Sales Development Representative (SDR)

About the Role

Help prospective clients find the right next step with Morningstar. As a Sales Development Representative (SDR), you’ll turn interest from marketing campaigns into qualified sales conversations by understanding each prospect’s business needs. You’ll work with marketing and sales colleagues to improve outreach and give account executives the context they need to continue those conversations. You’ll build your product knowledge and sales skills through prospect research, outreach, and feedback on what works. This role requires four days a week in our Chicago office and is an immediate hire role.

Key Responsibilities

• Handle and qualify all Marketing Qualified Leads (MQLs) provided by the marketing team within predetermined Service Level Agreements (SLAs).
• Conduct proactive outbound prospecting, including cold calling potential Morningstar Prospects, to identify new business opportunities and generate interest in Morningstar solutions.
• Engage with leads via phone calls, emails, and LinkedIn to understand their needs and pain points.
• Develop early-stage opportunities through follow-up conversations. Arrange meetings and product demonstrations with account executives or sales managers, sharing the prospect’s needs and conversation history.
• Keep prospect records and next steps current in the CRM so sales colleagues can pick up the conversation without losing context.
• Support outbound sales campaigns as needed, adapting your outreach to each prospect’s business challenges.
• Track calls, emails, meetings set, and opportunities generated. Review conversion rates, outreach results, and pipeline growth to identify where the qualification process could improve.
• Share feedback with marketing on lead quality and campaign results.

Requirements & Tech Stack

• Use what you learn about Morningstar’s products, industry trends, and competitor offerings to make your conversations more useful to prospects.
• Familiarity with CRM tools, such as Salesforce, and sales engagement platforms.
• Ability to use lead and outreach data to improve your approach.

Qualifications

• Internship-2 years of experience in customer-facing roles, sales, or business development; experience in business-to-business (B2B) or software-as-a-service (SaaS) settings is preferred.
• A bachelor’s degree is required. Business, Marketing, Communications, or a related field is preferred.
• Clear written and verbal communication, with the ability to listen closely and ask questions that uncover a prospect’s needs.
• The ability to manage several prospect conversations, prioritize follow-ups, and meet agreed response times.