Overview
You identify and reach out to companies that own commercial solar installations to book meetings for Account Executives. This means researching solar asset owners (often hidden in holding companies), cold calling facility managers and finance teams, and explaining why they should consider switching from their current O&M provider to Omnidian's performance assurance platform.
Role Snapshot
| Aspect | Details |
|---|---|
| Role Type | Outbound SDR |
| Sales Motion | Outbound-heavy (70%+ cold outreach) |
| Deal Complexity | Lead qualification for consultative sales |
| Sales Cycle | N/A (you book meetings, not close deals) |
| Deal Size | N/A (upstream from deals) |
| Quota (est.) | 15-20 qualified meetings per month |
Company Context
Stage: Growth-stage (302 employees, expanding GTM team)
Size: 302 employees
Growth: Hiring for multiple GTM roles; building out SDR function to feed growing AE team
Market Position: Challenger in fragmented solar O&M market; creating category around "performance assurance" vs basic maintenance
GTM Reality
Pipeline Sources:
- 70% Cold Outbound - You're building lists from solar installation databases, LinkedIn, and trade show attendee lists; reaching out cold
- 20% Warm Outbound - Following up on trade show scans, webinar attendees, and content downloads from marketing
- 10% Inbound - Handful of inbound demo requests from website that you qualify and pass to AEs
SDR/AE Structure: Dedicated SDR team feeding AEs (likely 3-4:1 SDR to AE ratio)
Tools: Outreach/Salesloft for sequences, ZoomInfo or similar for contact data, HubSpot or Salesforce CRM
Competitive Landscape
Main Competitors: In-house O&M teams (biggest competitor), regional solar maintenance contractors, EPC-bundled O&M services
How They Differentiate: AI-powered monitoring vs reactive maintenance, national tech network vs local-only coverage
Common Objections: "We already have someone," "Not looking to change right now," "Send me info" (brush-off)
Your Job: Find people dissatisfied with current O&M or in evaluation mode for new assets
What You'll Actually Do
Time Breakdown
Cold Calling (40%) | Research/List Building (25%) | Email Sequences (20%) | Admin/Meetings (15%)
Key Activities
- Prospecting research: Digging through solar project databases, county records, and LinkedIn to find who owns commercial solar assets and identify the right contact (not easy - ownership often buried in LLCs and holding companies)
- Cold calling: 50-70 dials per day to facility managers, directors of operations, and asset management teams; most voicemails, occasional conversations, rare immediate interest
- Email sequences: Writing personalized emails referencing their specific solar installations; following up on cold calls with "saw we missed each other" emails; A/B testing subject lines
- Qualification calls: When someone responds, asking questions about their current O&M setup, asset size, pain points, and timeline to determine if they're worth an AE's time
The Honest Reality
What's Hard
- Finding the right contact is half the battle: Solar assets are often owned through complex corporate structures. You'll spend hours figuring out that "Sunshine Holdings LLC" is actually owned by a private equity fund, and then finding who at the fund manages those assets.
- Low connect rates: Commercial solar isn't sexy. You're calling busy ops managers who don't take unsolicited calls. Expect 5-10% connect rate on dials, and many of those are "not interested."
- Long nurture cycles: Even interested prospects aren't ready to talk for 3-6 months. You're planting seeds and staying in touch, not booking meetings this week from this week's calls.
- Technical credibility gap: You're entry-level but need to sound credible about solar performance monitoring to facility managers who've been in energy for 20 years. There's a learning curve.
What Success Looks Like
- Book 15-20 qualified meetings per month that AEs accept (some will get rejected as not qualified)
- Generate 4-5 SQLs per month that turn into real pipeline for AEs
- Maintain activity metrics: 250+ dials/week, 100+ emails sent, consistent follow-up cadence
Who You're Calling
Primary Targets:
- Directors of Operations or Facility Managers at companies with on-site solar (manufacturing plants, distribution centers, corporate campuses)
- Asset Managers at solar investment funds and independent power producers
- Project Managers at solar developers who own/operate assets post-construction
What They Care About:
- Uptime and performance: Is their solar producing what it should be? Are they losing money to downtime?
- Hassle-free maintenance: Do they have reliable local techs, or are they scrambling when inverters fail?
- Reporting for stakeholders: Can they easily show their CFO or investors how the solar assets are performing?
Requirements
- 0-2 years sales experience (entry-level or career-changer friendly)
- Grit and resilience (lots of rejection and gatekeepers)
- Research skills and comfort with ambiguity (you'll be finding contacts manually)
- Willingness to learn technical concepts (solar energy basics, how O&M works)
- Coachability and process discipline (hitting activity metrics, following cadences)