How to write a sales development representative resume
An SDR resume is a numbers sheet with a story: lead with quota attainment and activity-to-outcome conversion — "booked 18 qualified meetings/month at 130% of quota; 40% converted to pipeline worth $1.2M" — and name the stack (Salesforce, Outreach, LinkedIn Sales Navigator, ZoomInfo). For career-changers and new grads, any evidence of structured outreach, rejection resilience, and measurable persuasion (fundraising, retail upsells, recruiting) translates directly.
What recruiters and ATS look for in a sales development representative resume
SDR hiring is volume hiring with fast screens: recruiters look for quota numbers within seconds, then for stack familiarity, then for signs of coachability and drive. No quota history is survivable — SDR is the classic entry door into tech sales — but then the resume must quantify something: calls made, response rates, events sold, donations raised. Sequenced, tool-literate outbound (personalization at scale, A/B tested messaging) increasingly beats raw dial counts, and AI-assisted prospecting fluency is becoming a differentiator worth one honest bullet.
Section order: Summary → Experience (numbers first) → Skills (stack) → Education. New grads: add Activities showing hustle (fundraising, campus sales, athletics).
ATS keywords for a sales development representative resume
These are the keywords most sales development representative job descriptions use as ATS-filter inputs. Include the ones you genuinely have evidence for in your Skills section.
Starter Skills section
A starting point for your Skills section. Prune to what you genuinely have evidence for.
Best action verbs for sales development representative bullets
Lead every bullet with a strong, specific verb. For this role, the strongest openers are:
Example bullet points (before → after)
Three rewrites following the action-verb / quantified-outcome pattern. Replace the specifics with your own. Never invent numbers.
Sales Development Representative resume FAQ
Quota attainment percentage, qualified meetings booked per month, meeting-to-opportunity conversion, and pipeline dollars sourced. Add activity context (touches/day, reply rates) as supporting evidence — outcomes first, activity second.
Quantify adjacent persuasion and volume work: fundraising calls, retail upsell rates, recruiting outreach, campus event ticket sales. Pair it with proof of drive (athletics, side projects) and stack familiarity from a course or self-teaching — SDR managers hire for coachability plus evidence you act on metrics.
Salesforce plus an engagement platform (Outreach or Salesloft) are the core filters; add Sales Navigator and a data tool (ZoomInfo, Apollo). One line on AI-assisted prospecting — drafting, research, personalization at scale — reads current without hype.
Companies swap the labels freely (often SDR = inbound, BDR = outbound, but not reliably). Use the JD's term in your summary and make the inbound/outbound mix of your actual experience explicit in the bullets so there is no mismatch at interview.
Related guides: How to write a account executive resume · How to write a revenue operations analyst resume · How to write a customer service representative resume
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