What is an SDR? Meaning, daily work, metrics and career

By bravabase · Updated 13 November 2026

SDR stands for sales development representative. An SDR is the salesperson who finds potential customers, makes first contact by phone, email and LinkedIn, checks whether they’re a fit and books a meeting for the account executive (AE) who closes the deal. SDRs don’t close deals themselves: their job is to fill the pipeline.

SDR meaning

In sales, SDR means sales development representative, sometimes written sales development rep. It’s the first role in a typical B2B sales team: the SDR starts conversations, and someone else finishes them.

The title exists because prospecting and closing are different jobs. Finding the right people and getting a first reply takes hours of research and dozens of messages a day. Running demos, writing proposals and negotiating takes a different kind of focus. Splitting the two lets each person do one job well.

Outside sales, SDR has other meanings, such as the IMF’s Special Drawing Rights or software-defined radio. This guide is about the sales role.

What an SDR does day to day

A typical SDR day is a loop of research, outreach and follow-up:

• Research accounts. Find companies that match the ideal customer profile and a reason to contact them now, such as a new hire, a funding round or a job ad. See buying signals.
• Build lists. Pick the right people at each company and find their work email and phone number.
• Reach out. Calls, cold emails and LinkedIn messages, each tied to that reason.
• Follow up. Plenty of replies only come on the second, third or fourth touch, so SDRs run a sequence of follow-ups across channels.
• Qualify. A short conversation to check fit, need and timing.
• Book and hand off. Put a meeting in the closer’s calendar with notes on what was said.
• Log everything. Update the CRM so nobody contacts the same person twice.

It’s a high-volume job. According to Bridge Group’s 2025 SDR Metrics Report, which surveyed 351 B2B companies, the median SDR logs 112 activities a day: 44 calls, 41 emails, 19 LinkedIn touches and 8 texts or other touches. That adds up to about 4.1 quality conversations a day.

SDR vs BDR vs AE

The three titles describe stages of the same pipeline. Here’s how most companies use them:

Many companies use SDR and BDR interchangeably, so read the job description rather than the title. The AE split is consistent: AEs close, SDRs and BDRs feed them. Bridge Group found one SDR supports 2.4 AEs on average, and 60% of SDR teams report into sales, 26% into marketing.

SDR metrics and benchmarks

SDRs are judged on the pipeline they create, not on activity alone. These are the benchmarks from Bridge Group’s 2025 SDR Metrics Report:

Track the same handful of numbers whether you hire an SDR or do the work yourself: reply rate, meetings booked, meetings held and pipeline created.

SDR career path

SDR is usually an entry-level sales job and a path into closing. A strong SDR moves up to account executive or into SDR team leadership. Some move into GTM engineering and build the systems SDRs work from. The role turns over quickly: Bridge Group puts average SDR tenure at 1.9 years and median annual attrition at 40%, with promotions accounting for 16 points of that.

That turnover is the hidden cost of the role. Every time an SDR moves on, you recruit again and wait another three months for the new hire to ramp.

SDRs and AI

Software now does much of the research half of the job. An AI SDR finds companies that fit, gets contact details, drafts outreach and keeps follow-ups on schedule, while a person still takes the calls. To weigh one against a hire on cost and ramp time, read AI SDR vs hiring an SDR.

bravabase gives you Brava, an AI sales agent that does the SDR groundwork: it finds leads ready to buy, gets their work emails and phone numbers and drafts outreach you approve before anything goes out. It’s $99 per user a month with a 7-day free trial (pricing).