80: Confessions of an SDR #1 (with Brad Norgate, Enterprise SDR at Cognism)

So this is the first episode of the SDR Confessions, and I have to tell you all, I was not ready for this confession. We dive into how Brad sent his first video and how it was a massive mistake. I go into one of my big mistakes that I made video, and we also talk about our personal lives. Stay. Welcome everyone to Confessions of an sdr, and I'm really excited to do this show in partnership with CSM because we're gonna be going and finding SDRs and uncover some of the funniest, untold stories that you've never heard of and some absurd stories that you probably never heard of as well.

So this will be a ton of fun. We are our first victim. I mean, our first guest here, which is Brad. Uh, so Brad, tell us a little bit more about yourself and we'll dive into this confession. Yeah, I, I mean, um, I'm enterprise SD csm. I joined in April. Um, so what, this is eight or or nine months now. It's gone.

Mm-hmm. , it's gone so quickly, but also it feels like I've been here my whole life. So it's, it's one of those. Um, yeah, so, so every day, pretty much the life of an sdr, cold calling, cold emailing, and I've got quite a few, uh, embarrassing moments as I'm hoping the rest of, you know, the rest of the community does.

I'm not alone in that, but, uh, we'll find out. Yeah, I mean, look, if you're, if you've been an SDR for for two weeks, you probably have something that is a confession and probably something absurd. So I think everyone could probably relate, uh, in all those different ways. So, Brad, let's hop right into it. How we start these is figuring out where your confession is and then unpacking it from there.

So what is your confession, Brad? Talk. Well, my, my confession is that, um, I sent a vi and I give some context, um, but I sent a, a VI yard. Um, now I think a lot of SDS use this tool, but of course it's just allows you to record your screen, uh, maybe present the product and, and also yourself to send a video to a prospect.

Anyway, I, I, I hadn't been able to get this prospect on the phone. He was a very senior, uh, VP at a tech company. Um, and so he was one of my key prospects. I hadn't been able to reach him properly on, on the phone, so I thought, I'll try something different to cut through the noise and send him a video. And it was going really, really well.

I was really happy with, you know, I, I think I'd, you know, I thought I'd been really clever and I'd found a case study and I was, I was showing him the platform. Um, and then I, I looked over at my friend stupidly, um, who made. Burst out laughing in the middle of the recording and then I, I remember just trailing off and losing track of, of, of, um, of my thought process and I thought, right.

Bin that, and I'll film another one, come to sending the email. I didn't, I must have just not checked the link I attached because I ended up sending that one. Um, and. and all I can pray for ever since is that he never saw that email . But, uh, yes, pretty, pretty embarrassing. That is my, that is my confession.

Um, oh man. It probably doesn't sound too dramatic, but it definitely felt it in the moment. I mean, I mean, yeah, like if sitting a, sitting an outtake video to, uh, an executive is, is gonna give anyone a little bit of a, a blip on the radar when it comes to their heart rate. Uh, so, and when you were sitting in that video, was it too, you said like, To a prospect.

Was that like a VP of sales or c r o? Like what, what, what was that to? Yeah, he was v he was VP sales or he was vp. He was VP sales. Em or he was vp. Em, I can't remember which. It was, um, I dunno if I should say the company. Should I say the company or mm-hmm. M don't have to. Um, but, but yeah, it was a very, very big tech company and it was one of my key accounts and he was a key prospect.

And so, as you can imagine, Rewatch it and you realize you've sent that your heart just drops, um, to your stomach. So yeah, it was not a great feeling. Yeah. I mean, , I don't think anyone will have a great feeling about that as a whole. Uh, and so, okay. You, you sent that video sinking feeling and you're like, ah, this is awful.

So let's, let's talk about some lessons that people can learn from this confession. I think the, the first thing, and I've been there before, I've sent videos that. Might have messed up. I've sent one video where I sneezed . Right. Uh, that probably isn't something that probably someone who wanted to watch.

Right. So one thing I always tell people is, before you send the video, make sure that you review it and you look at it to make sure it's the right one you want to send. But anything that you uncovered that you learned from that experience that you now do every single time? Well, yeah, I, I mean, the most obvious one, which I think you already touched on there, is.

Double check, especially with a key prospect. I mean, you should be doing it all the time, but especially with a key prospect, just double check everything you're sending them. Make sure, you know, click that link before you send it and make sure it's the right video. It's not an outtake as I sent, um, but, but then I think that the second part to that, Morgan, is about just taking a second and knowing that the world is not gonna crash and burn.

This, this prospect probably has a full inbox and is not gonna see it straight away. At least that's what I. Praying for. Um, and then, you know, take a, take a minute and maybe if you can recall the email, try and do that. Just, uh, just gather yourself as opposed to, to panicking or letting the panic take over.

That's what I'd say. Yeah. Yeah, you definitely don't want the panic to tick over. Which leads into like the theme of all this, which is mindfulness, like being mindful on, okay, before I send this video, let me double check it. Let me make sure that I'm good. Right? I think those are our big pieces as well.

But here's, here's another question I have for you. So you had those, you had those outtakes. Do you now spend. Do you try to get things done in one take now? Like, what is your philosophy on creating videos? Cause I, I feel that I probably would've burned you a little bit to be like, all right, I'm just gonna do this in one take.

So there are no outtakes. Well, this, the, the worst part about this whole thing is that it was relatively early on in my. Uh, SDR career here. And it was also one of the, it, it was very early on in, in me sending videos. I didn't really use them up until that point. I was just a cold caller. Um, but, but since then, I, as you say, I've tried to do everything in one take.

I've had experience now recording videos. I know the flow, that sort of general gist of my videos. So I try my logic. Is if I do it in one take, then it's, it's, uh, less files to get confused what get confused with and, and, and possibility of sending the wrong ones. So yeah, try and do it in one take from now on.

That's what I do. And, and what do you, and what do you do to make sure that you can get it done in one take? What are some steps that people could listen again? That they can do so they don't end up, you know, sending the wrong video for, for themselves , right. Well, it, it's, for me, it's a matter, it's similar to cold calling.

Yes. Okay. We deal with lots of different objections and we get lot different, different people, different ICPs, but there's a general structure to your cold calls, right? Um, everyone's is different, but you should know your own so that you're not left flustered on a cold call. And I think it's the same with video.

So just find your style, find your groove, and find what's working for you over video and. Memorize that, uh, that structure so that when you get on, when, when you're filming a video, you know, you know that this is what I'm gonna speak about and then I'm gonna move to this, I'm gonna move to this, I'm gonna move to this.

And what that has allowed me to do since is, um, as, as you say, just film them in one take and, uh, reduce, reduce the, uh, likelihood of sending the wrong thing. . Yeah, no, that, that, that makes sense there. And I want to also touch on something too, uh, that we were talking about creating those videos. One take. I love that you talked about the framework of how to do that, so now people can do it.

Another thing I'd say I always suggest for people to do is if you do do multiple videos, like delete all the ones that weren't good before, you send the one that you wanna send, so then you can narrow it down to the one. So then it's like, this is the one. The, uh, the one that you wanna do, cuz I have definitely sent videos that are that, that just were not good.

Or it's me saying, oh, this didn't work and then I sent that one and it's the worst. And you're like, I hope they never view this. It's like the one time as an SDR where I was like, I hope they never view this. Don't open it. Yeah, don't click it. Right. Stay away. That's not the one you need to look at. Yeah, you spent your whole, your whole, uh, career trying to get them to open the emails.

But when that happens, that's the last thing you'd want to do. Um, well, you can't, you can't just let us, let us know that you, you have done it before. Morgan. You have to give us an example. Come on, I've, I've shared . I need you. No, this is, this is your confession, not mine. . So I'll give, I'll give, I'll get, I'll, I'll give a quick one.

I mean, I mentioned it earlier. So, um, I was making, I was making. , um, , I was making a video and. I sneezed, but there was more to that story. So I would do like five videos in the morning, um, like every, every single morning to get better at videos. And I was like, on my last video, and I had been, I had done all the rest of them as a one take, right?

And so I sneezed on the last one and was like, oh man, that's a, that's a lot of stuff that came out right? And then I, and then I like kept going, uh, and then I was like, okay, well I just wanted to like, get in the flow to make sure I could deliver. The pitch or whatever. And so I ended up doing another video cause I was like, all right, I just sneeze and like stuff went everywhere.

So that's probably disgusting, right? No one wants to see that. So I made another one, but then I didn't follow my rule and I didn't delete that outtake. And I sent the one where I was sneezing saying like, oh, like, hey, like look what , look at all this stuff that went everywhere. So, yeah. Uh, no one, I mean, they.

No one responded, but they did click and watch the video. So that's kinda, it's demoralizing. Yeah. Yeah. Actually video. Someone's gonna blackmail you with video one day. It's definitely in the hall of shame. It's definitely been presented probably in a, in a meeting somewhere. I don't even, I honestly don't even remember the company at this point cause it was so long.

It was so long ago. But yeah, it's definitely in a hall of shame somewhere. It's definitely been roasted probably to a certain degree, but that was, that was not good, man. That was not fun. No. I mean, yeah, at least I didn't, uh, but I, I feel a little bit less stupid now for, for doing something like that. I guess the lesson that I'm learning is to follow those rules that you, that you just said and hopefully we won't be shut.

Prospects are snot or, or, uh, laughing again. Yeah, please don't, yeah, I have more confessions than I can count. So , I have, I've faced a lot of things that people probably have gone through as well, and. We talked about, okay. We talked about things on how to go about that. Uh, one of the things that you mentioned as well was.

It rocks you a little bit and you felt a little bit mentally off as well, which in my case, like, you know, no one wants to see , all snot going all over the place. So I, I was like, oh, they clicked the video, like heart sank. So what do you do now to make sure that you stay calm in these moments, uh, if you do make mistakes because they will happen.

But how do you stay mindful of, okay, I'm getting a little stressed about this. I'm like really pressed about this. How do you remain calm in those situations? . Yeah. The, the first thing you, you, you touched on there was that actually understanding that these mistakes are always gonna happen. You're not ever gonna escape them because, um, Although hopefully less of less mistakes will come with a bit of experience.

Um, you know, you're always gonna make them. So I think understanding and admitting that to yourself, that, that every day is not gonna be perfect and you're always gonna gonna make mistakes. That's, that's, The biggest part so that actually when they happen, you are already kind of mentally prepared for that.

You know, it's not, not a massive shock to the system. I think if you walk in expecting, you know, I've had a few years experience at this and, and I'm, I'm not gonna make some mistakes anymore. When they, when they do come along, it will probably be quite a shock to you. But in terms of, of handling that in the moment, once it's happened, um, I would say it's about just taking a second, stepping back.

Understanding the world's not gonna end. You know, there's a, there's a 90% chance, I mean, think Morgan, as you just said there, like SDRs, we, we try and, uh, get prospects to open our emails all the time. Yep. And it doesn't always work. So I think remembering that, and they're probably not gonna open it, um, is, is good.

And then you can just, you can gather yourself and you can just hopefully learn from it. Hopefully learn from it. Are there, are there things that you do outside of work to. Get in that mindset. I think one of the hardest things for any sdr, any salesperson to have is to just be like, Hey, like this is the end of the world, but it feels like the end of the world because you've made a mistake that could potentially like not get your response or I don't know if it's really bad, gets you fired.

Right? I don't think that's gonna happen to most people, but that's what, that's what people's immediate thoughts are. So are there things that you're doing to help that with that mindset and be. It's, so number one is, um, try and try and keep a network of other people in your industry, right? So, I mean, link, everyone is on LinkedIn these days and, um, that presents an opportunity to have conversations with other people that are doing the same job as you.

Um, and to understand that. Uh, we we're all making those mistakes and you know, you, you chat your LinkedIn feed and you, you hear these stories come up quite often. So I think if you, if you, if you stay active on those, those platforms where, where you share a network with other people doing the same thing, you realize that actually they're not as silly or as serious as perhaps your brain is spiraling you into believing in those moments.

Right. So just it's about contextualizing that. But in terms of, I mean, I dunno, you, uh, were you expecting maybe that I was gonna say something like meditation, like mindfulness? No, it's your, it's your answer. . It's your answer. You know what, I actually should though. I, I really want to, um, I, I'd love to. Get into the habit of meditating or like, they say that journaling is quite good, like reflecting on your day.

I'm sure that would help. So actually, um, I would love to be able to say that I do that, but I don't, uh, however, I'll make it New Year's resolution. There you go. I, I would say so I've done morning journaling. I've done an afternoon journaling and. . I think in sales, the A, actually, the afternoon journaling and the morning routine's always important.

But I think the afternoon journaling is helpful because it allows you to really reflect on how the day went. where in most scenarios we go make cold calls, we do emails, and then we just go through that process and then it's like, I got, I'm just gonna move on now. I think being, I think like really thinking about what you're doing and how you're going about it is really helpful to a degree, because then you can reflect on what you could do better, what you should stop, et cetera.

So I think that piece. How to continuously focus on impacting your life and also your sales crew by reflecting in a journal afternoon could be helpful. Yeah. But I think everyone, uh, everyone goes about how they handle stress and being calm across the board in all, in all different types of ways. . Well, and, and the, the other thing you said there about journaling in the afternoon to reflect, right?

I'm sure that a, again, and this is assumptive because I haven't yet built that habit, but I'm sure through building that habit, you'd probably get to a state of mind where you would see every mistake you make is actually just a, an opportunity at the end of the day to reflect and then learn. Um, So it, it seems like, yeah, maybe I, I do need to get into this because, um, SDR Inc can be pretty, can be pretty manic.

So maybe a, maybe a journal to reflect on would be, I mean, any asides from that. Anything else you do in the moment to like, you know, bring the, bring the temperature down a little bit or, yeah, yeah. So my, my answer is, Brad will be a little woowoo. I'm gonna, I'm gonna put it that way. So , that's what people would describe them as.

However, I have noticed. Very mostly composed across the board. Yeah, I mean, I think that there are gonna be situations where like you do get stressed, you get annoyed and you're like, what's going on? But I started, once I started doing these things, like I don't, there's not a lot of things that truly bother me.

So I do chiro therapy. So essentially what that is, is like the ice box. So you can only be in there for like three minutes. So I sit in there for like three minutes. I do it on the coldest temperature, tells you how often I go. And so that for me is. It, uh, calms you down. It like lowers, lowers, like all the different anxiety that you have.

Like, it's been really helpful for me. So that's why I go. I also do like an infrared sauna, so it's different than a regular sauna. So what it does is it, it's not based on heat that they're pumping into the room. There is heat in the room, but it goes like into like your. I think it's like your bloodstream or something like that.

The way that they describe it, and basically it helps you sweat from like inwards to outwards. So it's like really good for like getting rid of toxins. It's really good for like a de-stressor. It's like anti-aging. So I do that and then, uh, I don't, I don't do as much of. Meditating. I do pray, but I don't do as much meditating.

Um, and then journaling, I do from time to time. I don't do it as often as I used to, so it's something that I actually want to get back into. So I'll start diving into that. And then my favorite one that I do, but I don't do it like every single day because it'd be way too, it'd be way too much is float takes, I don't know if you've heard of the float tanks before.

Yeah. But in the dark, it's like dark and you're in there and there's like, I've heard of. That has been, that has been absolutely incredible for me. Well, I think I, I actually just, uh, you saying this, remind me of something. I, um, a, a big part of it, I think staying calm in that moment is understanding that, um, or, or just have it taking the perspective that, um, once things are done, sometimes it's completely out of your control.

Yeah. And that, um, You know, you sitting there stressing or, or getting worried is gonna do absolutely nothing to, to change the situation. So I think once you take that view, you can look at things a little bit more logically and you just bring your, your internal stress down. But you said as well about, um, like cryotherapy.

Um, I, not as extreme as that, but I do have cold showers. I only have cold showers. My mom thinks I'm really weird. Um, whenever I go. And I leave it on cold. If I have a shower, if I go back to, to her house and I have a cold shower, I get yeah. Very angry text messages. So, but yeah, I actually do find, you get out the shower and you feel really, um, I just love it.

I just wouldn't, I don't think I would have a hot shower again. I dunno if that's weird to say. No, it's, it's, it's not like, uh, I know one of my friends, he lo, he like loves the cold shower. He's like, I love it. Starts my day and I get fired up and I'm like, all right, dude. Like, Hey, do what you gotta do. Like I do the, yeah.

Wait, what'd you say? Sorry, I didn't mean to cut you off. I, I was just saying that they call it like mind over body as in you like the idea of a cold shower does not sound appealing to anyone. If you can train your mind, uh, to, um, to just overcome that, overcome what your body's telling you, then that actually gives you a lot of, uh, that's an opportunity there for, for the rest of your life as well.

I, I absolutely agree. That's why I do the chio therapy as well. Yeah, because it's just so helpful to just get in there mental, okay, this is how I want to go about it. But I mean, also, like I said, like , you gotta be able to come in there mentally and be like, this is what I'm gonna do. Cuz Yeah, it can be very, very like, Overwhelming if you don't prepare yourself mentally to get in that cold shower.

But I think, you know, and everything that we're talking about, like you have to figure, like, kind of in conclusion of everything we're saying, you have to find what is gonna be helpful for you so that you have a calm demeanor about how you go about things and just be, and your mindfulness increases because I, I just know that the reps I know that are successful, they don't let.

Mistakes or the cold call errors get to them that much, that that stops them from taking action that they need to in their momentum. There are things that are gonna happen and, you know, we talked about the video piece. Like that will happen to you, Brad. Most people probably like, probably would've like quit

Like they would've been too stressed. They would've laughed. Like, I can't do this anymore. And you have to just have that mindset of like, Hey, that happened. It's outta my control now. I can't go back in the past. How do I make sure that doesn't happen again? And the tips that we've given you so far are ways that you can do that, right?

Like make sure that you're deleting videos that are outtakes, like looking at the video. Looking at, okay, what, what am I putting in this email? Or if even, you could even call it out and say, Hey, I made a mistake. If you want to, right? Or making sure that you're doing one take. All the things we talked about are ways that you can avoid that, uh, what we both did.

But I think it's important that I think overall, if you are mentally composed and you can keep a steady mindset, any mistake that you make will obviously not be good in the moment. Be able to mentally move on. Yeah. And I, I have to say, when I came, when I came into this, I did not think that I was going to be discussing cold showers, um, as, as a, as a piece of advice.

But actually, um, I, I think it does. , it, it is part of like a larger, um, you know, being an SDR is actually, it can be an incredibly tough job. It's not always a nine to five. You do take it home with you a lot. And, um, I think to to mindset is a massive part of performance in sales. Um, I know that can seem quite cringe worthy, but, um, it's, it's so, so true and it's often the differentiator between top performers and perhaps people who are struggling.

And so if you can learn early on as I'm trying to do, um, Mental ways of almost coping mechanisms to deal with stress when it arises and to deal with problems when they arise. And you can do that through a number of ways that we've discussed. But as you say, it's about finding, finding your own coping mechanism, and hopefully that's, that's gonna really, uh, give you the mindset to overcome these things when they come up.

Absolutely. Well, Brad, thank you so much for coming on the confessions of an sdr. Hopefully that, uh, maybe some people feel like, okay, my, my rule is not as bad as I thought. Right. Uh, for, from both of our confessions, uh, and as we wrap, what advice would you give to all the other SDRs out there? Better start now.

Oh my God. Um, do it. It depends what you want. Do. Like a, a real actionable piece of advice, like a real practical piece of advice? Or do you want something more general? Hmm. Let's get something practical. Let's get something, let's get something that people can go do right now. I was gonna say, um, I've already, I've already said the cold showers, so let me try something a little bit more practical.

Um, I, something that I've actually started recently doing, which may seem incredibly obvious, but uh, has, has helped me out a lot. I now double dial my prospects. So I have a Power hour in the morning and a power hour in the afternoon. Uh, and what I try to do now at the end of those, if I've made say 35 calls in that morning power hour.

I'm gonna go back before lunch and make sure I try all of those numbers again, which, um, you know, you might not think to do initially as obvious as it may seem, but the past few weeks I've had. 2, 3, 4 additional connects during those power hours that I just wouldn't have had before. And some of those have been meetings or callbacks or, or really good pipeline for me as an sdr.

So I guess my most practical piece of advice would be to, to try that for yourself and, and see if that works. See if that has an improvement on your results. Let's worked for me so far. Are you, are you using the same number when you do those double dials or are you switching. I am using the same number because my hope is that, um, someone could be, I mean, as silly as it sounds, we're calling rural people, right?

So they could be in the bathroom, they could be having a coffee break, they could be in a meeting. I'm just calling back from the same number, hoping they pick up or they wonder who's this guy calling me twice? He must want something. Uh, and it's worked for me so far, Morgan. So I'll keep you update. Hey, look.

Yeah, keep us updated. Hey, look, if it's working, keep trying it. Uh, keep testing it out. Hopefully some people out there you go. Test it out yourself. And as we, as we wrap here, Brad, are there any shout outs or anything else you wanna mention before we get out? . Yeah, there, there definitely is. Um, shout out.

I'm just trying to think. Uh, I'm gonna give a shout out to my manager, Ola Pew. Um, because when things like this happen and, uh, we are on the, the confessions of an s d i here when these things happen, he's, uh, a real steady hand and a steady head at dealing with these things. So he's, he's a. Good bloke to go to.

Um, who else do I wanna shout out? I missed a shout out. I, I did something like this the other day and I am gonna, I'm gonna shout out Al Pervez, who's an A here at csm. He, uh, is fantastic and is a massive support to me. He's really, really kind man. So, yeah, that's tho those are my shoutouts, Morgan. So thank you for giving me a bit of time to speak today.

Yeah, absolutely. Thanks for, uh, coming into your confession. Uh, hopefully people learn from it. Got some tips and maybe some people will take some cold showers. Brett, maybe you started a movement. We'll see. So we all appreciate, Hey, look, started a movement. Who knows? Uh, appreciate you coming on hopefully again, y'all enjoyed this episode and we'll see you all next time.