SDR Leader / SDR Manager

Overview

You're Chamber Media's first SDR leader, responsible for building their outbound sales motion from the ground up. You'll manage a small SDR team (probably 2-4 people to start) while still carrying your own quota. You're targeting CMOs, VPs of Marketing, and Growth leaders at $10M-100M+ ecommerce brands and B2B companies, trying to book qualified discovery calls about their performance marketing services.

Role Snapshot

Company Context

Stage: Bootstrapped or early-stage (44 employees, no public funding info)

Size: 44 employees

Growth: Hiring their first SDR leader indicates they're ready to scale beyond founder-led sales and referrals

Market Position: One of many performance marketing agencies - differentiation is their focus on performance creative + paid media together, and their claim of $1B in tracked revenue

GTM Reality

Pipeline Sources:

• 0% Inbound currently (or minimal) - they're hiring you because they need outbound
• 100% Outbound - you're building cold email sequences, LinkedIn outreach, cold calling
• Some referrals/word-of-mouth from existing clients

SDR/AE Structure: You'll be building this. Likely founder or VP still closing deals initially, then they'll hire AEs once pipeline is consistent.

Current State: They've been growing through referrals and founder networks. Now they want predictable pipeline. You're implementing systems, tools (Outreach/Apollo/etc.), building lists, and hiring/training SDRs.

Competitive Landscape

Main Competitors: Tons of performance marketing agencies (Tinuiti, Wpromote, Metric Theory, etc.) plus in-house teams at larger brands

How They Differentiate: They emphasize performance creative (300K+ video ads produced) paired with media buying, not just ad management. They talk about "performance funnels" and claim 30% ROAS improvement.

Common Objections:

• "We have an in-house team already"
• "We're working with [another agency]"
• "We're not looking to switch right now"
• "How are you different from the 10 other agencies that reached out?"

Win Themes: Track record with similar brands, creative + media buying integration, specific ROAS improvements they can show

What You'll Actually Do

Time Breakdown

Building Outbound Systems (30%) | Personal Prospecting (30%) | Managing Team (25%) | Internal Meetings (15%)

Key Activities

• Building the outbound machine: Setting up sequences in Outreach/Salesloft, building target account lists in Apollo or ZoomInfo, writing cold email copy that gets replies, defining what a "qualified meeting" means, and creating the handoff process to AEs.

• Personal prospecting: You're still hitting your own number - 50-70 cold emails/day, 20-30 LinkedIn messages, probably some cold calls. You're targeting marketing leaders at ecommerce and B2B companies doing $10M+ in revenue. Most don't respond. You're trying to book 5-8 meetings/week yourself.

• Managing SDRs: Daily standups, reviewing their messaging, listening to calls, coaching on objection handling, tracking their metrics (emails sent, reply rate, meeting rate). You're hiring, onboarding, and potentially firing if someone isn't cutting it.

• Cross-functional work: Weekly pipeline reviews with sales leadership, aligning with marketing (if they have one) on ICP, working with ops on tech stack and reporting, and constantly tweaking messaging based on what's working.

The Honest Reality

What's Hard

• You're building from zero: No playbook, no proven sequences, no historical data on what works. You're figuring it out as you go. If you've only worked at companies with established SDR orgs, this will be a shock.

• Services selling is tough outbound: Unlike SaaS where you can show a demo, you're selling a relationship and results. Getting someone to take a call about switching agencies is hard - most are locked into annual contracts or happy enough with current setup.

• You're still a rep: 50% player means you can't just manage - you need to hit your own number while also building the function. When your SDRs are struggling, you can't just coach, you have to cover their pipeline too.

• Agency churn: Performance marketing agencies lose clients. If they're hiring you to build pipeline, it might be because retention isn't where it needs to be. You'll be filling a leaky bucket until they fix delivery/results.

What Success Looks Like

• Your team books 15-25 qualified meetings/month consistently within 6 months
• Meeting-to-opportunity conversion rate is 30%+ (meaning AEs think your meetings are actually qualified)
• You've hired and ramped 2-4 SDRs who hit quota
• You've documented a repeatable playbook: ICP, target titles, messaging, sequences that work

Who You're Selling To

Primary Buyers:

• CMOs and VPs of Marketing at $10M-100M ecommerce brands
• Growth/Performance Marketing Directors at B2B SaaS companies
• Occasionally founders at smaller but fast-growing DTC brands

What They Care About:

• ROAS and CAC - can you prove you'll improve their unit economics?
• Creative refresh - are their ads stale? Can you produce better performing creative?
• Whether you understand their specific vertical (they're tired of generic agency pitches)
• Case studies from similar brands - they want proof you've done this before

Requirements

• 3+ years as an SDR/BDR, with at least 1-2 years managing or leading SDRs
• You've built outbound from scratch before, or at least owned a territory/segment independently
• Experience in B2B services or agency selling (not just SaaS product demos)
• You're comfortable being hands-on - this isn't a pure management role
• You can hire, train, and hold people accountable to metrics
• You're okay with ambiguity - there's no playbook to follow here