How to hire an SDR: what to offer, whom to look for, how to pay and how long it takes

Hiring a sales development rep (SDR, or BDR at many companies) is mostly a question of three things: an offer that holds up against the postings a candidate sees beside yours, a profile drawn wide enough to include people who have never held the title, and a pay plan that rewards meetings the account executives can actually use. On this board, US sales development postings state a median of $75,000 a year, half of them name no years of experience at all, and the median open seat had been posted for 45 days. This guide turns those figures into a hiring plan: what to offer, whom to look for, how to pay, how to interview and how long to expect.

The figures come from the 1,110 open sales development roles open to US candidates on this board on 2 November 2026, read from 1,480 employers' own hiring systems, and from the posting dates those systems state. Pay is the midpoint of each posting's own range on a full year's scale, base or on-target earnings as the posting states it, one per posting after repeats of the same title at the same company are merged. Studies by other researchers are named and linked where they are used. Right now, across every country, the board's open sales development roles post a median of $75k/yr, with a typical band of $59.5k/yr to $125k/yr, across 2,400 open roles.

Contents

1. What the offer has to beat
2. The profile: who becomes a good SDR
3. The pay plan
4. The posting
5. The interview loop
6. How long the seat stays open
7. Keeping the people you hire
8. How these figures were counted
9. Quick answers

1. What the offer has to beat

A candidate for an SDR seat usually applies to several at once, and most of the postings they compare yours with state a range. The market on 2 November 2026:

Where you hire moves the number more for this seat than for most. SDR postings in the San Francisco Bay Area state a median of $90,000 and in New York $86,250, against $62,500 in Austin, and seats at AI companies ($95,000) and enterprise SDR seats ($90,000) sit at the top (SDR salary has the full breakdown). Remote seats pay less, not more: $68,500 at the median for remote US roles posting pay, against $77,900 for office roles.

Two practical readings follow. An offer below the middle half competes for the candidates other companies passed on. And because SDR pay is mostly on-target pay, candidates compare the base and the plan as well as the total, so state both.

2. The profile: who becomes a good SDR

The postings themselves show how open the seat is. Of the 159 US sales development postings whose leading requirement lines the board read:

Half name no years at all, and among those that do, the median is two and a third ask for one year or less. Compare account executive postings, where 77% lead with years and the median is five. The SDR seat is the way into sales, and the people who fill it well often come from jobs with a different title: retail and hospitality, recruiting, customer support, teaching, the military, or a first job after university.

What to screen for instead of the title:

• Comfort starting conversations with strangers, on the phone and in writing. A short written outreach exercise and a cold-call role play show this in an hour.
• Persistence with a method. Prospecting is many touches per account; ask how they kept going at something repetitive and how they measured it.
• Curiosity about the buyer. The best SDRs research before they reach out. Give them one target account and see what they find in twenty minutes.
• Coachability. Ask them to redo the role play with one piece of feedback and watch what changes.

A degree leads only one SDR posting in five on this board. Requiring one narrows the pool without much evidence that it predicts the work.

3. The pay plan

An SDR plan pays a base plus variable pay on what the rep creates for the account executives. The Bridge Group's 2025 study of 351 B2B companies found a median on-target pay of $80,000 at a 68:32 split, a $55,000 base and $25,000 of variable pay, with 60% of reps reaching quota - The Bridge Group.

What the variable is counted on matters as much as its size:

• Meetings held is simple and within the rep's control, but rewards volume over fit unless the meeting has to meet clear criteria.
• Qualified opportunities, accepted by an account executive, rewards fit, but puts part of the rep's pay in someone else's hands; set a deadline for the account executive's decision.
• Pipeline value ties the rep to revenue, and suits seats selling into larger accounts with fewer, bigger meetings.

Whatever the measure, publish how many reps hit target last quarter and whether the plan pays above target. Candidates ask, and a plan nobody reaches is a pay cut in disguise. What is OTE explains quota-setting and payout curves, and the sales compensation benchmarks compare every seat.

4. The posting

A posting that names the buyer, the motion, the targets and the pay brings candidates who fit and turns away those who do not. State:

• The buyer: title, company size and industry the rep will contact, and whether the seat is inbound, outbound or both (SDR vs BDR explains the two titles).
• The work: channels (phone, email, social), the CRM and tools, the size of the team.
• The pay: base and on-target ranges, what the variable is paid on, and how often.
• The path: when and how SDRs move to account executive. It is the reason many candidates take the seat.

Fifteen US jurisdictions now require a pay range in the posting itself (Which sales jobs show their pay). The SDR job description guide has a template you can adapt.

5. The interview loop

Keep it short: SDR candidates are usually interviewing elsewhere, and the seats that move fastest win. A loop that tests the work in four steps:

1. A recruiter or manager screen (30 minutes): motivation, the path they want, and pay expectations against your range.
2. A written exercise: one target account and a first outreach email, prepared beforehand or in the room.
3. A cold-call role play with the hiring manager playing a busy buyer, followed by one round of feedback and a second attempt.
4. A conversation with an account executive the rep would book meetings for, so the candidate hears how the hand-off works.

The sales interview questions guide covers what candidates prepare for each of these rounds, which is worth reading from the other side of the table.

6. How long the seat stays open

The board does not see when a hire is made, but it sees how long open roles have been posted. On 1 November 2026 the median open US sales development role had been posted 45 days earlier, and 43% had been posted more than 60 days earlier: the longest of any sales seat on the board, against 38 days for account executives. Part of that is volume (SDR teams hire in groups and leave a posting up), and part is that the seat is hard to fill at the pay offered.

Plan for about six to eight weeks from posting to start unless you are paying at or above the middle of the market, and start the search before the seat is empty when you can.

7. Keeping the people you hire

The Bridge Group's 2025 study put the average SDR's time in the seat at 1.9 years - The Bridge Group. Some of that is the seat working as intended, with reps promoted to account executive; the rest is churn that restarts the search. What keeps it short is the path: a written standard for promotion, a typical number of months, and examples of reps who made it. Put it in the posting and repeat it in the offer.

8. How these figures were counted

• The roles: every open sales development role on this board on 2 November 2026 that a US candidate could take, read from each company's own careers system and checked every hour: 1,110 roles. The requirements come from the 159 of them whose leading requirement lines were read from the posting.
• The pay: the midpoint of each posting's own range, base or on-target pay as the posting states it, on a full year's scale, one per posting after repeats of the same title at the same company are merged. City, product and remote figures are from 1 November 2026 (SDR salary).
• The days since posting: from the posting date each careers system states, to 1 November 2026 (sales compensation benchmarks).
• What the board does not see: time to fill, offers made or accepted, and pay finally agreed. Posted pay is what the market advertises, not what each hire was paid.

9. Quick answers

What should I pay an SDR? US sales development postings state a median of $75,000 a year, with the middle half between $59,500 and $95,000 (2 November 2026), usually as on-target pay split about two thirds base to one third variable.

Do SDRs need sales experience? Half of US sales development postings name no years of experience, and a third of those that do ask for one year or less. Customer-facing work, persistence and clear writing are what the seat needs.

What should an SDR's commission be based on? Meetings held, qualified opportunities accepted by an account executive, or pipeline value. Meetings are simplest; opportunities and pipeline reward fit.

How long does it take to hire an SDR? The median open US sales development role on this board had been posted 45 days, and 43% more than 60 days, so plan for six to eight weeks.

How long do SDRs stay in the role? About 1.9 years on average, according to The Bridge Group's 2025 study, many of them promoted to account executive.