Florin Tatulea

Sales Leader | LinkedIn Top Voice 2023 | GTM Advisor | Focusing on Seed → Series B

I'm a passionate leader that lives and breathes all things sales.

I was lucky enough to be the first sales hire at Loopio and have had the opportunity to be a part of and contribute to the exponential growth that had led us to a sales team of ~50 strong. In my 6.5 years at Loopio we grew revenue by 65x. 

I am now doing it all over again at Common Room

Whether it's been as an SDR, AE, Manager or Director, I'm constantly looking for ways to reinvent myself and my team.

I'm a people-first leader that understands that leading a team is not about me. It's about lifting others up and seeing them succeed. My success is simply a bi-product of my team's success. 

As a sales leader, I'm curious about scaling sales teams, generating pipeline, increasing win rates and lowering ramp times in a remote world.

As an individual, I'm passionate about copywriting, sequence/cadence building, leveraging social selling and the future of sales technology.

Director of Sales

Last month, after 20 months of building at Common Room, I took some time away from being a full time operator. 

It’s been an absolutely EPIC journey. 

In a relatively short timeframe that I’ve been there: 

-We 4x’d ARR 
-4x’d the size of the SDR team
-Sourced 7-Figures in outbound revenue
-20x’d monthly outbound pipeline $ and built the outbound engine from scratch
-Re-architected our internal Common Room instance. This involved “GTM Engineering” the brain behind our outbound program using our AI agents
-Recruited and worked with the best operators I’ve ever had the chance to work with in my career. 
-Opened career paths and had our first rounds of SDR to AE promotions (this is a really important one for me)

The program is now in fantastic hands with Sara Hanegby . 
 
There aren’t enough words to say how grateful I am for everybody on this journey. You know who you are!! 

On the side, I’ve also been running my own 6-figure media company. 

I’ve given my career my all over the last decade and needed to slow down to focus on some other aspects of my life. 

It’s why I’ve been quiet on here the last month as I've stepped away from the tech echo chamber.

But… I am baaaack!!! 

I have some really exciting projects in the works and I’m looking forward to doing some advisory work and helping the start-up ecosystem over the next few months. 

If you are a company < $20M ARR and are thinking about scaling your outbound program I’ve figured out quite a few things over the last 12 years in B2B SaaS: 

1. I've built outbound from scratch at 4 companies and 3 have already been acquired.

2. I’ve designed and scaled sales programs, selling into SMB to large enterprise (Fortune 100 companies). 

3. I’ve cracked the code selling into Sales, Marketing, Rev Ops, Engineering & HR Leadership and have built systems that work across industries.

Im also excited to work with orgs on the content and thought leadership side. If you are selling to GTM leadership, I’ve built a curated audience of ~90,000 across LinkedIn, Substack & X. 

I’m only a DM away. 

It’s the most exciting time EVER to be building. 

LETS GOO!

GTM Leader | LinkedIn Top Voice | Advisor

I just took a look at the new Nooks launch.

Users of Outreach and Salesloft are going to want to take a look after what I saw with the their new AI Sequencer.

I believe they are going to seriously shake up the legacy sequencing space. 

Not a lot of people know this, but I was one of the first 10 customers of Nooks when the company was still just Dan, Rohan & Nikhil and a virtual sales floor.

As a multi-time customer, not even I could have predicted the level of execution that their team was going to put forth.

Apart from building a quality product FAST, Nooks did something (intentional or not) that is going to give them a massive competitive advantage over the next couple of years.

They owned the action/execution layer FIRST, and have now built the Data Foundation layer (Account Research, Signals, etc.) around it.

Most GTM tech orgs in the market today are doing the exact opposite.

They built the data foundations and are now trying to build an execution layer.

Why is this important?

Because the action layer is where the rep lives. If you own the action layer and do it well, it’s VERY sticky.

Reps will kick and scream if you take it away from them. Re-training tens or hundreds of reps on a new system of action is a nightmare for enablement.

Trust me, I’ve lived through the kicking and screaming.

Selling GTM tech, everybody was constantly asking us… “Can you integrate with Nooks? That’s where our reps live.”

Right now there is a full-blown race to see who will own the full “Sales OS”.

Today, Nooks made this race a lot more interesting by launching their new Agent Workspace for Intelligent Outbound.

They just added:

1. Signals (Combining live web intent with your CRM and past calls)
2. Autonomous Account Research Agents (Running in the background 24/7)
3. List Building Capabilities
4. An Omnichannel Sequencer (Executing across Email, Phone, SMS, and Social)

Imagine autonomous agents that monitor web intent in the background, cross-reference it with your CRM, draft hyper-personalized emails, and then drop the warmest leads into a power hour calling block.  Because it's actually an action layer, the feedback loop makes it smarter with each engagement. 

You can argue that they have a real chance at being the MAJOR player in the consolidation of the GTM tech stack.

They also have a massive moat of call data (50% of our own outbound meetings came from cold calls)... which a lot of other data platforms simply do not have.

​​GTM Leaders: what are your thoughts on this space? Let's debate below

(PS - go check out the massive Nooks launch ). 

#NooksPartner

SDR teams are toast. 

In fact...

SDR teams are so screwed that OpenAI and Anthropic are hiring SDR teams aggressively. 

The thing is, outbound is not a game of AI and automation. 

AI is a tool. 

Outbound is a game of: 

Precision

Timing

Deep industry expertise

Human relationships

It's why orgs like Ramp recently shut off their autonomous outbound program. 

It's why the people that make these LLMs realize that humans are still necessary. 

At least for now :)

If you prospect on LinkedIn, you should watch this. 

This is something I’ve always struggled with that I’ve now found a solution for.

If you use sequencing platforms like Outreach, Salesloft and Gong Engage you’ll know that after you do the manual steps of sending connect requests, LinkedIn activity just gets lost to the void.

There is no easy way to systematically filter for:

1. New LinkedIn connections who are actually in your ICP vs general networking contacts

2. Prospects who have accepted your request but you never actually bothered to send a DM to

This has made systematic outreach that’s coordinated more difficult.

This is no longer a problem as I’ve started to use Kondo: Superhuman for LinkedIn DMs. 

I can now:

→ Filter for connections and bulk tag them as prospects

→ Search for specific personas very easily with a fuzzy search that actually works

→ Open a custom of these personas posts on LinkedIn to build more tailored outreach

SOOO much easier. 

They have a great promo running right now if you sign up by the end of the week (Feb 28):

2 months free with this code:  https://lnkd.in/gFETw84Z

You are welcome :) 

#KondoPartner

2026 is the year to double down on cold calling.

Last year, 50% of all of our qualified opps came from cold calling. 

Keep it simple.

First, get yourself a proper data provider for cold calls so you actually get connects. 

FullEnrich has been an absolute CHEAT code for us with their 20-provider waterfall. 

They now also have amazing search functionality directly in the platform so you can build proper lists. 

Then, I break this down into 3 parts (here's an example):

1️⃣ Permission Based Opener

Hey this is {NAME}, I was actually just on the customer tab on your website at
{ACCOUNT}, and had a question. Do you have a sec?

2️⃣ Menu of Pain (most important part)

Noticed you are selling to accounts like {ACCOUNT}. Typically when I talk to SDR leaders at commercial open source companies, they’re focused on one of these three things:

1. Your SDRs see tons of developer engagement but struggle to identify which users are actually ready for a sales conversation.

2. Your team relies on community signals, but it’s hard to surface and action on real buying intent.

3. SDRs waste time digging through GitHub, Slack, forums, and LinkedIn instead of working on the right leads.

3️⃣ Open Ended Question

How are you making sure your SDRs are focusing on in-market leads?

-----

I like the menu of pain, because if done correctly and the messaging is tight, at least one of the 3 challenges is something they are likely thinking about.

This then opens the conversation.

3 days left this week. Let's get it 🫡

#FullEnrichPartner

No alternative text description for this image

How do you feel about this take GTM leaders? 

To me it comes across as a take from somebody who doesn’t fully understand GTM. 

Sure, there are a lot of incredible things AI can do to automate TAM building, lead scoring, account research, funnel optimization etc. 

But GTM is also still one of the professions that is still deeply human. 

I doubt this person has spent a lot of time making cold calls, on demos, meeting clients in person etc. 

If you believe this, you essentially believe that robots will be selling to each other only in the near future. 

No offense to you Jay Sahnan. I respect the opinion and it’s a good discussion 🙏🏻

graphical user interface, text, application

We talk about “GTM Engineering” and “Revenue Orchestration” but how does it apply to outbound? 

Here’s how you tactically execute a strategy at scale using signal data. 

Now we have the ability to capture 100+ signals at a time, transform the data and tell us which leads are the lowest hanging fruit.

That’s a HUGE amount of context for sales reps to have in one place and it means that we can now get HYPER-specific with our messaging and sequences.

Each signal that is important to your organization should have its own purpose, messaging, and sequence built out.

Step 1: Write down all the signals that you currently have access to at your organization. 

There are standard signals everybody can use (I.e. web visits) but also very specific signals to your org (I.e. software outages for an outage tracking product) 

Step 2a: Map out where each signal implies a lead is in the buyer journey

Look at the image below. You can see that a signal and therefore message has to adapt to where somebody is in the BUYER JOURNEY.

Step 2b: Create a lead-scoring system that takes into account which signals (or combination of signals) tend to imply that an individual and account is ready to buy or at least talk to sales. 

This usually happens when they are in the “Solution Aware” and “Product Aware” stage.

Step 2c: Cross reference these leads with your account level- ICP criteria. 

Not all leads that exhibit buying behavior work at accounts that are good fits for your business. (THIS IS CRUCIAL). 

Step 3: Create messaging (i.e. email campaigns, outbound sequences etc.) for each signal.

You can get even more complex here and create messaging or sequences for combinations of signals.

Step 4: Set up alerts and workflows so that if a lead provides a certain signal or hits a certain threshold they get put into the respective “campaign”.

There are many platforms to do this in… Common Room, Clay etc. 

THREE OTHER THINGS TO CONSIDER:

1. Top of funnel leads that aren’t ready to talk to sales go in automated sequences that are more focused on education (this can either be done by marketing or SDRs)

2. Mid-to-Bottom of funnel leads are sent to the sales team and are put into the appropriate sequences (emails + call scripts + LinkedIn message templates are already built out by the team). It is up to the SDRs/AEs here to do additional research and tie your product's value to your prospect’s strategic priorities.

3. Consider the size of the account and the number of owners on the buying committee. Start multithreading into the various decision makers/economic buyers who will influence your deal so you establish momentum early.

(h/t FletchPMM  for the great visual)

#sales #outbound

undefined undefined

Obtained a GPA above 3.5 for the entire academic year 2011-2012

Dean`s List

E3 Business Case Competition

Top Ranked Junior Tennis Player - Canada  

Talk Master Certification 

Competed against 20 business schools across the U.S. including Wharton, Stern, Berkeley and Sloan. 
This competition asked students to choose a stock to either long or short, with the only requirement of it having a 30 day SMA of over $200m in market cap. Our team, being the only international presence in the competition,  chose to pitch Iridium (IRDM), a satellite communications company, and have received a final judgement score of 24/30 based on Stock Selection, Presentation, and Q&A. 

Georgetown Stock Pitch Competition

Cold Email Conversion Machine by Florin Tatulea

Prospecting from the Trenches | Florin Tatulea | Substack

Working with Local Food Plus, a not-for-profit aiming to drive a sustainable food model to the benefit of local farmers and retailers in Ontario

There is a very simple but important question that most sales reps miss when they are selling to GTM leaders . 

And I say this from experience as somebody that buys software. 

Put simply: 

“Is your team hitting their number…What % of attainment is your team at?” 

The harsh reality is that unless you are a SVP/EVP/C-Level exec with long term incentives, the average GTM leader doesn’t really care to change much if things are working well. It’s a massive uphill battle to sell to a leader that is crushing. 

Even most VP, Sales are just trying to survive next quarter. 

It’s very difficult to sell somebody the “future” if they are at 110% of quota as a team and in accelerators. 

Saves you a lot of time as a rep. 

Just what I’ve seen over the last decade. 

Thoughts?

On a mission to help 100,000+ SDRs have great sales careers. 

Here's 3 ways I do that: 

1. The Cold Call OS - A self-paced digital course taking you from fearing cold calls to booking meetings every day

2. SDR-to-AE Bootcamp - 10x hour live cohort designed to teach you the foundations of building a successful career as an Account Executive

3. 8-Week Outbound Training - bespoke training programme designed for SDR  teams at SaaS B2B companies so they can book more meetings and become a profitable part of the commercial org. 

Chris Ritson

When you're booking loads of meetings, you're overwhelmed, chasing follow-ups, and trying to keep quality high.

When things are slow, you're second-guessing everything... your messaging, your calls, yourself.

When you're steady, it can feel like you're stuck, not improving and you're wasting time. 

Growth is stressful.
Slow periods are stressful.
Plateaus are stressful.

There’s no stage where it suddenly becomes easy.

The SDR job will test your consistency more than your talent.

The difference isn’t avoiding the hard stuff... it’s understanding what kind of hard you’re in and adjusting:

→ Slow? Double down on activity + experiment
→ Busy? Focus on qualification + control your time
→ Plateaued? Refine your craft and your messaging game

Every phase has friction.
Everyone experiences every phase.

The SDRs who win aren’t the ones who avoid it... they’re the ones who keep going anyway.

It’s supposed to feel hard.

Don’t quit.

- Chris

PS. Hope this helps one person on LinkedIn today 🤘

--- 

Want my SDR Playbook for FREE? 
You can get it here: https://lnkd.in/egmNw9jC

I'd rather be an SDR leader than an AE leader

flexprts

I help founders and sales leaders build predictable monthly pipeline coverage

I cold called a CRO last week.

CRO: "Where did you get my number?"

Me: "I used Prospeo to find it. Your SDRs should use it too."

CRO: "Thanks for the honest answer. Why are you calling me?"

That one response turned my cold call into a conversation.

Most salespeople panic when they hear "Where did you get my number?"

They lie. And the convo usually dies before it's even properly begun.

Honesty interrupts the pattern of BS prospects are used to hearing from sellers. It builds immediate trust. That trust starts the conversation. 

You can't have that impact on email. 

Prospeo's amazing data quality helps you open doors. Your skill-set gets you invited inside.

Cold calls > Cold emails. 

♻️ Save the talk track and repost for other SDRs. 

PS. Want more pick-ups? Get better phone numbers here; https://prospeo.io/cr 🚀

Join my new SDR to AE School → Click visit my store 📈

The average SDR gets rejected 5+ times every single day.

- Hang-up.
- Not interested.
- Send me an email.
- Call me next quarter.

Now zoom out.

That’s 25+ rejections a week.
100+ a month.
1,200+ a year.

Most people see rejection.

Great SDRs see training.

Because every “no” is building something:

• Resilience... you stop taking rejection personally
• Pattern recognition... you hear the same objections hundreds of times
• Better messaging... you learn what actually earns attention
• Confidence...you’ve spoken to more buyers than most AEs ever will

By the time an SDR becomes an AE, they’ve already had thousands of sales conversations.

That’s why the best AEs I know rarely panic when they're getting push back. 

They stay calm. 
Consistent. 
Curious. 

Because they spent years in SDR hearing “no” until they mastered getting to “yes.”

With every ''no'' you're closer to a ''yes''. 

Keep going. 

♻️ Thanks if you repost this.

SDRs - your career is 80,000 hours long 

[40 hr weeks x 50 weeks a year x 40 years]

Most of you think: 

- Being an SDR >12 months is bad
- It's a race to getting promoted
- You deserve a pay rise today

Remember: 

1. The fail rate for AEs with less than 10 months experience as an SDR......55% 

2. The fail rate for AEs with more than 16 months experience as an SDR....6%

Swapping 1000 of your 80,000 hours [6 months] for a 49% better chance of success = priceless. 

♻️ Share this so others outside my network see it. 

I don't know any SDR with >2 years experience that regrets it. Do you?

---

PS. Want to be an AE in 2026? Take my ''AE Readiness Test'' here: https://lnkd.in/e78vhrUa

Two AEs get promoted.

One did 6 months as an SDR.
The other did 2 years.

Same title. Same quota.

But the gap shows up fast.

AE with 6 months SDR experience:

• Sources ~10–15% of their own pipeline
• Needs 9–12 months to fully ramp
• Has handled roughly 300–500 prospect conversations
• Relies heavily on marketing + SDRs for opportunities

AE with 2 years SDR experience:

• Sources 35–50% of their own pipeline
• Ramps in 4–6 months on average
• Has handled 2,000+ prospect conversations
• Comfortable creating pipeline when things get quiet

Same role.

Very different foundation.

The reps who spend longer mastering SDR don’t slow their career down.

They build the skills that carry their entire AE career.

♻️ Thanks if you repost this!

PS. Not made it to AE yet? Try my AE readiness quiz for free and see if you've got what it takes: https://lnkd.in/ex5nzEVi

SDR who is replaceable: 

- “I hit my 12 meetings this month.”
- “I’ll speak with anyone who replies.”
- “If they say yes to a 15-minute call, that’s a win.”
- “My job is to pass it to AE... what happens after isn’t my problem.”

SDR who is irreplaceable: 

- “Is this prospect a real fit or just filling my calendar?”
- “Let me qualify tighter... I want to look after my AEs time''
- “My pipeline should close, not just look good in a dashboard.”
- “I’d rather book 6 meetings that convert than 12 that die in stage 1.”

Most SDRs think their job is to book meetings.

The top SDRs?
They know their job is to create pipeline that becomes revenue.

And the best SDRs I’ve coached this year understand something simple but rare:

You can’t hide behind meeting volume.

Quality is the multiplier.
Revenue is the scoreboard.

Intent > Activity.
Pipeline > Calendar Slots.
Revenue > “I booked another meeting.”

If you want to stand out in 2026...
Stop booking calls. Start creating revenue. 📞💰

♻️ Thanks if you repost this! 

👉 How much revenue have your meetings generated this year?

I met an SDR this week who’s already at 130% of quota in February.

(Every single opportunity came from the phone)

No inbound.
No lucky replies.
No viral LinkedIn posts.

Just ‘’warm’’ calls triggered by signals: 

→ Hiring SDRs
→ Visiting pricing pages
→ Engaging with outbound content"

But not the way most SDRs do it.

Here are 5 things he does differently:

1.) He doesn’t “cold” call - he warms every account first.

Before he dials, the prospect has already seen his name:
→ A relevant email
→ A LinkedIn touch
→ A simple insight

So when he calls, he’s not interrupting.
He’s continuing a conversation.

2.) He uses messaging data before he ever picks up the phone.

He tests angles in email first:
→ Which problems get replies
→ Which industries engage
→ Which wording lands

Then he calls with what’s already working.

Most SDRs guess on calls.
He shows up with proof.

3.) He calls with a point of view - not a script.

He doesn’t “check in” or “introduce himself.”

He leads with:
→ A problem he sees
→ A reason it matters now
→ A simple question

If he can’t explain why it’s relevant in one sentence...
he doesn’t dial.

4.) He nurtures between calls instead of spamming dials.
If someone doesn’t pick up, he doesn’t just redial 10 times.

He:
→ Sends a follow-up email
→ Drops a LinkedIn touch
→ Adds context for the next call

So every call gets warmer. He directs the reader back to the idea of him calling again so they have more context. 

5.) He measures conversations - not activity.
He doesn’t care about dials.

He tracks:
→ Conversations started (4% pick-up)
→ Meetings per conversation (42%)
→ What actually converts 

Because 1 good conversation beat 100 empty dials.
Every time.

That’s how he’s already at 130%.

Not more volume.
Better execution.

Calling is still his main channel.
But the difference?

Every call is earned before it happens.

And this is exactly why he uses lemlist

Not as a CRM or to ‘’keep him up to date with activity’’.

→ To warm up accounts before calling
→ To nurture prospects between touch-points
→ To test messaging so calls actually land

So when he picks up the phone...
…it’s not really cold anymore.

Leverage the call.
Don’t hide behind volume.

If you’re still dialing cold, you’re just guessing.

This is the workflow top performers run in lemlist.

Steal it and save this post. 

Hope it's helpful. 

PS. Are you cold or ''warm'' dailing?👇

lemlist

The #1 skill top earning SDRs have...

→ Great at asking questions.

📞 Ask bad questions on cold calls? 
You don't find pain. The phone goes down.

📨 Ask bad questions on cold emails? 
No-one responds. You book no meetings.

🖥️ Ask bad questions on qualification calls? 
You look like an amateur. And lose the deal. 

And it gets worse when you're an AE...

📊 Ask bad questions in demos? 
You miss vital intel you could leverage. 

👫 Ask bad questions in negotiations? 
You end up discounting & losing commish.

Every cold account and live deal...

They're opened up by great questions. 

There are no ''bad ICP prospects'', just bad questions.

♻️ Repost the cheatsheet now for other SDRs.

SDRs in 2006:

“I made 200 dials today.”
“It’s a numbers game.”
“More calls = more success.”
“Just get someone on the phone.”

Volume was everything.
If you worked harder than everyone else... you won.

SDRs in 2016:

“I booked 12 meetings this month.”
“It’s about conversion.”
“Quality over quantity.”
“My job is to pass it to AE.”

The role evolved.
Less noise. More structure.
But still measured on activity output.

SDRs in 2026:

“Would I take this deal myself?”
“How much of my pipeline actually closes?”
“Is this a real opportunity or just a meeting?”
“Am I creating revenue or just filling calendars?”

Now it’s different.

Because the best SDRs have realised:

Booking a meeting isn’t success.
Starting a deal that closes is.

The game has changed.

2006 → Activity
2016 → Meetings
2026 → Revenue

Most SDRs are still playing the 2016 game (I see it everyday). 

The top 10% have already moved on.

They don’t chase volume.
They don’t celebrate calendars.

They focus on one thing:

Business outcomes.

Because that’s what actually gets you promoted.
And that’s what makes you hard to replace.

Which game are you playing?

♻️ Repost if you think SDRs need to evolve.

PS. Happy Valentines Day, my SDR friends ❤️🌹

My ex-VP Sales: “Books are bu****it.”
Me: “With respect, you're wrong.”

Everyone’s chasing the next “hack.”
The next AI tool.
The next viral post.

Meanwhile, the best sales lessons were written 30+ years ago...
by people who built empires without automation, inbound leads, or ChatGPT.

Here are 13 “old” books every seller should have read and studied👇

1️⃣ How to Win Friends & Influence People — Dale Carnegie
2️⃣ SPIN Selling — Neil Rackham
3️⃣ The Challenger Sale — Matthew Dixon & Brent Adamson
4️⃣ New Sales. Simplified. — Mike Weinberg
5️⃣ Fanatical Prospecting — Jeb Blount
6️⃣ To Sell Is Human — Daniel Pink
7️⃣ Never Split The Difference — Chris Voss
8️⃣ Influence — Robert Cialdini
9️⃣ Gap Selling — Keenan
🔟 The Psychology of Selling — Brian Tracy
11️⃣ Selling to Big Companies — Jill Konrath
12️⃣ Eat Their Lunch — Anthony Iannarino
13️⃣ Secrets of Closing the Sale — Zig Ziglar

Between them, these authors have 350+ years of sales experience.
Their books are a shortcut to all that knowledge.

Everyone’s reading LinkedIn posts.
But few are reading the people who wrote the principles those posts were built on.

If you can read, exercise it.
Wisdom isn’t accumulated by scrolling.

♻️ Repost for the sellers who’d rather get smarter than louder.

Going from SDR to AE is messy. 

It's not just:

- Practicing Discos
- Negotiating with execs 
- Watching top performers
- Closing deals and making $
- Getting meetings booked for ya

It's much more than that.

9 ways to develop SDR to AE:

1. Deal With Rejection
Focus fully on letting ''go of the no''. You'll get some painful no's as an AE. 

2. Understand Prospects Problems
Spend time learning your personas and what challenges they face daily. Learn how to uncover them in discovery. 

3. Be Specific With Your Demos
Gently guide prospects to the answers by showing them tailored demos using stories to back up why you're the right choice for them.

4. Really Listen
Learn to stop talking.

5. Learn to Multithread 
Understand depth of relationship is your key to infiltrating every account you're working. When you meet someone new, ALWAYS keep the conversation going.

6. Give Give Give Give, Get
Use the 80:20 rule for give:gets. Give 4x more than you try to get from your prospects. 

7. Learn To Leverage Your Team
There is no shame in bringing in your boss, CSMs and anyone else who can help you progress deals. Ditch the ego. 

8. Turn Up Daily and Build Pipeline
You're an SDR with a different job title. Rely on discipline and structure, not motivation.

9. Learn How To Write 
Ditch copy and paste business cases. Master writing a business case execs will understand quickly. 

10. Ditch The BS Urgency Tactics
Buyers hate scarcity and urgency tactics. Learn how to negotiate and close without frustrating your buyers.

Being a great AE is a journey, not a destination.

➟ It helps you resilience.
➟ It makes you a team player.
➟ It deepens all of your relationships.
➟ It's your secret sauce to success in life. 

Turn up and practice daily.
Your life will be better for it.

Enjoy this? Repost for your network ♻️.
And follow Chris Ritson for more posts like this.

Thank you!

PS. Want to be an AE in 2026? Take my ''AE Readiness Test'' here: https://lnkd.in/e78vhrUa

Dear SDR Leaders - you don’t work in sales anymore.

Hate to break it to you, but jumping on the phones once a week isn’t a sales job.

Your role is now 99% these three things:

→ HR
Not just hiring and firing - it’s coaching confidence, managing burnout, handling conflict, and solving people problems you never expected.

→ Ops
Your team is a machine.
You design it, scale it, improve it, and remove every ounce of friction slowing it down.

→ Enablement
Your job is to make reps better every single day.
Relentless training on messaging, mindset, skills, and process. This never stops.

Sure - you might send the odd email or DM a dream account.

But as the team grows, selling becomes a tiny part of your week.

Can you handle that?

If yes... you’re built for SDR leadership.
If not... this role will eat you alive.

♻️ Repost if this is true! 

PS. Building 4 new SDR Leader resources this week. Can't wait to see what you folks think. 😍

Bad selling feels like you’re being sold to.
Bad cold callings feels like you're being cold called. 
Bad prospecting feels like you're being prospected to. 

That’s why people say they “hate sales.”

But here’s the truth:

99.9% of people don’t hate sales.
They hate being sold to badly.

- The fake urgency.
- The scripted pitch.
- The pressure tactics.

Especially the listening just to respond, not to understand.

That’s what people really hate about sales. 

The good salespeople?
Prospects buy from them every day.

And they don’t even think about it.

Because great sales doesn’t feel like selling.
- It feels like clarity on a problem.
- It feels like confidence around solving it. 
- It feels like someone helping you make the right decision.

The best sales pros don’t push.
- They diagnose.
- They guide.
- They challenge when needed.
- They earn trust instead of forcing action.

When it’s done well, sales doesn’t feel like persuasion.

It feels like therapy. 

If someone says they hate sales, it’s not the profession they dislike.

It’s the experience they’ve had.

Be the exception.

What do you think? Is sales more the feeling you give people? 

♻️ Thanks if you repost this. 

PS. Hope you have a top Tuesday, my sales friends!

An SDR Cold Emailed me...

The Email: 

''Hi Chris, 

I hope you this message reaches you well. 

I saw you've launched a new bootcamp and you're probably considering the best way to scale sells for it. 

We work with a lot of coaches like you across the world to increase sales. 

Are you open to a conversation? 

Sincerely - Mary-Ann''

My reply: 

''Hi Mary-Ann - always appreciate SDRs doing their thing! 

I'm not interested in external help with sales right now but here are some email tips to help you convert other prospects on your list...

1. Remove ''I hope this message reaches you well'' - it's unnecessary and doesn't help you stand out. 

2. Your first sentence is solid - I love how you've made an observation and then made a guess about what my challenge could be! Keep this up for everyone you email. 

3. Be specific with the customers you have helped. Limit to one logo and include the exact result you achieved. Lots sounds great but less is more here. 

Try something like ''The coach at ABC started using our [insert feature/product] and saw an increase in sales of 2x''. 

4. Remove sincerely - just say thanks. Small point but no-one says sincerely in real life so don't say it on email. 

5. Include a PS. if you can.

For example: 

''PS. Connected on LinkedIn also! See ya there''

Here's the whole step by step guide to writing emails that get replies if you'd like it: https://lnkd.in/ezqwV9RZ

And here's 5x Proven Cold Email Templates to get you started: https://lnkd.in/e8ab5A6a

Good luck - Chris.'' 

----

Mary-Ann messaged me a few weeks later to tell me she had booked 6 meetings from the templates. 

Win for her. 
Win for her biz. 
And a big win for me. 

It takes 1 minute to write feedback emails to BDRs. 

Stop complaining about BDRs. 
Start coaching them instead. 

PS. ♻️ Repost if you'd like to share this with your network. 

And follow me @chrisritson for more sales training content like this.

----

An SDR I coached 

Went from 90%-135% of quota in Q4

On Monday they got promoted to AE with a £26k pay-rise 

Before that they'd been rejected for 10+ AE roles due to ''no experience of closing deals''. 

Instead of throwing in the towel they sucked up their ego and asked me for feedback on where to improve their AE skills.

First thing we did was they took my SDR to AE test so we could see where they were good and not so good. 

That way we could work on the things they needed to improve. 

3 months of that led to an interview, an offer and a pay rise of £26k. 

Focus on figuring out where you need to improve. 

You're closer to something great happening than you think. 

PS. Hope this story is useful, my SDR friends! 

Thanks if you decide to ♻️ repost this.

And if you'd like to be an AE, you can take the test here to see how good your AE skills really are; https://lnkd.in/ex5nzEVi

I met an SDR who makes 100+ dials a day and still hits 140% of quota every month.

Target = 7 qualified opps.
They average 10–11.

Not because they’re louder.
Because they’re sharper.

I asked what actually moves the needle on the phone.
These were their 5 rules:

1. Cap the chaos
More dials don’t automatically mean more meetings.
Better conversations beat more attempts.

2. Follow one call structure
They use the same framework on every first connect.
Discipline > winging it.

3. Stop treating calls like a numbers game
Every conversation should earn the right to a next step.
Not just another tick on the dialler.

4. Treat every attempt like a first impression
Most SDRs burn out after a bad morning.
Pros reset on every call.

5. Repeat what works
If an angle lands, use it again.
Clarity beats cleverness.

Before I left they said something I wrote down:

''100 calls a day keeps the doctor away''.

Cold calling isn’t just about out-thinking people.
It’s about out-working people as well. 

That’s the difference.

What would you add?

♻️ Thanks if you reshare this story! Have a top day.

The best SDR I ever promoted was ''dumb''. 

- Failed at school and had a low IQ 
- Took a job as a builder labourer 
- Worked 6.5 day weeks until 21 
- Then I hired him as an SDR

At work he described himself as ''the dumbest person in the room''.

And he was right [if his grades were anything to go by]. 

Most days he would make maybe 150 dials, send 30-40 emails and a 25+ DMs. 

He'd come in before management at exactly 730am and leave after everyone else at 6pm [or later].

His commute was 1.5 hours each way. 

By 8am, he was on the phones whilst everyone else was commuting or having breakfast. 

Every lunch hour, he'd eat at his desk whilst doing ''admin'' 

Every evening, I'd get WhatsApps from him asking for tips to break into an account he was obsessing over. 

For 12 months... his name was at the top of every leaderboard.

He never moaned about his AE, never missed his personal activity metrics. He just got into the office and got on with it. 

He wasn't able to ''out-think'' everyone else. 

So he ''out-worked'' them instead. 

My point... 

The best SDRs aren't all ''sports team, uni graduates''. That's a lie.

The truth?

The best SDRs are the ones who learn the job, on the job. 

They don't wait for things to happen, they make things happen. 

Some have high IQs, some a little lower. 

The thing they share? Discipline. They turn up, get on with it and don't let the down moments affect them. 

It's their ability to show-up when it's hard that sets them apart. 

To all the ''dumbest people in the room'' out there...

It doesn't matter how high your IQ is.

What matters is how you turn up. 

Let's talk degrees in sales...

♻️ Repost if you agree with this!

PS. What's more important, IQ or effort?

I met an SDR making 130+ dials a day.

They’re at 175% of quota for Q1. 

Target = 12 qualified opps a month.

Not because their script is genius.

Because volume + good data > perfect talk tracks. 

Here’s what actually moves the needle (according to them):

1. Volume removes luck
At 50 dials a day, you’re hoping.
At 130+, probability kicks in.

2. Dials × data quality > clever scripts
They don’t obsess over rewriting openers.
They obsess over calling the right personas with verified numbers.
(Good data from tools like Prospeo = more connects, fewer dead lines which you can check out here for free: https://prospeo.io/) 

3. Speed beats perfection
Build the list.
Verify the numbers.
Start dialing.
Tweaking talk tracks doesn’t create pipeline... conversations do.

4. Reps create sharpness
More live connects = faster pattern recognition.
Objections feel predictable.
Confidence compounds.

5. Effort is the edge
Most SDRs want a better script.
Very few want 30 extra dials.

High activity with bad data is noise.
High activity with good data is pipeline.

99.9% of the time, effort wins.

Outwork. Outdial. Outperform.

What would you add? 

PS. Thanks if you repost this! ♻️

Every SDR wants the same thing:

- A booked meeting.
- A qualified opportunity.
- Pipeline and commission. 

That’s the cake they're trying to bake. 🎂

But here’s what most people miss:

No two great SDRs bake the cake the same way.

Some put 80 calls in a day. 
Others write personalised emails. 

A lot use LinkedIn DMs. 
Others go to events. 

Some even only do warm intros
Or send 50 voice-notes a day. 

Different ingredients. 

Same outcome 🎂

Yet most SDR teams try to force one recipe:

“Send this template.”
“Just follow the script.”
“Do exactly this sequence.”

But the best SDRs figure out their own cake mixture that consistently creates opportunities.

Calls.
Emails.
LinkedIn.
Video.
Timing.
Messaging.

Your inputs create the opportunity.

The goal isn’t copying someone else’s recipe.

It’s building your own system that consistently bakes the cake.

Because pipeline isn’t luck.

It’s the result of repeatable inputs.

Curious - what’s your best ingredient right now?

📞 Calls
✉️ Email
💬 LinkedIn
🎥 Video
🤝 Referrals

(Repost this if it was helpful ♻️)

SDR life is unpredictable. 

Somedays you're on top of the world. 

Others you feel like absolute sh*t. 

Win or lose. Keep going! 

♻️ Repost if this hits home! 

PS. Have a great Tuesday, my SDR friends ❤️

---

taplio

The Battle

Florin Tatulea

Chris Ritson

Followers

Posts

Engagements

Likes

Performance ScoreFlorin Tatulea's LinkedIn Performance

Performance ScoreChris Ritson's LinkedIn Performance

Ready to grow your LinkedIn presence?

taplio

The Battle

Florin Tatulea

Chris Ritson

Followers

Posts

Engagements

Likes

Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Florin Tatulea's LinkedIn Performance

Performance ScoreChris Ritson's LinkedIn Performance

Ready to grow your LinkedIn presence?

Performance ScoreFlorin Tatulea's LinkedIn Performance