbound sales works best when sales and marketing are aligned, working together to get the right message in front of the right people. Stop trying to get more meetings. Focus on getting better ones.

The fastest way to stall a great SDR’s career? Promote them into an AE role based on meeting volume, not deal readiness. Too many companies treat promotions like participation trophies. “Congrats, you booked 40 meetings/month...now go run multi-stakeholder enterprise cycles.” lol that’s nonsense. Here’s what actually happens: - The newly promoted AE leans on demo theater because they never learned pain discovery. - They can’t qualify intent from interest, so the pipeline bloats and stalls. - Forecasts blow up because they don’t understand deal strategy - just meeting math. And when they miss 2 quarters in a row, they’re back on PIP, wondering what went wrong. You didn’t build a seller. You built a high output SDR who’s now drowning in expectations they were never trained to meet. And to be super duper clear: meeting count does NOT = sales readiness. Because booking a VP is not the same as selling to one. Setting the meeting is tactical. Owning the motion is strategic. And yet, most SDR promotion tracks are based on the same three metrics: - Meetings booked - Meetings held - Attitude None of which predict if someone can run discovery, align to tension, drive urgency, or close. So what should you evaluate instead? 1. Pain identification accuracy. Can they consistently surface real business pain tied to a persona’s KPIs - not just vague challenges? 2. Qualification fidelity. Do they understand what real buying signals look like (budget, timing, authority), or are they just pushing meetings? 3. Deal strategy participation. Have they shadowed multiple opportunities, participated in stage planning, or contributed to next step design? 4. Persona messaging depth. Can they adapt messaging across industries, roles, and verticals...or are they still templating everything? 5. Critical thinking under pressure. Have they handled objections live? Navigated gatekeepers? Found creative ways into accounts? If they’ve never been in uncomfortable situations, they’re not ready for AE friction. Promotions should be based on pattern recognition. Not just output. Not “Who books the most?” But “Who thinks like a seller?” Your AE attrition problem isn’t a comp issue. It’s a pipeline of underprepared SDRs thrown into enterprise cycles with zero reps under pressure. Stop building an AE graveyard.

I'll say it once...and I'll say it forever...if you're leading an SDR team / department and you're NOT paying attention to what happens with your team's work after they hand it off to AEs... You're relegating your team / department to a support function rather than a strategic one... SDRs can't keep being appointment setters while prospective buyers are more discerning and more risk averse than ever And just tossing meetings and opps over the fence that meet "qualification criteria" isn't going to cut it unless your company is signing contracts like there's no tomorrow ➡️ Take into consideration what sales deems as "quality pipeline" (*cough* it's likely more than just persona + need *cough*) ➡️ Identify how your team can support sales in getting 1 step closer to "quality pipeline" (within reason) ➡️ Set benchmarks for conversion rates towards "quality pipeline" standard ➡️ Partner with sales and sales enablement to come up with a playbook for SDRs and AEs on best practices to hit "quality pipeline" standard ➡️ Make sure everyone -- AEs, SDRs, AE managers, SDR managers, etc -- knows what quality is and isn't, and coaches/reinforces to that standards; consider discovery scorecards, next step sequences, plays for objections during discovery, etc ➡️ Leverage data to identify what needs the most work and what must be true to improve, i.e. further coaching, enablement, disposition training, tactic, campaigns, etc

I almost fired our best SDR last year. It wasn’t personal. He was a good guy, worked hard, and always showed up on time. But month after month, his numbers weren’t improving. Emails went unanswered. Calls never connected. Demos? Non-existent. We were both frustrated. I started to wonder if he was the problem. Maybe sales wasn’t his thing? Then one afternoon, we grabbed coffee. Instead of talking numbers, we talked openly. I asked him straight-up: “Why isn’t it working?” He took a deep breath and replied: “I’m following our playbook. I send hundreds of emails, but honestly, I’m just guessing. I don’t really know who’s ready to talk, so I try everyone.” It hit me like a ton of bricks. We’d built a system based on volume and hope, not precision. It wasn’t him. it was us. We’d given him the wrong tools, the wrong strategy. So instead of letting him go, we completely changed how we did outbound. We stopped guessing. We started paying attention to signals: Who’s visiting our LinkedIn profiles? (Tracked via Teamfluence™) Who’s engaging silently with our posts? (Tracked via Clay) Who’s spending serious time on our website? (Tracked via RB2B) Suddenly, our SDR wasn’t sending cold messages. He was following signals that said, “Hey, I’m interested. Talk to me.” Within a month, his reply rate doubled. In two months, he became our top performer. Today, he leads our outbound team. It wasn’t about effort. It was about timing and having a system that showed him exactly when to reach out and who to reach out to. Outbound isn’t about sending more messages. It’s about knowing exactly when and how to engage. If your SDRs are struggling, ask yourself: Are they failing you or are you failing them? It might change your perspective. It certainly changed ours. #Outbound #SalesLeadership #SDRlife #RevOps #LinkedInSales #SalesLessons #GTMStrategy #B2BSaaS #SmartSelling #GTMEngineering #AIOutbound #Teamfluence #Clay

Two SDRs. Same meeting. Very different results. 𝗦𝗗𝗥 𝗔 𝗯𝗼𝗼𝗸𝗲𝗱 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗺𝗲𝗲𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴. AE ran the call. Prospect showed interest. Meeting ended. SDR moved on. Next account. Next task. 𝗦𝗗𝗥 𝗕 𝗮𝗹𝘀𝗼 𝗯𝗼𝗼𝗸𝗲𝗱 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗺𝗲𝗲𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴. Also attended. Also took notes. But after the call? They did this: → Re-read their notes for stakeholder clues → Highlighted key priorities the AE uncovered → Identified 2 senior leaders tied to the initiative → Built a mini follow-up sequence tailored to those leaders → Referenced the meeting: “We just spoke with [Name] re: X...” One of those leaders replied. Took a call. Opened the deal up faster and wider. Most SDRs stop at the meeting. Top SDRs expand pipeline from it. Book the meeting. Then build on it. That’s how you get ahead.