Hiring a bunch of great SDRs can help you climb your ladder to success faster. Since they are the first ones to form a connection with a prospect, hiring in the wrong direction can actually tank your company’s reputation in a second. One interaction can bid goodbye to the prospect, and witness a lost opportunity.

Thus, hiring inefficient SDRs can be costly and burn your business. Hiring the perfect SDR might be a huge task, but there are a few things that will help you know that they are ‘THE ONE.’ Here are a few skills/traits to look for and what you can do to hire the best of the best.

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1. Your ideal SDR

The way you work on your ideal customer profile, in a similar sense, you must work on an ideal SDR profile. This can contain the personality traits and skills you want your SDR to possess and you can also include their preferred background or estimated target that you wish for them to achieve.

After this, you can design a job description and requirement for your ideal candidate. This will help you eliminate the candidates who do not match your desired description.

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2. A curious cat

A curious SDR is always ready to ask questions in order to understand the problem or product better, and they’re genuinely interested in the company. During the interview, pay close attention to the kind of questions they ask. How relevant are they? How interested are they to learn more about the company?

This also helps in realizing how much attention the SDR pays to the conversation. If they’re a good listener and ask all the right questions, that means they can easily convert a cold lead into a hot one with their relevant questions and attentiveness.

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3. A skilled machine

An SDR has to be a master of many hats. If the candidate shows that they’re experienced in most of the key skills, training them becomes a piece of cake. Here are a couple of skills you can look for:

Overcoming objections
Expert listener
Asking discovery questions
Evaluating the right point of contact for a prospect
Ability to learn and become a product expert
Taking criticism constructively
Motivated and a drive to crush the targets

These skills can also be evaluated during the interview process by giving the candidates a few hypothetical scenarios and then assessing how they would respond to them. You can give them tasks such as writing an outreach email, recording a voicemail, or do a customer-SDR role-play with them to evaluate their skills.

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4. A perfect match for your company goals

While hiring a bunch of SDRs, you need to make sure that it aligns with the company-wide goals as well. Depending on your quarterly target, estimated revenue generation, or even the number of accounts/prospects you’d like to pursue, etc.

You can decide the number of SDRs you need and shortlist the candidates that have the skills that can help you achieve the company goal.

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5. Evaluate them based on their answers

Make a list of questions that will help you determine if the candidate you interview will be a great fit or not. Note down questions around different situations or questions that’ll help you assess their traits.

Rank these questions based on their importance and then start scoring the candidate for their answers. This will help you evaluate all the candidates numerically as well.

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6. Are they culturally correct?

Ask them questions that’ll help you know them on a personal level. This round can be conducted like an open conversation where the candidate can also ask questions to learn about the company culture. Here are a few questions you can ask:

What is your ideal work environment?
Where do you see yourself in 5 years?
What do you like to do in your free time?
What excites you about being an SDR?

Take this as an opportunity to speak at length about your company culture plus take note of what the candidate is looking for and if your company can provide a similar environment.

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