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apollocommerceAPP-003

The Apollo SDR

#apollo#outbound#sdr#sales#sequencing#lead-generation
Aha Moment

“What was the moment this product clicked?” —

Identity

A sales development rep or account executive at a B2B company of 20–300 people who runs outbound prospecting as a core job function. Apollo is their prospecting database, their sequencing engine, and their activity tracker. They use it every day. They've built sequences that work and sequences that don't, and they've learned the difference by watching reply rates. They're not sentimental about approaches that aren't working. They test, they iterate, they move on.

Intention

What are they trying to do? —

Outcome

What do they produce? —

Goals
  • Find qualified prospects that match their ICP and contact them with a message
  • that feels personal even at volume
  • Know which sequences are working before the pipeline review, not at it
  • Log activity accurately enough that their manager's dashboard reflects reality
  • without double-entry
Frustrations
  • Contact data that's outdated — the LinkedIn title is current, the Apollo email bounces
  • Sequences that can't branch based on prospect behavior
  • Email deliverability that degrades without a clear signal about why
  • CRM sync that creates duplicate contacts instead of merging them
Worldview
  • Outbound is a numbers game with a personalization multiplier
  • A bounced email is a wasted sequence slot — data quality is pipeline quality
  • The rep who reviews their sequence performance every Friday is better than the one who doesn't
Scenario

It's Monday. They have 40 new leads from a Clay-enriched list of companies that just raised Series A. They're building a sequence: 5 steps, 3 email and 2 LinkedIn, over 12 days. Step one references the funding announcement. Step three references a pain point from the company's job postings. The sequence is personalized at the variable level, not at the character level. It will go to 40 people. 3 of them will reply. That's a good week.

Context

Sends 30–80 new prospects into sequences weekly. Manages 4–8 active sequences simultaneously. Uses Apollo's contact search to build lists filtered by industry, headcount, technology stack, and title. Reviews sequence analytics — opens, clicks, replies, opt-outs — every 2–3 days. Syncs activity to Salesforce or HubSpot. Uses Apollo's email warmup feature or a third-party tool. Has a personal sending domain separate from the company domain for cold outbound. Has been through one email deliverability crisis and changed their setup as a result.

Impact
  • Real-time data freshness indicators on contact records surface outdated information
  • before a sequence is sent rather than after a bounce
  • Sequence branching based on engagement signals (opened but didn't reply, clicked
  • but didn't book) enables follow-up that's responsive rather than scheduled
  • Deliverability diagnostics that explain inbox rate decline and prescribe fixes
  • remove the "my emails stopped working and I don't know why" investigation
  • CRM sync with deduplication logic that matches on email and LinkedIn URL
  • removes the duplicate contact problem that corrupts pipeline reporting
Composability Notes

Pairs with `clay-primary-user` for the list enrichment-to-sequence workflow. Contrast with `salesforce-primary-user` for the outbound activity-to-pipeline tracking experience downstream. Use with `intercom-primary-user` for the outbound → inbound → customer success handoff workflow.