salesVP80

VP Sales

SDR / BDR Involvement post first demo

Not every lead pushed to AEs has BANT (budget, authority, need, timeline). I'm interested in business development's role post 1st meeting with the AE.

For example, If timeline is missing/not established/etc, what role does business development play? Are SDRs trying to push timeline on the lead so that the AE will re-engage or qualify as an opportunity?

What's happening is that AEs are focused on opportunities with BANT and also on their self-sourced deals. These leads that come through with a component missing sometimes get neglected.

Thanks for your feedback!

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Diablo

Politicker

Sr. AE

I think it depends upon company to company, AEs' role whether they are handling SMB, MM or Ent customers and so on.

SMB and MM AEs might have more number of opportunities hence they cannot put a lot of time if any of the links in BANT is broken but Ent AEs might have some time to spend to re-engage with these opportunities.

For me, an SDR tries to re-engage if example timeline is in the future (for SMB and MM prospects). There is no way we push customers to make decisions early, we might try to create an urgency but pushing.. Naaah...

salesVP80

Opinionated

VP Sales

Thanks for your perspective. We are in the SMB and lower side of the mid-market. My instinct aligns with your experience.

Yes - pushing to next steps but if 15 other opps are mid-late stage, are we neglecting qualified opps if we are pushing some of these broken-BANTers

HarryCaray

Notable Contributor

HMFIC

I keep my BDRs involved quite a bit in the early part of a deal. I don't want them to push trash to me just to hit their qualified lead number, so they know that I expect some real substance if I'm going to give them credit for it. I let them run with scheduling the follow ups and next steps until it's qualified, keeping me CC'd or just generally in the loop. I want them to really own the opportunity. They definitely have to earn that QL, but then I always take care of them for it. Ours get paid on estimated size of the deal based on an initial quote, so I always max out a lot of stuff and leave it all at list price, even if I know I'm going to discount it before actually giving a proposal to a prospect. I have a couple of the best BDRs in the company, but they bust their ass and get rewarded for it.

salesVP80

Opinionated

VP Sales

Thanks for your input! What is your definition of a QL?

Do.it.for.the.checks

Politicker

Account Executive

I think this depends alot on how you compensate and organize your teams.

If you're paying for meetings set, it's not fair to have the SDR continue to work. Itd be like making an AE hunt to farm but not paying for subsequent years of revenue.

It also depends alot on the team you've put in place and resources available. Are they able to sell jointly or are they lone wolves? Is your marketing team rock stars that can keep customers engaged? Do you have automation tools to keep this from being a time suck? Is the value there to chase unqualified leads versus finding new leads that could be qualified?

Not really an answer but questions worth asking.

salesVP80

Opinionated

VP Sales

All relevant questions!

When you ask if we're paying for meetings set, can you provide anymore detail related to your question?

Do.it.for.the.checks

Politicker

Account Executive

SDR compensation packages are all over the place. Some get a percentage of closed deals, tihers gets comped on pipeline growth, and some get paid per meeting or deals opened.

If you are paying them say 100 bucks a meeting, their OTE is built so they spend time setting meetings. If they are now tasked with posting meeting tasks, you will negatively affect their ability to hit OTE.

salesVP80

Opinionated

VP Sales

Thanks! Have you seen it where they are compensated on both meeting and pipeline?

Do.it.for.the.checks

Politicker

Account Executive

Not personally, but I have seen meeting and closed deal percentage. I've seen meeting plus bonus for a deal that gets past a gate i.e. stage 3.

The 2nd one might work for what you want to accomplish. Assuming BANT is needed to cross a certain stage. It gives both incentive to get meetings for AEs to try and qualify, but also incentives to stay on deals that aren't ready to buy today.

However, this can create internal strife. Ive heard SDRs complain that AEs aren't moving qualified deals past a stage or AEs being pressured to make their pipeline more fluff because the SDR wants to be paid

CuriousFox

WR Officer

🦊

What did you end up implementing?

salesVP80

Opinionated

VP Sales

It's been a journey - we are in the process of creating alignment between specific biz dev members and AEs so there's accountability and "skin in the game" for both sides. We are pairing this with changing our commission structure where biz dev is transitioning from being paid on opportunity to being paid on closed won

cw95

Politicker

Sales Development Lead

Being in a small-start up, I would love to be involved in the after care too...but then again I'd probably eat my words.

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salesVP80

SDR / BDR Involvement post first demo

12 comments

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