7 Key Takeaways for Building a Successful SDR Team in 2025

I had the pleasure to discuss with Florin Tatulea (Head of Sales Dev, Common Room) 7 things that are working in 2025 (lessons from building a 13 SDRs team): 1. Groundswell (Gather Internal Info) Before prospecting, reach out to ex-employees of a target account to get info about the company. When you have 2 pieces of information, attack the new account omnichannel using those 2 insider insights. 2. Volume is Dying How many emails did it take to get a meeting? 15 in 2015. 50 in 2020. 100 in 2022. 1000 in 2025. More volume is no longer sustainable. We need to flip the broken playbook we’ve been using for decades. 3. Automated vs Data Activated Automated outreach no longer works on its own. Divide your TAM into tiers and balance automation with human touch. Example: Named account → Slack notification to the AE, Tier A → Send to Outreach, Tier B → AI SDR 4. Leverage 1st Party Data for Prospecting Similar to point 1, but using proprietary data. Example: Closed/lost account insights, competitor renewal dates. Leverage those info on top of the sequences. 5. GTM and TAM Intelligence Most companies think their TAM is 10,000+ accounts. That’s rarely true. Look beyond Sales Nav filters using churn analysis, win/loss data, RevOps maturity, and you’ll find your real TAM is much smaller. 6. How the Math Works Old model: 10,000 accounts → 3 SDRs → $1-2K tech stack per SDR → $600+ cost per meeting. Average ACV: $10K New model (after real TAM analysis): 3000 accounts → 1 SDR → $500 tech stack → micro-lists + gift cards. Lower cost per meeting, higher win rate. Average ACV: $30K 7. Micro vs Large Volume Volume no longer works. You have to go deep. Instead of testing one message across a large TAM, test micro hyper-relevant lists with a gift card. You’ll see it’s possible to contact 25 people and book 1 meeting. Slides here: