But Really... How Many Accounts Should I Work Per Month?
Whether you are a XDR leader or a rep, you've absolutely asked yourself this question along with all the others that come with working in the world of prospecting sales. Am I on track? Will I hit my goals? How can I ensure my team is doing enough? We've all sat in this analysis paralysis (or sought to google for a generic formula to make ourselves feel just a teeeeny bit more confident).
In 2019, TOPO published their Sales Development Benchmark Report focusing on the strategies and tactics of successful sales organizations. Below is the recommendation of # of Accounts/XDR/Month based on the ACV of the segment they prospect into.
For the $75k-$250k ACV range, working 6 contacts (yay multithreading!) per 100 accounts/month means 600 people/month or 150/week. Hit those people 2-3x/week in the early stages of prospecting, means 450ish activities/ week/rep.
~ Dang, there's a lot of math in sales ~
Now, 5 years later, when looking into how many accounts our 6sense BDRs work per month, we noticed a dramatic increase from what was recommended in 2019. For the $75k-$250k ACV range, our 6sense Enterprise BDRs are able to work ~160 accounts per month. Naturally, increasing the amount of accounts worked can make some leaders fear a fall off in quality messaging and personalization levels. Well, have no fear! 6sense's personalization levels are at an all time high and reps are able to increase the amount of accounts without taking up more energy or time.
What can we chuck this up to?
Duh! AI!
When we think about AI in terms of prospecting and bring tools like Orum, Conversational Email, Outreach/Salesloft and, of course, 6sense Sales Intelligence into the mix, we are working smarter and not harder to hit more accounts while still retaining the same amount of quality. Your reps can easily call into multiple accounts at the same time, or have Conversational Email send messages to closed/lost accounts while reps focus on current 6QAs.
So while the 2019 benchmarks still hold true as a recommendation for what will help team's hit the goals for their segment, push yourself and your team to use their tech stack to their advantage. Pretty soon I think you'll see an increase in reps exceeding quota.