Alternatives to hiring SDRs for a funding company

Five ways to add call capacity, and who each one fits

If you run a small funding company, you have four routes besides hiring more SDRs. They are outsourced callers, a dialer for your own reps, a DIY voice platform, and a fully managed AI voice agent. Which one fits depends on how much of the work you want to run yourself.

Here is the short version, with hiring included.

• Hire: you want a person who owns relationships and you can manage the team.
• Outsource to callers: you want people on the phone without adding payroll, and you can manage a vendor.
• Dialer for your reps: your reps have time to call and want faster dialing.
• DIY voice platform: you have technical staff who want to build and run an agent.
• Fully managed AI voice agent: you have a paid-for aged file and want it worked without adding headcount.

Who runs what

The useful question is who runs each piece of the work. Numbers, scrubs, cadence, transfers and consent records all need an owner. Some routes leave all of them with you.

Route	Numbers	Scrubs and call rules	Cadence	Transfers	Consent records
Hire SDRs	You	You	Your reps and manager	A rep hands the merchant to a closer	You
Outsourced callers	Ask the vendor	Ask the vendor	Ask the vendor	Ask the vendor	Ask the vendor
Dialer for your reps	Ask the vendor	Ask the vendor	Your reps	Your reps are on the call	You
DIY voice platform	Ask the vendor	Ask the vendor	You configure it	You set up the hand-off to your rep	You
Fully managed AI voice agent (LeadRefinery)	We provision and register them and check them daily	Every dial passes a logged compliance gate	We set cadence, timing and pacing	Live transfer, callback or your application link	You confirm consent when you load a file

The rows for outsourced callers and dialers are generic. They cover whole categories, and this page links no vendor in either one. The “Ask the vendor” cells are questions to put to any provider, not statements about what a given provider does. Get each answer in writing before you sign.

When hiring a rep is still right

Hiring is the right call in some shops. Pick it when:

• You want a person to build relationships with merchants over years.
• Your file is small enough that one rep can work all of it.
• You want to run the calling in your own way, with your own script and style.
• You have a manager with time to coach and review calls.

Most leads need more touches than a rep can spare. So reps give each lead a few tries and move on, and old files go unworked. If that sounds like your floor, weigh it against the cost of the next hire. Growing call volume usually means hiring more reps. It does not have to.

DIY voice platform: what you build and run yourself

A DIY voice platform gives you the tools. You build the agent. Retell’s own documentation describes a platform to build, test, deploy and monitor voice agents. Retell also has a page for financial services firms that describes its offer to them. Read it for yourself, and test any claim a vendor makes before you rely on it.

This route fits a shop with technical staff who want control over the agent and are ready to run it. Before you pick any platform, ask the vendor which of these it covers and which you add yourself:

• Scrubs against Do Not Call lists
• Calling hours
• Cadence for each lead
• Consent records
• The hand-off to your closer

Consent stays with the caller on every AI voice route

The FCC has confirmed that the TCPA’s limits on artificial or prerecorded voices cover AI technologies that generate human voices. Calls that use them need the prior express consent of the called party. That holds whether you build the agent yourself or use a managed one.

This is not legal advice. Talk to counsel about your consent records. With LeadRefinery, calls with an AI voice need prior express written consent that covers calls from the broker. You confirm that consent when you load a file, and only those leads are dialed. Consent records stay your responsibility.

Fit check

Ask yourself three questions before you choose a fully managed AI voice agent:

1. Do you have an aged file you already paid for, and will you give it to the agent? It only calls the files you give it.
2. Do you have consent that covers AI voice calls from you for those leads? You confirm it when you load the file.
3. Where should a merchant who wants to talk go next? The agent can hand back by live transfer to your rep, a booked callback, or your application link.

If you want a dialer for your own reps, a dialer fits better. If you cannot answer the consent question yet, sort that out with counsel before you add any AI voice route. For a longer look at the tradeoffs, read reactivating old MCA leads with a CRM, dialer or AI voice agent. For vendor questions, read what to check before you buy an AI voice agent.

How the fully managed route works at LeadRefinery

LeadRefinery is an AI voice agent that works the aged leads already sitting in your CRM. Working more of the file does not have to wait on a hire.

• You upload, we run. You upload leads and watch results in a web app. Your reps do not need logins.
• Numbers. We provision and register the phone numbers and check their health every day.
• Cadence. We set the cadence, timing and pacing for every lead.
• Compliance gate. Every dial passes a compliance gate, and every check is logged. If one fails, the call does not happen.
• Hand-back. When a merchant wants to talk, the agent hands them back by live transfer to your rep, a booked callback, or your application link.

For how to choose between those three, read live transfer vs callback vs application link. For the setup behind the service, see how the fully managed service works. For how pricing works, see pricing.

If your shop passes the fit check, Book an intro call.