A BDR, or business development representative, is the sales role that builds pipeline by opening new markets. Where an SDR answers demand that already walked in, the BDR goes and creates demand where none existed — cold-prospecting net-new accounts, running sequences, and booking the first conversation. Both hand the qualified opportunity to an account executive. The BDR's job ends at the qualified meeting, never at the close.
What a BDR actually does
The BDR is the company's first move. They research a target market nobody at the company has touched, build a list of accounts and the right contacts inside them, and reach out cold — email, calls, LinkedIn — to start a relationship from nothing.
That means the BDR's day is built around outbound volume with relevance. You pick accounts that fit the company's ICP, find the named person who owns the problem, write a line that shows you actually read their site, and follow up on a cadence until one of three things happens: a meeting is booked, the prospect goes quiet, or they tell you to stop. None of that is glamorous. It is the craft that fills the top of the funnel.
When a first conversation is booked, the BDR hands the qualified context to an AE and moves on to the next account. That handoff is not optional — it is the product.
BDR vs SDR: same on-ramp, different label
The two titles are used almost interchangeably, and the exact split varies by company. The clean rule most orgs follow: BDRs work net-new and outbound; SDRs work inbound and existing segments. Ask which one the role is in the interview, because it changes your day and your metrics. Both produce the same deliverable — a qualified meeting that shows up.
What a BDR is not
The BDR is not a closer, not an AE, and not the person who runs the demo or negotiates pricing. If you hear yourself pitching the full product and quoting terms on your first call, you have drifted outside the role. The boundary exists for a reason: it keeps your ask clean. The BDR asks for one thing — a conversation. Everything else belongs to the people who own the deal.
The BDR responsibility checklist
Here is the checklist the best BDRs I have seen run, mapped to the interview question each responsibility answers. It is the operating system, not a script.
Account research
- Pick accounts that fit the ICP (firmographics + trigger events) — "Walk me through how you'd choose the first 20 accounts."
- Find the named contact who owns the problem — "Who do you reach out to inside a target account, and why?"
- Find one trigger or stat that makes your opener relevant — "Give me an example of a personalised opener."
Outbound execution
- Send 30–40 first-touch emails in batches of 10 — "What does your typical outbound day look like?"
- Leave 10–15 voicemails on the accounts you emailed first — "How do you handle voicemail?"
- Run a sequence (touch 1 → 2 → 3 → call) and log every touch — "What cadence do you run, and how do you know when to stop?"
Qualification + handoff
- Qualify with 5 questions: problem, budget, authority, timeline, fit — "How do you know a lead is qualified?"
- Book the first meeting and confirm it (show rate is yours) — "What does a successful day look like to you?"
- Hand the AE a 3-line context note so they never walk in cold — "How do you hand off to an AE?"
End of day
- Update every pipeline stage — no "next step: call them later"
- Write one line of learning: what worked, what did not
The point of mapping each responsibility to an interview question is practical: any of these can be asked in the room. If you can talk about how you choose accounts, run a cadence, qualify, and hand off, you are describing the actual job — and that is what gets you hired.
Start here
Your first decision is whether the outbound activity load fits you. If it does, the next lesson breaks down the single most common confusion — the difference between an SDR and a BDR — so you can tell which role you are actually applying for.