Sales Development Representative

Overview

You book meetings for AEs by prospecting into RevOps, Sales Ops, and GTM leaders at B2B companies. You qualify inbound leads from content downloads, product sign-ups, and partnerships, plus do targeted outbound to mid-market and enterprise accounts. You're researching companies to understand their GTM motion and current tech stack before reaching out - this isn't high-volume smile-and-dial.

Role Snapshot

Company Context

Stage: Series B ($52.9M raised, $300M valuation)

Size: 146 employees

Growth: Actively hiring, VP RevOps posting about company "ready to explode in 2026" - likely ramping SDR team to support growth

Market Position: Challenger in signal detection/GTM intelligence space - not as well-known as 6sense/Demandbase, so you're educating buyers on the category

Employee Sentiment: Mixed on Glassdoor - some negative reviews specifically mentioning Sales/CS culture. Recent reviews more positive but worth noting.

GTM Reality

Pipeline Sources You Handle:

• 50% Inbound - Content downloads (whitepapers on signal detection), product sign-ups (they likely have free trial or limited free tier), partnership leads, webinar attendees. Quality varies - some tire-kickers, some legit buyers.
• 50% Outbound - You're given target account lists (companies with 50+ person sales teams, Series B+ stage) and you research + reach out to ops leaders. This is strategic, not spray-and-pray.

Your Outreach Mix:

• 40% Email sequences (personalized, not templates)
• 35% LinkedIn messages and engagement
• 15% Phone (warm calls to people who engaged, or direct dials to high-priority accounts)
• 10% Creative outreach (video messages, relevant articles, following up on news/hiring signals)

Tools You Use: Salesforce, Outreach/Salesloft, LinkedIn Sales Nav, maybe their own product (Common Room) to find signals on target accounts, ZoomInfo/Apollo for contact data

Competitive Landscape

Main Competitors: 6sense, Demandbase, ZoomInfo, Apollo, Pocus

Your Challenge: Prospects already get hit up by signal/intent vendors constantly. Many already use one of the big names. You need to articulate why Common Room is different (all-in-one vs point solution, better signal coverage).

Common Responses: "We already use 6sense," "Send me info" (brush-off), "Not a priority right now," "I need to talk to my team" (translation: not interested but too polite to say no)

What You'll Actually Do

Time Breakdown

Account Research (30%) | Email/LinkedIn Outreach (35%) | Calls (15%) | Inbound Follow-up (10%) | Internal Syncs (10%)

Key Activities

• Account Research: You look up companies on target list - what's their GTM motion? How big is their sales team? What tools do they use (check job postings, tech stack websites)? Are they hiring? Any recent funding/news? You're building context before reaching out. This takes 15-20 min per account if done right.
• Personalized Outbound: You're not blasting generic emails. You write 20-30 personalized emails per day referencing specific details - "Saw you're hiring 5 SDRs, curious how you're currently routing intent signals to them..." First email is research-heavy, follow-ups are shorter.
• LinkedIn Engagement: You comment on ops leaders' posts, engage with their content, send connection requests with context. Then send message once connected. This is a slow burn - takes weeks to get responses.
• Inbound Qualification: Someone downloads a guide or signs up for trial. You call/email within 5 minutes (if it's working hours). You ask discovery questions: "What made you check us out? What tools are you using today? Who else is involved in evaluating this?" Lots of tire-kickers - people just browsing, not actually in-market.
• Re-engaging No-Shows: You book a meeting, prospect doesn't show. You follow up: "Hey, noticed you couldn't make it..." Happens constantly. Maybe 30% of booked meetings no-show on first attempt.
• Dealing with Gatekeepers: Ops leaders are busy and protective of their time. Executive assistants screen. You get a lot of "Send me an email" brush-offs. You need to be persistent but not annoying.
• Weekly Pipeline Reviews: SDR manager reviews your pipeline of prospects, asks about stalled conversations, tells you to focus on higher-quality accounts vs chasing low-intent leads.

The Honest Reality

What's Hard

• Response Rates Are Low: Even with personalized outreach, you'll get 2-5% response rates on cold emails. Maybe 10-15% on warm LinkedIn outreach. You send 100 emails, get 3 replies, 1 meeting. That's normal. It's a grind.
• Ops Buyers Are Skeptical: They get pitched constantly by sales tech vendors. They're not excited to take exploratory calls. You need a strong hook - a specific problem or insight, not just "Want to see our platform?"
• Educating on Category: Common Room isn't as well-known as 6sense. You spend time explaining what customer intelligence/signal detection even means. Some prospects don't know they have this problem yet.
• Inbound Quality Is Mixed: You get excited about an inbound lead, then discover it's a student researching for a project, or someone at a 5-person startup with no budget. Lots of time wasted on disqualification.
• Metrics Pressure: You're tracked on activities (emails sent, calls made, LinkedIn touches) AND outcomes (meetings booked, meetings held). Miss your meeting quota two months in a row and you're on a plan. It's very numbers-driven.

What Success Looks Like

• Booking 12-15 qualified meetings per month consistently (qualified = right ICP, actual budget/authority, real problem)
• 65-70% of your booked meetings actually happen (no-show rate under 35%)
• AEs accepting 80%+ of your meetings as properly qualified (not complaining that leads are junk)
• Converting 3-5% of your outbound outreach to meetings (top performers hit 5-8%)

Who You're Selling To

Primary Targets:

• Director/VP of Revenue Operations (best fit - owns GTM tools and data)
• Director/VP of Sales Operations
• VP of Sales or CRO (harder to reach but can fast-track deals)
• Head of Sales Enablement (sometimes owns GTM tools)

What Gets Their Attention:

• Specific Pain Points: "Saw you're hiring 10 AEs - how are you planning to get them pipeline fast?" or "Noticed your team uses 6sense - curious if you're seeing gaps in coverage on product usage signals?"
• Relevant Insights: Sharing something they didn't know - a signal source they're missing, a workflow improvement, benchmark data
• Not Wasting Their Time: Clear, concise asks. "15 min to show you how [specific outcome]" not "Let's explore how we can help your team"
• Proof: Mentioning similar companies that use Common Room, specific results ("Helped [company] identify 40% more in-market accounts")

Requirements

• 0-2 years in SDR/BDR role (or this is your first SDR role)
• Comfortable with low response rates and lots of rejection - you can't take "no" or silence personally
• Strong writing skills - your emails need to be clear, personalized, and compelling in 3-4 sentences
• Research skills - you need to enjoy digging into companies to find relevant hooks
• Coachable - you'll get feedback on messaging, call recordings, email copy. You need to iterate fast.
• Self-motivated - this isn't a call center with a manager standing over you. You manage your own day/pipeline.
• Curious about sales tech - you should generally understand what a CRM, sales engagement platform, and intent data are (or be eager to learn)