Sales
September 22, 2022

Best Practices for SDRs

Best Practices for SDRs

You need an SDR when you are finalizing a deal with a client. So, you must understand an SDR’s role and how best to utilize one. Following are the best ways to use SDR to help you boost your sales career.

What Are SDRs?

It is best to ask what SDRs are equipped with. They come with helpful, well-researched information about a potential client. Because of this, they know how to steer the conversation towards not only new sales but also the accumulation of new prospects.

The acronym SDR stands for Sales Development Representatives. You may have also heard of them by another name: Business Development Representatives (BDRs). They are in charge of finding new prospects instead of simply sticking with closing new deals. So, they differ from salespeople who focus on meeting a quota by utilizing the existing sales database.

SDRs take it further by reaching out to new leads and pushing them further across the sales funnel.

What Do SDRs Usually Do to Reach Their Goal?

SDRs send emails to prospects. They also make cold calls, knowing exactly what to say, having been backed up with proper research. Because they know what they are doing, they can get the prospective clients open for talks with someone who can close the deal.

Since SDRs are searching for new leads, your sales team can focus on working on the qualified leads and getting them to close the deals and achieve the company’s targets.

What Is the Role of an SDR?

As you can see, having an SDR can make workflow more efficient. Your company’s employees will not be run ragged. The sales team does not have to double as the prospect hunters.

However, an SDR’s role is also not one-dimensional either. In fact, prospecting can go two ways: inbound or outbound.

SDRs take care of leads that have already shown interest in your products and services. These people have already engaged with your posts on various marketing channels.

They know how to create contacts via various media types, including phone, email, or social media. So, they can follow up with anyone interested in their services. Their media posts provide information on what the products or services are all about. Still, they can provide answers to further queries.

However, that is not where their role stops. They can also perform cold prospecting. This means they can reach out to prospective clients who have never engaged with the company.

If you hire an SDR for your company, they will take care to thoroughly understand the business model to see where it would be a good fit. They will also educate potential leads about how your solution can help them. They know how to bridge the gap.

So, SDRs sound like the perfect solution to your business needs. However, there are good ones and bad ones, as well. You must know which SDRs follow the best practices.

Here are some of the best SDR practices out there:

Understanding Current Customers

While it’s true that SDRs are trying to reach out to new leads, they must first understand the current customers.

They must know what the current customers like about the product. So, they carry these insights when outbound prospecting to ensure happy customers.

Work with a Good Quality List

A good SDR strategy begins with the admin. SDRs should not be weighed down with a long, mixed-quality list.

Even if you are supposed to work with many potential clients, you should keep your list packed with high-quality companies. What does this mean? It means you should not use directories to make your list of potential deals. Many companies are not in directories any more; perhaps the ones you are finding can no longer be contacted using the same number.

SDRs should have overlong lists. When that happens, the quality of each call will be reduced, even if the SDR begins with energy and enthusiasm. The following few calls will merely sound tired and dejected.

Each SDR should work with similar companies and industries. If you aim to connect to various types, you must assign them to different SDRs. This way, each SDR only works with a category they are familiar with.

Suppose an SDR is comfortable and knowledgeable about the category they are working with. In that case, they will more likely listen better and emotionally connect with the client.

Turn up the Charm

Whether you are in the regular sales team or part of SDR services, you must convey a lot of energy and enthusiasm by smiling.

It makes the most sense when you meet with your clients in person. However, smiling over the phone is also recommended. While it may seem strange, it gives you the right mood for expressing yourself the right way.

Whatever humor and joy you feel can be transported through the phone lines. Your prospective client will feel that optimism and understand how excited you are about the products and services you recommend.

Most of the time, your cold call will end with a rejection. So, being and sounding positive works two-fold. Your optimism and confidence can sway a potential customer. Then, it can also keep your spirits buoyed because you may be in for many disappointments along the way.

That is the reality of it. However, do not let that affect you and drag you down.

Listen to Your Prospective Clients More

So, you are making the cold call. Understandably, you may think you need to give the whole spiel. You are, after all, being paid for persuading clients to consider your products and services.

However, talking without listening will only annoy your prospective clients. You must know when to listen. In listening, you will better understand the client and see how you can better connect to them.

Listening is a kind of more personal approach to research. SDR is supposedly all about excellent research and an in-depth understanding of potential leads. So, hearing from potential clients helps you better see where you can bridge the gap between you and them.

Send Personalized Video Messages

Calls can feel so impersonal. Your potential client may suspect that they are just another number for you to call. With so many clients to cold call, it can feel that way.

However, remember that clients will better align themselves with a brand that makes them feel special.

One way in which you can do that is by utilizing online video. It humanizes and presents a more personal look at you, the caller.

So, while it may take a few more minutes of your daily routine, recording personalized video messages can help endear you to more potential clients.

Use LinkedIn for Sending Voice Notes

It seems inevitable that we have just talked about videos and are now considering audio. You can use LinkedIn for more than just posting announcements and posters. You can also use it to send voice notes.

Like videos, voice notes are more personal. They can convey who you are as a person. You are not a robot sending several messages to many potential clients simultaneously. Instead, you are a person sharing an important message.

Sending voice notes provides more warmth than a text message, in which sometimes the tone can be misunderstood. It is also a more time-efficient way of doing so.

Set Your Eyes on the Prize

Yes, it can be discouraging to get rejected, especially if you get turned down several times in a row. However, being an SDR requires you to keep positive. Focus on the goal.

When you do that, you cannot just give up because you were told that the decision-maker is occupied. You always ask for any other possible booking that is more convenient for them.

It takes a lot of hard work, but persistence often comes with a reward. Of course, add outstanding research, an incredible product, and enthusiasm for your actions to finally engage new additions to the sales funnel.

Engage Several People in the Company, Not Just One

Some marketing and salespeople focus on just one person for a company. They want to hop from one company to another.

There is nothing wrong with being time-efficient, but sometimes, you wonder if you have met the decision-maker in each company you visited.

So, find out if the person you initially talked to was even the decision-maker. If not, book a meeting with that person if you have finally found them.

Of course, do not waste the opportunity. If you finally get that appointment, tailor your pitch to the company’s needs immediately. Decision-makers are often busy. So, you need to catch their attention right away.

Be Industrious

As with any other career, being an SDR is all about working hard. You need to keep working to gain more potential clients and finally close deals with the ones whose attention you have already engaged.

Call as many potential clients as often as possible without annoying them. Take note of the conversations and even record your calls. This way, you can go over what you have done right or wrong in each transaction.

Working hard should be paired with working wisely and learning from your experiences and mistakes.

Calls should not be more than two to three days apart, or you will not get a good recall connection from the first call to the second.

Be Organized

You must be organized. While it’s great that you are working hard, you must also work wisely. Whatever you do for your team should not be haphazard. It must be within a well-thought-out plan.

Every plan must be detailed. The execution must be detailed, too. This way, you can quickly evaluate your strategies and check which ones work for the client and which are not.

Be Persistent

You will never win if you easily give up. Nobody else will make that call but you. Well, at least that should be the attitude that you should take.

Think about how much you will feel accomplished if you manage to close a few deals. But what if there were many other rejections before that? If you have done your homework well, the deals you close are the ones that will be more likely to go up through to the other end of the sales funnel, anyway.

The ones you win by explaining your products and services well are the ones that are more likely going to close the deal or maybe even become loyal clients.  

Twelve to fourteen calls are ideal, after which you can give yourself and your targets a break.

Keep It Honest

While it may be tempting to contact a target person through dishonesty, refrain from that. You may get the sale, but the setup will destroy further hopes of a good relationship with the client.

For example, using fake local numbers may make your target accept the call, but they will not have a good feeling about you. They may have picked up the call from an unknown number with the worry of some sort of emergency.

The reaction may more likely be adverse when they realize that you are merely trying to get them to respond.

Keep It Clear

When contacting a client, you should be clear about your purpose. Saying vague things like “Don’t forget to keep in touch,” or “Remember that we offered you a deal that got you interested,” might confuse a target client, especially if they have so many things in their mind.

Confusing messages are even worse if you send them via voicemail. You will have them scratching their heads, wondering who it was they had to get back to.

Every voicemail, email, and call should be well-crafted without feeling cold. While the words have been prepared, they should also not feel scripted.

Conclusion

From the above tips and discussion, you are now fully aware that being an SDR can be rough. It takes a lot of skill and patience to become a successful one.

This article hopes to provide a clear playlist of the best and most effective SDR strategies. However, you may want to seek more information for yourself or for your team.

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