The short answer: outsourced SDR companies charge $3,000 to $15,000 a month for a managed program in 2026, with entry retainers of $3,000 to $5,000 for a single-channel program, $4,000 to $8,000 for multi-channel, and $9,000 to $14,000 for a dedicated team, according to the pricing guides the agencies themselves publish. Pay-per-meeting vendors charge $150 to $1,500 per booked meeting depending on qualification. The AI SDR option, Sdrs, does the list building, writing, follow-up and booking for $49, $149 or $499 a month with no contract. The table below puts the real numbers side by side so you can decide with a calculator instead of a sales call.
Outsourced SDR companies compared on price
Prices come from each vendor's own site or published cost guide where one exists, and from third-party pricing roundups where the vendor quotes only. Agency pricing changes often; treat the ranges as a starting point for your own quote request.
| Provider | Published or reported price | Minimum term | What it buys | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Leadium | $3,500/mo cold calling only; $4,000 to $5,000/mo multi-channel (own cost guide) | Month to month advertised | Shared or semi-dedicated SDR, phone, email and LinkedIn | Mid-market teams that want phone plus email from a US agency |
| CIENCE | $2,000/mo campaign team + $499/mo platform + SDR from $1,750 (offshore), $2,500 (Europe) or $4,500 (US) per month, plus a performance bonus and a one-time setup fee (pricing page, October 2026) | Month to month | Platform plus managed SDR talent, multi-channel | Teams that want to pick the SDR seniority and pay for the platform separately |
| Belkins | About $11,000/mo per dedicated SDR; programs reported at $3,000 to $15,000/mo (third-party reviews) | 3 to 6 months reported | Dedicated SDR, appointment setting, email deliverability work | Companies with a proven offer that want a dedicated named rep |
| SalesRoads | $11,950 per four weeks for one dedicated SDR, $16,750 for two (pricing page, October 2026); appointment setting page also lists a fractional program from $6,950. See SalesRoads pricing | Cancel anytime (published) | Dedicated SDR, operations team, client success director | Enterprise deals that need a full phone-led team |
| memoryBlue | $3,500 to $11,000+/mo (reported in pricing roundups) | Quote | Outsourced SDR with an option to hire the rep later | Tech companies that want to convert the rep to in-house |
| Martal Group | $2,000 to $40,000/mo (reported), quote only | Quote | Fractional SDR and sales teams, multi-channel | Tech vendors selling into North America and Europe |
| Pay-per-meeting vendors | $150 to $300 per loosely qualified meeting, $300 to $500 ICP-matched, $800 to $1,500 verified executive (Leadium cost guide) | Often a meeting minimum | Booked meetings only, list stays with the vendor | Teams that want a variable cost and can absorb no-shows |
| Sdrs (AI SDR) | $49, $149 or $499/mo billed monthly; $288, $888 or $2,988/yr annual (published) | None, cancel monthly | B2B database, AI-written sequences, follow-up, reply detection, booking, CRM sync | Founders, small sales teams and agencies that want outbound meetings without a retainer |
One number is missing from every agency row: the fully loaded cost of the alternative you are comparing against. SalesHive's published SDR cost breakdown puts an in-house sales development rep at $110,000 to $160,000 a year (base, commission, benefits, tools, management, recruiting, ramp and turnover), which is why $5,000 a month for an agency reads as a bargain. It is a bargain against a hire (see our full SDR cost breakdown for each line). It is not a bargain against software.
What an outsourced SDR retainer actually buys
Strip the sales language and a managed SDR program is five pieces of work: building a list, writing the messages, sending and following up, handling the replies, and booking the meeting into a closer's calendar. The agency charges a retainer because a person does each of those, and because that person needs a manager, a data subscription, a sequencer, a dialer and a quality-assurance layer.
The pricing guides are candid about what moves the price. Channel mix is first: a cold-calling program costs more than email because dials take human hours. Team location is second: offshore programs price 30 to 60 percent below US-based equivalents, at the cost of call quality and time-zone overlap. Dedication is third: a shared SDR working four accounts is the entry tier, a named rep working only yours is the enterprise tier.
Then there is the invoice. Leadium's own guide lists the items that commonly appear after the quote: setup fees, separate data fees, tooling surcharges, per-seat charges, early-termination penalties and auto-renewing lock-ins, with the warning that a $5,000 quote can become $8,000 once they land. Ask for every one of those in writing before you sign, and ask who owns the list when the contract ends. At most agencies, they do.
How much does an outsourced SDR cost per meeting?
An outsourced SDR costs $300 to $800 per held meeting at typical retainer and output levels: a $5,000 a month program that books ten meetings costs $500 each, and the same program booking six costs $833. SalesHive uses about $1,000 per qualified meeting as the threshold where a program stops making sense, and an in-house rep at $130,000 a year booking ten a month lands at $1,083.
The AI SDR number is different in kind, not just in size. On Sdrs Plus at $149 a month, ten booked meetings cost about $15 each, and because the sequences keep running, the eleventh meeting costs nothing extra. Even if you assume the AI books half as many meetings as a good human setter, the cost per meeting is still twenty to thirty times lower. That gap is what changes the decision for any team below enterprise deal sizes. If you are pricing a pure meeting-booking program rather than a full SDR, our breakdown of appointment setting services cost compares retainer, hourly and pay-per-appointment quotes on the same cost-per-meeting basis.
SDR outsourcing pricing models
SDR outsourcing pricing comes in three models: a monthly retainer of $3,000 to $15,000 for a managed team, pay per meeting at $150 to $1,500 per booked meeting, and a hybrid with a lower retainer plus a fee per meeting or a commission. Most SDR agencies also charge a setup or onboarding fee and ask for a 3 to 6 month minimum.
| Pricing model | What you pay | Who carries the risk | Watch for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Monthly retainer | $3,000 to $15,000 a month | You, since the fee is due whatever gets booked | Minimum terms, setup fees, data and tool charges billed on top |
| Pay per meeting | $150 to $1,500 per booked meeting | The agency, on paper | How a qualified meeting is defined and whether no-shows are billed |
| Hybrid | A reduced retainer plus a per-meeting fee or commission | Shared | Commission terms on deals that close months later |
| AI SDR software | $49 to $499 a month at Sdrs | You, at a much smaller stake | Someone on your team still approves the targeting and takes the meetings |
When you compare SDR agency pricing, convert every quote to cost per held meeting over the full minimum term, including setup. A $4,000 retainer with a three month minimum and a $2,000 onboarding fee is a $14,000 decision, not a $4,000 one. We list current per-SDR prices, bonus formulas and first-year totals vendor by vendor in our outsourced SDR pricing guide.
How much does an SDR cost?
An SDR costs $110,000 to $160,000 a year in the US when you hire one, counting base, commission, benefits, tools, data, management time, recruiting, ramp and turnover (SalesHive's fully loaded estimate). An outsourced SDR costs $3,000 to $15,000 a month, or $36,000 to $180,000 a year. An AI SDR costs $49 to $499 a month at Sdrs, or $588 to $5,988 a year.
| Option | Monthly cost | Yearly cost | Time to first meetings |
|---|---|---|---|
| In-house SDR (US, fully loaded) | About $9,000 to $13,000 | $110,000 to $160,000 | Two to three months of hiring and ramp |
| Outsourced SDR company | $3,000 to $15,000 | $36,000 to $180,000 | Two to four weeks of onboarding |
| Pay-per-meeting vendor | Variable, $150 to $1,500 per meeting | Depends on volume | Two to four weeks |
| AI SDR (Sdrs) | $49, $149 or $499 | $588 to $5,988 monthly, or $288 to $2,988 on annual plans | First campaign the same day |
The software option also changes what you are buying. An agency or a hire sells you hours; AI BDR software sells you the prospecting loop itself, so volume goes up without the invoice following it.
What SDR as a service means and who sells it
SDR as a service is the subscription version of outsourcing: instead of a project fee, you pay a monthly rate for a defined amount of sales development capacity, usually a fraction of a rep or a whole rep plus tooling. CIENCE's talent-cloud model (platform fee plus an at-cost SDR rate by experience level) is the clearest example among the agencies above, and most of the month-to-month programs in the table are sold the same way.
The label now covers two very different products, and buyers should know which one they are being sold. Human SDR as a service gives you a person at $2,000 to $5,500 a month plus a platform fee, working business hours in one time zone, with the ramp and turnover risk that comes with people. AI SDR as a service gives you software that runs the same loop at any volume, around the clock, for $49 to $499 a month. The AI SDR pricing comparison lists what 11x, Artisan, AiSDR, Reply.io, Salesforge and Sdrs charge for the software version, and the spread there is wide too: from $49 a month to annual contracts of $30,000 to $45,000.
When an outsourced SDR company is the right call
Honest answer: three situations.
First, deals that only move by phone. If your buyers are hospital CFOs or plant managers who do not answer email and need a conversation before they will take a meeting, an agency with trained US callers earns its retainer. Sdrs places AI voice calls on Pro, but a seasoned human on a complex first call is still better at reading the room.
Second, deal sizes that make the retainer irrelevant. If one closed deal is worth $250,000, a $10,000 a month dedicated team that books four qualified executive meetings a month pays for itself, and the agency's management layer is worth having.
Third, no internal owner at all. An AI SDR still needs someone to describe the ideal customer, approve the messaging and take the meetings. If nobody on the team will spend two hours a week on that, a managed program with a client success manager is the safer buy.
Outside those three, the retainer is paying for hours that software now does, and the contract term is the real cost: three to six months of a $5,000 program is $15,000 to $30,000 committed before you know whether the offer resonates.
The AI SDR option plan by plan
Sdrs runs the whole outsourced SDR loop from one account, which is why we sell it as outsourced SDR services on a monthly plan. Starter at $49 a month gives 500 verified leads a day from the built-in B2B database, AI prospect research, email sequences up to seven steps with conditional branching and A/B testing, mailbox warm-up and deliverability monitoring, CSV import and export, and three seats. Plus at $149 adds 2,000 leads a day with phone numbers, LinkedIn and X in the same sequence, smart scheduling that detects positive replies and inserts your calendar link, two-way sync with HubSpot, Salesforce and Pipedrive, and five seats. Pro at $499 adds unlimited leads with direct dials, full autopilot from discovery to booked meeting, AI voice calls, buying-intent signals, multi-client workspaces and API access, which is how agencies run one workspace per client.
For teams whose whole goal is first meetings on the calendar, the AI appointment setter page walks through the setup step by step. Teams that want a human on the phone and software on the written channels can run Sdrs for email and LinkedIn and keep a part-time caller, which usually lands below $2,000 a month all in.
The DIY stack for comparison
The third route is buying the parts an agency uses and running them yourself. A contact database at $50 to $100 a seat, a sequencer at $50 to $100 a seat, warm-up and a scheduler, plus a dedicated cold email tool that writes the personalized sequences and protects deliverability, comes to $150 to $400 a month before anyone's time. It works for a sales ops person who enjoys the tooling. It does not remove the hours: someone still builds lists, writes copy, reads replies and books meetings, which is exactly the work the retainer was paying an agency to absorb.
How to switch from an outsourced SDR company without losing pipeline
- Read the termination clause first. Note the notice period, any early-termination fee and the auto-renewal date. Give notice in writing before the renewal, not after.
- Get your data out. Ask for the full contact list with status, every sequence that was sent, reply logs and the meetings booked. If the contract says the list is theirs, at least export the accounts that replied.
- Load the replied accounts first. In Sdrs, import that CSV and run a short re-engagement sequence to the warm contacts while the AI builds a fresh list for the segment that converted best.
- Run both for two weeks. Overlap the last agency weeks with the first Sdrs campaign so the calendar never empties. Compare cost per held meeting at the end of the overlap.
- Keep the phone if you need it. If the agency's callers were producing the best meetings, keep a part-time caller for the accounts that reply to email but will not book, and let Sdrs handle everything written.
Frequently asked questions about outsourced SDR companies
How much do outsourced SDR companies charge?
Outsourced SDR companies charge $3,000 to $15,000 a month for managed programs in 2026: $3,000 to $5,000 for a single-channel entry program, $4,000 to $8,000 for multi-channel, and $9,000 to $14,000 for a dedicated team. Pay-per-meeting pricing runs $150 to $1,500 per meeting, and offshore programs price 30 to 60 percent below US-based ones.
Is outsourcing SDR worth it?
Outsourcing SDR work is worth it against hiring: $5,000 a month is far less than the $110,000 to $160,000 a year a fully loaded in-house rep costs. Against AI SDR software at $49 to $499 a month it is only worth it when the deal needs live phone work by an experienced caller, the contract size is large, or nobody in-house will own the campaign.
What is the cheapest way to get SDR output?
The cheapest way to get SDR output is an AI SDR on a monthly plan: Sdrs Starter is $49 a month for list building, AI-written sequences and follow-up, and Plus at $149 adds LinkedIn, X, automatic booking and CRM sync. The next cheapest is an offshore human SDR at roughly $2,000 to $3,500 a month, then US-based agency programs from $3,000. If you were about to hire a remote rep, a virtual SDR on a monthly plan covers the same prospecting work without the hire.
Do outsourced SDR companies require a contract?
Most do. Quarterly or annual terms with auto-renewal are the norm, and third-party reviews report 3 to 6 month minimums at Belkins (see our Belkins pricing breakdown); Leadium and CIENCE advertise month-to-month options. Sdrs has no minimum term on monthly plans and can be cancelled from the account at any time.
Can an AI SDR replace an outsourced SDR team?
For written outbound (email, LinkedIn, X) an AI SDR replaces the list building, writing, follow-up, reply handling and booking an outsourced team does, at a fraction of the cost. It does not replace an experienced human caller on complex enterprise deals. Many teams run the AI for volume and keep one caller for the accounts that need a conversation.
Ready to see the difference on your own list? Compare the Sdrs plans and launch the first campaign today; there is no setup fee and no minimum term.