BDR Management Best Practices: New habits, cadences, motivators, metrics and more

The playbook for helping BDRs drive predictable pipeline and results in B2B organizations continues to deepen. And in last Friday's CMO Coffee Talk discussion all about BDR management best practices, we had as many new questions as we did experience shares.

Special thank you to Gabrielle “GB” Blackwell , Manny Ataebi?? and Ernest Owusu for sharing their best practices and playbooks with us.

If you are already in the CMO Coffee Talk community, don't miss Gabrielle's BDR management templates and cadences in the #swipefile channel.

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Chat highlights from both BDR management best practices sessions are below.

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In your experience,?what are material differences for managing BDRs in a mature/majority inbound lead environment vs new category/account-based environment?

In terms of targets are you measuring number of meetings set up, meetings that result in pipeline and is there any accountability for bookings/revenue?

How do you pull in others in the company? SMEs, marketing leaders, PMs, etc.?

How do you agree on the targets - I manage the BDR team and feel they could be setting a higher number of meetings but my BDR leader is pushing back - how can I have a constructive conversation

We should all track activity, but interested what this group uses as the ultimate measure/tied to comp??Meetings scheduled, Demos booked, demos performed, pipeline created?

hands on is crucial for effective BDR performance

Have you settled on a mix of activity? Calls vs. emails vs. social vs. …?

We measure Handoffs aka Zero stage opportunities - meetings accepted byreps

One of the mistakes I have seen is bring in an intern to do the BDR work

Effectiveness of LinkedIn outreach vs. email… any data?

An old bdr team of mine did things like a daily stretch...and a team cheer when the team collectively met there goal for the day.?I always thought how great it would be to start on a team like that.

constant recognition and energy building is so important for these teams- sounds corny but matters. Ted Lasso!

A big decision is whether the BDRs are Appt Setters, Qualifiers or both.

Fantastic level of details! How do you help or redirect a BDR that has had a few flops (calls that did not go so well) get back on the saddle? Do you have a coaching certification?

We tie comp to Demos Completed, with a kicker for any opp that closes.

we used a light qual as the gate to set an appointment - person, interest, need as a precursor to setting the appointment - resulted in a high SAL / SQL ratio

I actually did the email experiment with the BDR team last week - on a prospecting email that I received since we sell to the CMO persona.?They were amazed at the thought process and diagnosis as a reader.?Such a worthwhile experience.

We did an improv class

Yes, and ...

such a great idea, thinking on the fly is super challenging - interesting that you could develop that muscle

Bringing the customer to life for them -- LOVE THAT

Ok —— we need to hire comedians or get funny!

I was pissed off about the trickery someone was using to get me to read an email - it was deceitful and I wanted them avoid the same stupidity

Ahttps://improvasylum.com/classes/

Curious to know if SDR teams are going back to the office and how best to use the time there (e.g. team building, coaching etc.)

Most BDR comp models are built on some version of meetings set. But, many accounts we’re targeting aren’t ready for a meeting. They may just be learning that solutions like this exist. And, pushing them leads to a negative brand experience. How have you approached enabling and incentivizing BDRs to have high value touches up funnel?

We’re enterprise cyber as well.?Yesterday we brought in a CISO and his directs for an AMA with the BDR teams.?Kicked a lot of doors open for a younger team who didn’t really understand the persona deeply.

How many steps (and what is the mix -phone, email, LI Outreach, Gifting) within your general prospect outreach sequence do you see the most success with?

we comped on meeting completed with AE and a kicker on opps created

completed AE meeting with two BANT could be a good bar to set

Teach them to aim properly— ICP

and maybe company profile -- firmographics?

We set up bi-directional feedback between AE & BDR.?Includes a score based on a band-like thing.?This really helped drive alignment.

I’ve found equal comp for quality meeting completed, regardless of source (inbound vs outbound) is really important

And don’t over complicate it

Comping on meeting & set and opp created.

We did a mix - Meetings Set for AEs (which they control), and then components for Oppty Progression to a certain stage and then a kicker for a % of Revenue Won

Also it’s critical to hold AE’s accountable and measure SLA on responding to all Meeting requests.

I have usually split. 1/2 for discovery meetings held (right fit) and then 1/2 for next stage opps and kicker for deals won

depending on the velocity of sales cycle - I have also put comp on closed won

We comp on qualified meeting booked, then there’s kicker if the meeting makes it to the POC stage. We also have a “bounty list” of high value targets defined by mkt/sales leadership. If the BDR lands a meeting with a prospect from the bounty list, they get an added bonus

I found that hard to get that by a CEO so what I did was a 3 tier kicker for the CW (they wouldn’t give a percentage of the deal I have found)

For a global org, do you recommend a central BD team (all regions reporting into one BD leader) or regional (BDs reporting into local marketers)?

Events and high-value content work well … empower BDRs with "give to get"

Initially into the main leader but then have managers in the regions

Give-to-get is real. Or teach-to-get.

Outcomes based content!

Oh it get there. Initiallly into the main one until you grow to having 4+ in the region and then manager. Or at least team lead.

I mean, how much of a kick do you all get when someone sends you some useful piece of content?

What is the best ratio between outbound rep and SDR?

Value deposits

Planning insights

We spiff on event attendees and then bring a BDR to the event and spiff on new intros there too

I always comp on event attendees, otherwise they don’t want to work on booking up an event (like a solution seminar, hospitality event, etc.)

My son was a BDR for 16 months remote.?He met the team once.?And he just got promoted to DG specialist at the company.?An effective manager and motivated individuals will make BDRs successful

Anyone having success standing out in the email inbox and getting attention (and responses) without using some type of gift/offer? We’ve got some really well written, personalized emails and they don’t seem to get much attention. Only thing that seems to work so far is offering some type of incentive.

how much of your time is spent coaching versus the other elements of your role? Seems like that is the secret sauce?

Our BDRs are mostly remote, but come together (with AEs, SEs, Marketing, PS) as part of internal QBR at HQ.

I love your advocacy for working where you’re most effective. Yes!

+1000 Remote works really well… good for people, good for the environment, better talent! The world has changed for the better!

Remote location opens up the flood of skilled BDRs whereever they are

Would love to hear guidance on onboarding/training new SDRs

You MUST do the work on the call recordings.

Awesome. It reinforces the cadence we have set for our BDRs/SDRs

Q on org structure - what’s pov on reporting to Sales vs Marketing leader?

Do you work for Mktg vs Sales… which is better formula?

Metrics… beyond SALs or SQL???Conv rates:?MQL/SAL, SAL/SQL, % Pipeline Target, % Inbound/Outbound SAL, % Target/Named Account?

What split on inbound vs outbound?

How involved as an SDR leader working with PMM and Dmd Gen?

What tech for hybrid/remote team… Nooks, Gong, Outreach?

What SDR incentives work?

How do you calibrate on SAL or SQL monthly target?

Also about structure, do you separate inbound and outbound into 2 teams or are they all covering both?

How much do I love that she did the framework b/c her managers didn’t give her the guidance. So she dropped the mic on them!

what is your best practice for how a SDR preps before any call, email, outreach?

Does LinkedIn still work? Instead of InMail, how do you help SDR/BDRs establish authority on LN so they can position around larger opportunities?

Can you talk about KPIs you set and what you are tracking?

if you don’t report to Marketing, how does your team interact with Marketing?

What about the personality traits to hire for?

Have you seen any significant declines on the impact of SDRs? Meaning has the model or post covid/WFH impact success rates in meeting/opp creation?

We give them various Gong recordings. Successful first meetings, complete disaster first meetings, second meetings etc. Then we make them give the pitch to a small team on day 5 on the job. Works well for us.

How closely do you work with AEs? I think Latane said the best BDRs were those who were more liberated from the reps.

Is compensation structure for SDR/BDRs something we can discuss??

how do you balance being so hands on throughout the day with problems/improvements in a way that reps find helpful and not just anxiety-inducing?

One of our best SDRs was a former comedian

Group role playing is awesome and I always act as the rep and let them grill me. It really instills trust with them and you get better at making better talk tracks from marketing SOOO much faster.

Also ex-military for all the same reasons as ex-athletes

+1 for the team sports background. Our best SDR played in the MLS. Our second best on the national UK team for spike ball!

There is a company that train ex college athletes as BDR the shift group https://www.shiftgroup.io/

Have a “framework” for onboarding if it makes sense to still talk about it

This might be the worst pitch email I've ever seen, sent to a start-up CEO this week: https://www.dhirubhai.net/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7031659359872987136/

Re the “hire athletes”, we hired one years ago who was a competitive chess player…turned out to be a top performer. So I try to think “competitive” rather than “athletic”, but it’s the same thing we’re trying to unlock.

i get so many terrible LI pitches and email pitches and cold call pitches - it’s really disturbing

This is one of the role playing improv games we played for example : https://www.sbimprov.com/blog/2015/01/29/game-one-word-story

my #1 pet peeve is - take 5 minutes to look at my LI profile and my company website - and then refer to it when we speak - so many never do that its pathetic

From the SDR perspective what is the ideal tech stack ?

Competitive plus team is big. Sports with relays are good as well. Swimming. Track.

Depending on what ur selling. SL/Outreach, Zooming and maybe LeadIQ, then something with intent, Orum, and I like Crystal Knows. Also played with some email dev tools

#2 pet peeve - i don’t want to hear about your company - i want to hear about the problems you solve and the customers who you have helped - is basic

can you speak about how you approach on-going training on product / buyer-context / value-prop etc., after initial training during on-boarding - so month 3, 6, 12...

Love the quizzes - I did this in our BDR training too, and it helps encourage my people to listen / retain what we’re training them on.

Do you have BDRs wait until you are able to provide enriched contacts before they start their outreach. Or, when you have accounts that show intent, do you expect the BDRs to do their own research using LI for example, for the personas that matter.

target those accounts and contacts that fit your ICP at accounts that have hit your MQA threshold

since they sit in marketing they get to meet with the team monthly to learn as much of that as possible. Also have brought it coaches over time to help with the SDR training side like a Barrows training for example

Re inbound: Depends on the lead - we have seen that we can’t just send to an AE vs qualifying

I’ve recently taken the BDRs over from sales. We’re sending all inbound to BDRs because they can react quickly. Our BDR conversion of inbounds to opps is much higher than our sales reps

Cold calling is another touchpoint to reinforce the multi-channel approach

I sent all inbounds to our BDRs to set the meeting - we went from 30% conversion into pipeline to 65% just by having BDRs take the first pass. I pay them 50% of what I pay them to set a meeting w/ an outbound.

AE will drop conversions if you to them direct IMO

I think the biggest disconnect between marketers and outbound focused sdr teams is that we have a hard time understanding that things we don’t ‘like’ (ie being texted) are things that work for other people.

A "cold call" with context/value isn't really cold

Also IMO, most cold calls are awful - so a good script, in the right sequence can yield amazing results. But they need to role play and refine a lot before IMO

We round robin record our cold calls, share on Slack and we all have at them with comments

No spam, no cold calls....

BDRs becoming "buyer-Sherpas"

Curious how folks think about inbound vs. outbound BDRs and splitting the team as opposed to every BDR doing both outbound and inbound based on territory

And do you feel that SDRs should get Soft-BANT qualification within ICP and Persona rather than quick meetings that do not have BANT attributes?

we’ve decided that our BDRs will do both

Will we get to talk about BDR tools today??(Please say yes, please say yes, please say yes!)

75% of the meetings set by the group our sales team used were no shows. It’s was horrific. They were phone only too. They followed up with an email but it was after the call. Burning money.

my team does both. They’re incentivized financially to pursue outbounds but we round-robin inbounds to them.

We do the same. I recently had someone try to talk me into otherwise… I’m not sold.

Love the grading concept. I wish allllll companies were doing that! I see so many comping just on appointments.

do you measure conversion to pipeline or to sales from BDRs

We split the comp too - % on meetings completed/ % on Opps

Yes, our BDRs also do inbound and outbound but given the super niche nature of our business, there’s really no such thing as a true outbound.

Coming out of our SKO it was surprisingly scary to see how different each SDR set up and delivered their cold calls in our role play. Marketing really has to help develop not just the pillars of value but also the authenticity- ie “I want you to know this is a cold call and I respect that you’re busy but if you give me two minutes I believe I can help you…”

Same. We pay 30% on completed meeting and 70% on pipeline

we have them as separate teams and have different skill levels: SDRs take the inbound (handraisers); BDRs focus on outbound.

My agency BDrs were being paid only if it was a 'show' so they had an interest to make sure they attend and if not to get a second rescheduled call

Not a fan of cold calls but depends on the persona… at a former company, we were targeting owners of beer distribution companies, family owned businesses with older generation of leaders that are not as active digitally. It was still handshakes, in-person events, and phone calls.

Round robin the inbounds is interesting. What if it’s a contact/company a different BDR had been working?

Grading was like this. A- Right person, right company, project in 6 mon. B - Right person right company. C - Wrong person, right company. D - Wrong person and wrong company. Only counted A & B to quota. C meant SDR had to go back and find the right person. D means we need to target better

we measure on 1st meetings held (and comp based on that). We have additional payouts for meetings that meet certain downstage criteria

Can we talk about ADR / AE pairing, especially in a remote world?

we will route it to the BDR who is working the account, if that is known (We have a field in Salesforce for BDR owner). If no owner, round-robin.

Need to have post meeting expectations

but then if meetings don’t convert to pipeline sales complains - right?

YES! These people are not going to write orders.

I feel like if you pay on pipeline you really need to make sure Sales is aligned to what requirements must be met to create pipe. I’ve come across reps that are complete bastards about converting to app and hold sir to much higher standard than what has been defined by company. Feel like SDR doesn’t always have proper control to be goaded on pipe.

clear, objective exit criteria from stage to stage!

Re cold calling or not, I think it depends a lot on your space. Someone said “In security, people respond to LI video.” At one company we cold called a lot because our targets (PR people) were literally paid to answer the phone. If you’re selling into B2B SaaS, seems like social would matter. So I think the right recipe of activities have to do with the space you sell into.

I had AEs joke (not joke) that we should be handing off leads that were essentially POs that needed closing. Too much truth in that for comfort.

i think there has to be incentive on pipeline generated - this promotes alignment and it creates teaming between SDBs and field sales - they work together to move prospects forward

I love being so clear about what the role is defined and setting the appropriate KPIs to keep them accountable.

Clear role and clear goals.what's one thing you would recommend that Marketing leaders inheriting SDRs should do // should not do?

yes sales does complain. We are exploring changing it to comp’ing on “pipeline” - our BDR function was new so we wanted to keep it really simple to begin with

The issue is often BDRs prefer sales for the career path. But I will not take a gig either unless they report to me

I would add that it’s critical to create the BD/AE/Marketing definitions TOGETHER as a GTM revenue team to make sure alignment is there from the beginning

PIPELINE IS MARKETING. <<yes

We have this same debate. also if BDRs are not in marketing, how do we not compete?

I’ve actually been in places where it’s been a shared function, report to marketing, and then also reporting to sales. And it’s been successful in all - just depends on the S&M working relationship and shared KPI’s and goals. In my opinion

What is the role of the BDR manager for growing reps to the next career phase and where are you funneling them? What’s the lifespan of your reps?

A great BDR leader will make it work either way, whether they report to sales or marketing

It can work with BDRs reporting to either leader BUT less friction when report to marketing as there’s a big assumption that the CMO-CRO is 100% aligned on BDR approach but that can sometimes take some time to get alignment

I've had BDRs reporting to Marketing and Sales (sometimes at different times at the same company) -- it has always performed better in Marketing. Ensures alignment, correct messaging, persona targeting, etc.

I agree that regardless of whether BDR report to marketing or sales can work. Key is ensuring that Marketing-SDR-AE are all aligned!!

I used to say BD can work in either org, and it can. But I have enough evidence now to say it works better in Marketing.

I own global marketing and NA BD. Our EMEA BD rolls into that GM. It’s a better alignment for our size of company and focus of those geo-specific teams.

BDR's seek guidance and clarity!

I have also experienced both ways, led it in marketing and had it sales. When in marketing, how have folks managed the career path into sales?

How many BDRs to a manager? This feels like a high-touch role and given the turnover, feels like there needs to be a lot of coaches. Do you mentor with good BDRs and if so, what is the incentive. Or, is your awesome meeting structure filling that role?

sometimes their path will not be in sales - I’ve moved SDR’s to marketing ops, customer success, content…

There’s a few career paths. SDR team lead then to manager, commercial AE if you have that, CS, Field Marketing, and I had 2 go to PMM before

BDs get credit for all of it. Marketing influence is measured as an input to decide where to invest and pour money on campaigns that are working.?It’s IMPOSSIBLE to separate and point to one thing. No

The

The different career paths is a great call. That is our primary path for our BDRs today…mainly because they live in sales

When building FY plan do you separate SDR from sales in terms of new logo sourced pipe versus sales sourced???

I track all sources, AE, SDR, inbound, Channel, Referral etc. I report on all those broken down for the board

Anyone else just do CAC and LTV? That’s what we do. What is our OVERALL marketing and sales budget and where should we spend it? That’s the conversation we have quarterly (and of course for our annual plan)

Love that question ‘What role do we want the SDR team to play?’

What can marketing leaders do to make SDR jobs easier / more successful?

In a conversation that’s mostly about “who gets credit”, everybody loses.

The “credit” conversations are non productive to the max!

Funny. Just received an SDR call. If your phone system / autodialer takes more than a couple seconds to connect the call, you shouldn't use it.

we are doing it right now. Because we have significant inbound, we’re having a tough time allocating program spend by segment. We used to look at just program spend. Adding the SDR/BDR costs is easy. Now trying to figure what should go into overall marketing HC and other costs to CAC.

I’m curious, does anyone have part/all of their SDR team offshore?

I started my career as an SDR. Remote. At home with zero experience in the space. It worked out for me

There’s also a cultural aspect of it.?SDR is a lonely job.?Many are in their 1st job.?And need/want a social network (human not digital) of people they work with.

Liquid staff meetings can be in person or virtual. SDRS need social engagement. It’s so easy to get stuck in your head as you going through the drills. Doesn’t need to be f2f but there needs to be community — virtual or not.

do you track closed-won/revenue for SDR-sourced vs referral for example? Do you have any averages you can share across channels?

we have reps come in 4 days a week. They are young and hungry. They thrive on being in the office. We see such learning and growth with in person.

Yes closed won and pipeline from each is measured

Do you comp on closed-won?

Depends on the the sales cycle and acv what the percentages are

we are firm on this as they are young and need to be together - yes they need to be close, public trans ect. Our SDR’s are all in London, in person

Advantage to remote is time zone coverage.

But for enterprise 100K plus I saw outbound sdr at around 35%

Really important to have a progression / career path option - whether in BDR group or elsewhere in the company

We did team leads at a past start-up, was a great way to increase sales floor leadership, find the best leaders, etc.

We have a high performer who was a terrible manager. He was not motivated to teach and had little patience. So we put him back in an IC role and he’s taken off again. All depends on their motivation and desire for growth