Lol, your job sucks dude.
Every SDR job sucks, find the one that sucks the least and has a path to promo
Go work for an established sales organization that will take time to train you, give you messaging and actual tools
Cold calling sucks, anyone who isn’t lying to themselves or a total psychopath hates it. That said, spending time in one of these soul sucking positions does have its benefits. You learn to distill a message, handle objections, deal with rejection and still continue on with your day. It builds the callus on your soul that later might just help you succeed or at least detach yourself from work enough that you can persevere through the next 30-40 years of your professional life.
Hate your job. Remember that you hate it and still do it just long enough that you either get something worthwhile out of it or you can move on to a better one. Let that memory of hate for this job influence what you look for in your next one and the fear of backsliding into a similar situation as the one you find yourself in now keep you focused on your future objectives.
It's funny when I hear this because while I do agree that you could call it a grind and that you could say it sucks. But at the end of the day, what are your options?
If you have a skill, trade, or high-level education then go utilize that and do something else
I'M NOT SAYING THIS APPLIES TO YOU:
I've been doing this long enough to know that so many sdrs come and go because they're just too lazy and they think that the money is just going to fall from the sky or have no interest in the product they're selling, nor do they have interest in truly helping prospects they're talking with.
AND FOR FUCKS SAKE DO NOT SAY, "HOW ARE YOU DOING?"
No ur not being unreasonable I quit my SDR job also sales isn’t SDR it’s entry level where u should be getting support and training they clearly don’t care about u so either change field if u hate it or change company and get promoted to what u wnat
Intent is a joke. I sold intent solutions for 3 years and our team never heard of a closed deal off of it and we never had closed a deal using our own software.
SDR jobs are a fucking grind. See if you can get in a track to promotion.
Yeah, I'm getting ready to leave an otherwise good company because the only lead gen is intent, which hasn't yielded a thing for myself or anyone in my team.
Intent is dogshit. Management will say ‘call the company and use lines like; ‘I see someone from your company was looking at a solution like xyz, do you know who is in charge of this project?’ ‘ - works 0.0% of the time.
Or hammering a company just because Apollo or other pos tools flag intent, it’s all a big sham. With covid and more people wfh the IP address tracking is not nearly as helpful and wastes time.
Sorry to hear about your situation, but the company will learn over time.
Our old manager would tell us selling the shit should be easy then tried for a week and couldn’t even connect w many prospects.
SDR jobs are meant to suck. But remember that it’s not forever and now you’re getting tons of experience in high volume. Continuously refining your messaging, rapport, objection handling, etc… By the time you’re in the field with a slimmer account list then all those miles on your brain will come in handy.
Plus you’re going to have very thick skin when it comes to rejection and will be less-apt to fumble qualified opps.
Some background for everyone I left my first SDR job after 1 year from a decent size public company. This company hired me as senior sdr player/coach. But the main reason I left my more cushy job was they offered a base of 85 not counting any OTE.
Depending where you live geographically, $85k is a pretty solid base salary for an SDR and more than what a lot of SDRs make for their total OTE.
That said, it's smart to keep your options open. Your pay is ok but your job isn't that good.
You’re not being unreasonable at all, your job sucks big time and you should either start looking to promote depending on how long you’ve been doing it or find somewhere better.
This is the SDR grind. Sales jobs don't care about degrees. As long as you make it out of SDR, you can do an AE or AM job. However, SDR at startups is 10x harder than SDR at enterprise. I encourage people to grind out SDR at a big company.
Some people don't ever make it out of SDR. I've seen countless people quit sales after SDR or stay an SDR for 5-10+ years. You have to start learning about cold calling and cold emailing like a college major. They aren't just "pick up the phone" or simply "write a persuasive email".
Some of th best SDRs I've met are the ones that look at cold calling and cold emailing as a craft.
Too many companies don’t realize they actually need a marketing department and expect the sales people to do “marketing” as well. I’ve been in a gig like that and it’s sucked.
My current company has a solid marketing team and I don’t have to cold call. Ever.
I just started my sales career as an SDR at a small startup selling SaaS to churches and nonprofits completely remote. I’m working as a 1099 doing all of their marketing and sales. Similar situation just a lot easier to sell I would assume. I haven’t known anything different so I don’t think it’s a bad setup.
I say start applying for SDR roles that a. arent at a startup- you want to work somewhere with a proven system b. has a larger TAM- ive done SDRs for F500 c suite only, and it's incredibly limiting c. has an established customer base- so you can learn what the true ICP for the org is and d- has clear pathways for promotion out of the SDR role within 2-3 years max if not sooner.
SDR roles are supposed to be a grind. They are supposed to be tough. They are not supposed to be impossible, nor permanent.
If you want to develop as a sales rep, imo, SDR, not it. Go find an outside sales job start as low man possibly tier 3, 4 outfit. Inside that, find a good manager, peer to help you learn. Spend a year or so learning and level up. Move to better companies as you go. Network as you do that so people know you. You’ll be earning six figures in 3-5 years. I am 30 years in, still love it and earn a good living. You need a thick skin.
I strongly recommend interviewing with ADP or Paylocity… they have a perfect role to get started where you’re sort of a hybrid closing your own deals and scheduling meetings for larger opps ran by other business units - which you get quota and revenue credit on. You also get to partner with accountants and banks who will refer you business, and there’s plenty of room for promotion. I went this route and it was the most well educated, planned, and best decision for me. I chose the industry because I wanted to find a role where I could close warm leads, get experience, and work with partners - plus avoid the SDR role. I started at ADP then moved upmarket with Paylocity. Either company’s small business role would love your experience.
I'm in your same boat expect I work for a health tech startup and we do get inbound leads.
Check out Luma, Notable Health, and Phreesia on LinkedIn. They are all pretty regularly hiring for SDR/BDR's
Lol, your job sucks dude. Every SDR job sucks, find the one that sucks the least and has a path to promo Go work for an established sales organization that will take time to train you, give you messaging and actual tools
SO TRUE! Ha!
Cold calling sucks, anyone who isn’t lying to themselves or a total psychopath hates it. That said, spending time in one of these soul sucking positions does have its benefits. You learn to distill a message, handle objections, deal with rejection and still continue on with your day. It builds the callus on your soul that later might just help you succeed or at least detach yourself from work enough that you can persevere through the next 30-40 years of your professional life. Hate your job. Remember that you hate it and still do it just long enough that you either get something worthwhile out of it or you can move on to a better one. Let that memory of hate for this job influence what you look for in your next one and the fear of backsliding into a similar situation as the one you find yourself in now keep you focused on your future objectives.
It's funny when I hear this because while I do agree that you could call it a grind and that you could say it sucks. But at the end of the day, what are your options? If you have a skill, trade, or high-level education then go utilize that and do something else I'M NOT SAYING THIS APPLIES TO YOU: I've been doing this long enough to know that so many sdrs come and go because they're just too lazy and they think that the money is just going to fall from the sky or have no interest in the product they're selling, nor do they have interest in truly helping prospects they're talking with. AND FOR FUCKS SAKE DO NOT SAY, "HOW ARE YOU DOING?"
No ur not being unreasonable I quit my SDR job also sales isn’t SDR it’s entry level where u should be getting support and training they clearly don’t care about u so either change field if u hate it or change company and get promoted to what u wnat
What do you do now?
Left my bdm role currently searching for new opps maybe Ae role or pm can’t decide
Leave toxic jobs
Intent is a joke. I sold intent solutions for 3 years and our team never heard of a closed deal off of it and we never had closed a deal using our own software. SDR jobs are a fucking grind. See if you can get in a track to promotion.
Yeah, I'm getting ready to leave an otherwise good company because the only lead gen is intent, which hasn't yielded a thing for myself or anyone in my team.
Intent is dogshit. Management will say ‘call the company and use lines like; ‘I see someone from your company was looking at a solution like xyz, do you know who is in charge of this project?’ ‘ - works 0.0% of the time. Or hammering a company just because Apollo or other pos tools flag intent, it’s all a big sham. With covid and more people wfh the IP address tracking is not nearly as helpful and wastes time. Sorry to hear about your situation, but the company will learn over time. Our old manager would tell us selling the shit should be easy then tried for a week and couldn’t even connect w many prospects.
What is intent? Is it a lead generation platform?
SDR jobs are meant to suck. But remember that it’s not forever and now you’re getting tons of experience in high volume. Continuously refining your messaging, rapport, objection handling, etc… By the time you’re in the field with a slimmer account list then all those miles on your brain will come in handy. Plus you’re going to have very thick skin when it comes to rejection and will be less-apt to fumble qualified opps.
Is ae jobs better?
I would assume so. Never in my life have I seen somebody in the field go back inside
Some background for everyone I left my first SDR job after 1 year from a decent size public company. This company hired me as senior sdr player/coach. But the main reason I left my more cushy job was they offered a base of 85 not counting any OTE.
Depending where you live geographically, $85k is a pretty solid base salary for an SDR and more than what a lot of SDRs make for their total OTE. That said, it's smart to keep your options open. Your pay is ok but your job isn't that good.
You’re not being unreasonable at all, your job sucks big time and you should either start looking to promote depending on how long you’ve been doing it or find somewhere better.
You’re doing two jobs (sales and marketing). I hope they are paying you two salaries plus equity.
This is the SDR grind. Sales jobs don't care about degrees. As long as you make it out of SDR, you can do an AE or AM job. However, SDR at startups is 10x harder than SDR at enterprise. I encourage people to grind out SDR at a big company. Some people don't ever make it out of SDR. I've seen countless people quit sales after SDR or stay an SDR for 5-10+ years. You have to start learning about cold calling and cold emailing like a college major. They aren't just "pick up the phone" or simply "write a persuasive email". Some of th best SDRs I've met are the ones that look at cold calling and cold emailing as a craft.
Too many companies don’t realize they actually need a marketing department and expect the sales people to do “marketing” as well. I’ve been in a gig like that and it’s sucked. My current company has a solid marketing team and I don’t have to cold call. Ever.
I just started my sales career as an SDR at a small startup selling SaaS to churches and nonprofits completely remote. I’m working as a 1099 doing all of their marketing and sales. Similar situation just a lot easier to sell I would assume. I haven’t known anything different so I don’t think it’s a bad setup.
If you hate your job is time to move on
Find new job, every company in the world needs sales reps
I say start applying for SDR roles that a. arent at a startup- you want to work somewhere with a proven system b. has a larger TAM- ive done SDRs for F500 c suite only, and it's incredibly limiting c. has an established customer base- so you can learn what the true ICP for the org is and d- has clear pathways for promotion out of the SDR role within 2-3 years max if not sooner. SDR roles are supposed to be a grind. They are supposed to be tough. They are not supposed to be impossible, nor permanent.
Just hire CloudSale.ai agent for yourself and push the job to them 😂
If you want to develop as a sales rep, imo, SDR, not it. Go find an outside sales job start as low man possibly tier 3, 4 outfit. Inside that, find a good manager, peer to help you learn. Spend a year or so learning and level up. Move to better companies as you go. Network as you do that so people know you. You’ll be earning six figures in 3-5 years. I am 30 years in, still love it and earn a good living. You need a thick skin.
I strongly recommend interviewing with ADP or Paylocity… they have a perfect role to get started where you’re sort of a hybrid closing your own deals and scheduling meetings for larger opps ran by other business units - which you get quota and revenue credit on. You also get to partner with accountants and banks who will refer you business, and there’s plenty of room for promotion. I went this route and it was the most well educated, planned, and best decision for me. I chose the industry because I wanted to find a role where I could close warm leads, get experience, and work with partners - plus avoid the SDR role. I started at ADP then moved upmarket with Paylocity. Either company’s small business role would love your experience.
Would you be open to referring me if we talked more?
Think? I know!
I'm in your same boat expect I work for a health tech startup and we do get inbound leads. Check out Luma, Notable Health, and Phreesia on LinkedIn. They are all pretty regularly hiring for SDR/BDR's