Should you hire an in-house SDR or hire an SDR agency? Here is the honest breakdown, with numbers, across cost, time-to-pipeline, output, risk, and retention.
Cost comparison: in-house SDR vs Axe Frontier
| Line item | In-house SDR | Axe Frontier (Growth) |
|---|---|---|
| Base salary | $60,000–$75,000 | Included |
| On-target commission | $20,000–$30,000 | Included |
| Benefits, payroll tax, 401k | $18,000–$24,000 | Included |
| Tools (CRM, dialer, data, sequencer) | $9,000–$15,000 | Mostly included |
| Recruiter fee (20% on base) | $12,000–$15,000 | $0 |
| Manager time (15% of VP Sales) | ~$30,000 | $0 (we manage them) |
| Fully loaded annual cost | $149,000–$189,000 | $120,000 |
Time to first booked meeting
- In-house: 4–7 months (2 months to hire, 2–3 months to ramp, 1–2 months to produce)
- Axe Frontier: 3–5 weeks (1–2 weeks to configure, 1–3 weeks to first booked meeting)
Daily output
- In-house SDR average: 20–40 dials per day, 120–200 emails per day
- Axe Frontier dedicated SDR: 80+ dials per day, 150+ emails per day, LinkedIn and video
Who should still hire in-house?
Some companies genuinely should. If your ACV is $500K+ with a 9-month sales cycle, if your product needs deep technical knowledge to pitch, or if you have a long runway and no urgency to hit a quarter, in-house can work. You also get a longer-term employee brand and potential AE pipeline.
Who should hire Axe Frontier instead?
- Seed–Series C US B2B SaaS, Fintech, Cybersecurity, DevTools, MarTech, HealthTech
- ACV between $20K and $500K
- AE team already in place to take the demos
- Need to prove outbound as a channel in one quarter, not one year
- Churned through one or more in-house SDR hires already
What happens if it does not work?
You can downgrade or stop at the end of any quarter. No 12-month lock-in, no buy-out fee. We publish meeting-booking and pipeline metrics every week so you know in 30 days, not 6 months.