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SDR + inbound handoff redesign

Problem

Inbound volume doubled after a content push, but meetings booked flatlined. Leads bounced between SDRs with uneven product knowledge. Enterprise demos were assigned to reps who specialized in SMB. Marketing celebrated form fills while sales called the program a “randomizer.”

Constraints

CRM routing rules were brittle. Hiring more SDRs was not approved until next fiscal year. Marketing refused to gate every asset behind BANT questions that killed conversion.

Approach

We split the world into three inbound lanes by company size and industry tag—not by campaign source. Each lane mapped to a pod with vertical talk tracks. We added a fast “human triage” queue for ambiguous enterprise signals instead of forcing bad automation. Marketing supplied two optional self-segment questions on high-intent forms only.

Rollout

Shadow routing for two weeks: new rules ran in parallel without customer-facing changes. Compared time-to-touch and meeting rate. Flipped the switch on a low-traffic Friday with war-room monitoring through Monday.

Risks mitigated

• Pod overload: caps with spillover to backup pod
• Data gaps: default lane with generalists, not dead ends
• Political fairness: published round-robin logic and exception criteria

Outcomes (illustrative)

Median time-to-first-touch dropped. Enterprise meeting rate improved even as total lead volume stayed flat—quality, not quantity, moved the needle.

Lessons

Inbound fails in the router, not in the form. A few honest segmentation questions beat a perfect scoring model you will never maintain.