Overview
You're the first point of contact for enterprise prospects, cold calling procurement directors and supply chain VPs to book demos for an AI-powered procurement platform. You work remotely, managing your own schedule while hitting activity and meeting quotas. You're selling into a relatively new category (AI for procurement), which means you'll spend time educating buyers on what's possible before you can even pitch your specific product.
Role Snapshot
| Aspect | Details |
|---|---|
| Role Type | Outbound BDR - booking qualified demos for AEs |
| Sales Motion | Outbound-heavy - mostly cold calling and sequencing |
| Deal Complexity | Enterprise - selling to procurement/supply chain leadership |
| Sales Cycle | N/A - you hand off after demo is booked |
| Deal Size | Unknown - likely $50K+ ACV based on enterprise focus |
| Quota (est.) | 15-20 qualified meetings/month |
Company Context
Stage: Early-stage (funding unknown - appears pre-Series A based on size)
Size: 20 employees
Growth: Actively hiring for BDR role, leadership has track record of scaling companies
Market Position: Category creator/early mover - AI for procurement is emerging space
GTM Reality
Pipeline Sources:
- 90% Outbound - you're building lists, cold calling, running email/LinkedIn sequences
- 10% Inbound - minimal at this stage; mostly people who heard about them through network
- 0% Partners/Referrals - too early for meaningful channel motion
SDR/AE Structure: You're the BDR feeding meetings to AEs. Likely 1-2 AEs at this company size.
SE Support: Unknown - may have technical founders doing early demos, or AEs handle their own.
Competitive Landscape
Main Competitors: Traditional procurement software (Coupa, SAP Ariba) plus newer AI entrants (unknown specific competitors)
How They Differentiate: Predictive AI angle - forecasting procurement needs vs just managing existing processes
Common Objections:
- "We already have a procurement system"
- "What does AI actually do that we can't do manually?"
- "Our team isn't ready for this level of automation"
- "Too early in our AI journey"
Win Themes: Measurable ROI from prediction accuracy, reduces manual forecasting work, prevents stockouts/overstock
What You'll Actually Do
Time Breakdown
Prospecting (60%) | Follow-up/Nurture (25%) | Internal/Admin (15%)
Key Activities
- Cold calling: 50-70 calls per day to procurement directors, supply chain VPs, operations leaders. Most don't pick up. You leave voicemails and send follow-up emails. You're looking for anyone willing to take a 15-minute discovery call.
- Email/LinkedIn sequences: Researching companies, personalizing outreach based on their industry/challenges, running multi-touch campaigns. You're trying to break through the noise in crowded inboxes.
- Discovery/qualification calls: When someone bites, you spend 15-20 minutes understanding their procurement challenges, team size, current tools, and whether they're actually in-market or just curious. Then you try to book them for an AE demo.
- List building and research: Finding target accounts that fit your ICP (enterprise companies with complex supply chains), identifying the right contacts, enriching data in your CRM.
The Honest Reality
What's Hard
- Category education burden: You're not just selling your product - you're selling the concept of AI-powered procurement. Many prospects don't understand what predictive AI means or why they need it. Lots of calls die at "we're not ready for AI."
- Rejection volume: You'll get hung up on, ignored, and told "not interested" 40+ times per day. Procurement people are bombarded by vendors. Breaking through requires persistence and thick skin.
- Remote autonomy challenge: No one's watching you dial. You need serious self-discipline to hit 50-70 calls when you're working from home. Easy to get distracted or demoralized after a string of bad calls.
- Long feedback loops: You book a meeting, hand it off, and often don't hear whether it turned into an opportunity for weeks. Hard to know if you're qualifying well or wasting AE time.
What Success Looks Like
- Booking 15-20 qualified meetings per month that show up and convert to opportunities at >50% rate
- Maintaining 50+ calls/day and 100+ personalized emails/week consistently
- AEs tell you your meetings are well-qualified and prospects are engaged
- You start learning the procurement space well enough to have credible conversations with VPs
Who You're Selling To
Primary Buyers:
- VP/Director of Procurement (enterprise companies)
- VP Supply Chain / Operations
- Occasionally CFOs at mid-market companies
What They Care About:
- Cost savings and budget predictability
- Reducing manual forecasting work and spreadsheet hell
- Preventing stockouts or excess inventory
- ROI proof - they need to see measurable improvement
- Implementation complexity - they're skeptical of "AI magic" that requires massive change management
Requirements
- College degree
- 1-2 years BDR experience in SaaS (they want someone who's already proven they can hit quota)
- Proven success metrics/cadence (you need to show call volume, meeting rates, conversion data)
- Can work autonomously in remote setting (self-starter who doesn't need hand-holding)
- Comfortable with cold calling and high rejection volume
- Willing to learn a technical/enterprise category (procurement + AI)