SDR Onboarding: The First 90 Days Playbook for Australian B2B Teams

Most sales leaders treat SDR onboarding as a two week event. Show them the product, hand them a script, and turn them loose on the phones. Three months later they wonder why ramp is taking forever and the new hire is questioning their career choice.

A proper SDR onboarding is a 90 day program with clear weekly objectives, structured coaching, and ramping output targets. Done right it cuts time to productivity from 4 to 6 months down to 8 to 12 weeks. Done wrong it costs you a hire and 6 figures in lost pipeline.

This playbook breaks down what each phase looks like, what the new SDR should be doing, and what their manager should be measuring.

The 90 day output curve

A healthy Australian B2B SDR ramp follows a predictable curve.

• Days 1 to 30: Foundation and shadowing (5 percent of full output)
• Days 31 to 60: Supervised production (30 percent of full output)
• Days 61 to 90: Independent production (70 percent of full output)
• Day 90 onwards: Full production (100 percent)

If your new SDR is hitting full output in week 4 you have either hired a unicorn or your bar is too low. If they are still under 30 percent in week 12 your training is broken.

Days 1 to 7: Product and ICP immersion

Week 1 is not about phones. It is about deep context. The SDR cannot have meaningful conversations until they understand what you sell and who buys it.

Daily objectives.

• Day 1: HR onboarding, tools setup, team introductions
• Day 2: Product training, demos of every feature, customer use cases
• Day 3: ICP deep dive, buyer personas, competitive landscape
• Day 4: Sales process walkthrough, CRM training, sequence tool training
• Day 5: Listen to 20 recorded calls, take notes on what worked
• Day 6 and 7: Self study, read pitch decks, customer case studies

End of week 1 check. The SDR should be able to.

• Explain your product to a colleague in 60 seconds
• Recite your ICP firmographics from memory
• Describe 3 customer use cases with named examples
• Walk through your sales process from cold call to closed deal

If they cannot do all 4, week 1 has not landed. Repeat the gaps before moving on.

Days 8 to 14: Script work and call shadowing

Week 2 introduces the phone, but in shadow mode.

Daily structure.

• Morning: Live listen to 2 to 3 tenured SDR call blocks (60 to 90 minutes)
• Mid morning: Debrief, what worked, what failed, why
• Afternoon: Practice scripts in role play with a peer or manager
• Late afternoon: Review recorded calls, build a personal script bank

Targets.

• 15 hours of live listen by end of week
• 30 recorded calls reviewed
• Personal versions of 4 core scripts written (opener, objection handlers, voicemail, close)
• One full pitch delivered to the manager without notes

By the end of week 2, the SDR should sound natural delivering the pitch in a quiet room. Not great. Just natural.

Days 15 to 30: Supervised first calls

Week 3 puts them on the phone, but under supervision.

Daily structure.

• 9:00 to 10:30: Live calling block 1 (with manager listening)
• 10:30 to 11:00: Immediate call review and coaching
• 11:00 to 12:30: Independent practice calls on warmer accounts
• 1:30 to 3:00: Calling block 2 (with manager or peer listening)
• 3:00 to 4:00: CRM updates, list prep, follow up emails
• 4:00 to 5:00: End of day review with manager

Week 3 to 4 targets.

• 25 to 40 dials per day (not 100)
• 1 to 3 conversations per day
• 2 to 4 meetings booked total across the two weeks
• 100 percent of calls recorded and 30 percent reviewed with manager

The slower volume is intentional. Better to make 40 thoughtful calls than 100 panicked ones. Quality of conversations matters more than count in this phase.

Days 31 to 60: Supervised production

Now the ramp accelerates. The SDR is calling daily, books are growing, but the coaching frequency stays high.

Daily targets.

• 50 to 70 dials per day (climbing through the month)
• 4 to 7 conversations per day
• 1 meeting per day average by week 8

Weekly coaching structure.

• Monday: Week ahead plan and accounts to prioritise
• Tuesday: Call recording review (3 calls deep dive)
• Wednesday: Live listen and real time coaching on a calling block
• Thursday: Objection handling clinic (group session if multiple SDRs)
• Friday: Week wrap, metrics review, recognition of best moments

The critical metrics in days 31 to 60.

• Dials per day (volume discipline)
• Conversation to meeting ratio (skill)
• Meetings held to meetings booked (quality)
• Meetings booked to opportunities created (alignment with sales)

If meetings booked is rising but the show up rate is poor or the AE feedback is negative, the SDR is qualifying poorly. Coach to that immediately.

Days 61 to 90: Independent production

By day 60 the SDR should be running their own day with weekly check ins rather than daily supervision.

Daily targets.

• 80 to 100 dials per day
• 7 to 10 conversations per day
• 1 to 2 meetings booked per day
• 5 to 10 meetings booked per week

Coaching cadence drops to weekly.

• One 1:1 per week (30 to 45 minutes)
• One call review session (60 minutes)
• One team session (objection handling or pitch refinement)
• Manager spot listens to 2 to 3 calls per day without scheduled debrief

The day 90 milestone.

By day 90 the SDR should be producing 70 to 80 percent of a tenured SDR's monthly meetings. Hitting day 90 fully ramped at 100 percent is unrealistic. Hitting 70 percent is excellent.

The metrics that matter at each stage

Different metrics matter at different points in the ramp. Tracking the wrong ones too early demotivates new hires and masks real issues.

Days 1 to 30: process metrics

• Hours of training completed
• Calls listened to
• Scripts practiced
• Dials attempted

Days 31 to 60: activity metrics

• Dials per day
• Conversations per day
• Connect rate

Days 61 to 90: outcome metrics

• Meetings booked per week
• Meetings held per week
• Conversion from meeting to opportunity

Day 90 onwards: pipeline metrics

• Opportunities sourced per month
• Pipeline value generated per month
• Cost per opportunity

What manager involvement looks like at each stage

Manager time is the highest cost input in SDR onboarding. Allocate it correctly.

• Days 1 to 14: 2 hours per day per new SDR
• Days 15 to 30: 1 to 1.5 hours per day
• Days 31 to 60: 45 to 60 minutes per day
• Days 61 to 90: 2 hours per week
• Day 90 onwards: 60 to 90 minutes per week ongoing

Cutting manager time too fast is the biggest mistake in SDR onboarding. The investment pays back 10x in faster ramp and lower churn.

Common onboarding mistakes

Five patterns kill SDR onboarding in Australian B2B teams.

1. Putting them on the phone in week 1. Without product and ICP context, early calls produce bad habits that are hard to unlearn.

2. Skipping recorded call reviews. The single highest impact coaching activity. Skipping it makes everything else 30 percent less effective.

3. Measuring volume from day 1. Forces panicked dialing that produces no real conversations. Volume comes later.

4. Letting them write their own scripts in week 1. They have no idea what works yet. Give them proven scripts to follow, then customise once they have run 200 calls.

5. Treating onboarding as a project not a process. The best teams have an SDR onboarding manual, weekly checkpoint templates, and a defined coach. They do not improvise.

The investment

A properly executed 90 day SDR onboarding costs roughly.

• Manager time: 80 to 100 hours of direct coaching
• Lost productivity vs full output: 65 percent of one quarter
• Tools and materials: $500 to $1,000

In dollar terms, the onboarding investment for one new in house SDR in Australia is around $25,000 to $35,000 on top of salary. That is why churn at month 14 is so brutal. The investment never pays back.

The build vs buy comparison

This is also why outsourced SDR services exist. When you engage a phone first agency, the SDR onboarding is already complete. They are trained, equipped, and producing in week 1. The ramp cost sits with the agency, not you.

For Australian B2B teams running their first outbound motion, this matters. Build in house and you eat 90 days of ramp before you see real output. Outsource and you see meetings booked in week 2.

Whichever path you choose, the rules of effective onboarding are the same. Foundation before phones. Shadowing before calling. Quality before quantity. Coaching every week, forever.

Want help benchmarking your SDR onboarding or evaluating outsourced alternatives? Book a 15 minute call with Nousu Collective.