An AI sales agent that does the research and first drafts, so your reps can sell
An AI sales agent, often called an AI SDR, watches your accounts, researches buyers and writes first drafts at any hour. For most growing companies, it works best as a rep's assistant. We build it on HubSpot's Prospecting Agent or as custom work, and a rep approves what goes out.
Free, 30 minutes, and you'll leave with at least one clear next step.
What can an AI sales agent do, and what can't it?
What it does well
- Watches hundreds or thousands of accounts for changes your reps would miss
- Researches a company and its buyers in seconds
- Writes a first-draft email using what your CRM knows about the account
- Follows up on schedule, every time
- Sorts inbound inquiries and routes them to the right rep
- Logs what it did, so your CRM stays current
What it can't do
- Know what you sell the way a 20-year rep does
- Price a custom deal or judge whether you can deliver it
- Read a buyer's mood on the phone or handle a tough negotiation
- See order or billing history in other systems, unless someone connects it
- Fix a CRM with wrong owners and duplicate accounts
- Build trust with a customer who has bought from you for a decade
Why does a cold-email robot fail most businesses?
Most AI SDR tools were made to send thousands of cold emails to similar buyers. That's a poor match for most growing companies. Your buyers know their stuff and spot a generic email in the first line. Many of your best chances come from customers who already know you.
So we point the agent at accounts you already know, past customers who went quiet and new inquiries that need a fast first reply. Cold email to strangers at volume is where these tools do worst, and it's the fastest way to hurt your name.
Jobs an AI sales agent handles well
Waking up past customers
You have hundreds or thousands of accounts that haven't bought in a year. The agent drafts a short, specific note to each one from the account owner. The rep approves or edits it.
Following up on website visits
When a known account revisits your pricing or product pages, the agent drafts a check-in for the account owner and lists the pages they read.
Chasing open proposals
After a proposal or quote goes out, the agent drafts follow-ups on a schedule, so your team stops losing deals to silence.
First replies to new inquiries
A request arrives at 9 p.m. The agent checks whether the company already buys from you, routes it to the right rep and has a draft reply waiting in the morning.
Custom AI workflowsRenewal and reorder reminders
Customers coming up on a renewal, or late on their usual reorder, get a draft from their account manager before the window closes.
HubSpot's Prospecting Agent or a custom build?
HubSpot's Prospecting Agent fits when
- Your accounts and contacts already live in HubSpot
- Buying signals come from HubSpot data and public news, like page visits or new funding
- You're on Starter or higher in a HubSpot hub, and the credit cost works at your volume
- You want to start fast and adjust settings yourself later
Custom work fits when
- The best signal sits in another system, like a customer who stopped reordering or renewing
- The agent has to read documents like briefs, forms or purchase orders
- Your rules are specific, like territories, credit holds or minimum deal sizes
- Volume is high enough that paying an AI provider directly costs less
How much does the Prospecting Agent cost to run?
HubSpot charges credits for each lead the agent writes outreach for. Credits are a usage allowance that comes with your plan, and you can buy more. Check HubSpot's credit rate sheet for the current rate. We set daily caps on each play so the bill stays where you planned. Our Prospecting Agent page has the full setup.
Many teams use both options. HubSpot's agent writes the outreach, and a custom AI workflow feeds it signals it can't see, like a lapsed reorder in your accounting or order system.
What does the agent never do on its own?
We write these handoff rules with your sales lead before the agent touches a single account.
- Send an email without a rep's approval while the play is new.
- Quote a price, a discount or a lead time.
- Contact accounts on your do-not-touch list, like key accounts or those in a dispute.
- Keep emailing someone who replied. A reply goes straight to the rep.
- Change deal stages, owners or amounts in HubSpot.
- Make claims about your products or services that aren't in your approved content.
How do we roll out an AI sales agent?
- Weeks 1 to 2
Clean the accounts it will read
We fix owners, merge duplicate companies and fill in buyer roles on your target accounts. A wrong owner means the wrong rep's name on the email.
- Week 2
Write one or two plays with your best rep
A play says who to watch, what triggers outreach and what tone to use. We turn your top rep's instincts into rules.
- Weeks 3 to 6
Run in assist mode with a named reviewer
Every draft waits for a rep. Your sales lead is the named reviewer who reads drafts weekly with us and flags anything off.
- Monthly
Measure and widen
We compare replies and meetings with how the same accounts did before. Plays that work get more room. The rest get rewritten or switched off.
What happens to your customer data?
With HubSpot's Prospecting Agent, the work happens inside HubSpot, under HubSpot's terms. For custom work, a draft only needs a few fields, like company name, recent purchases and the rep's name. Price files and contracts stay out unless a job truly needs them. Every draft and every send is logged in HubSpot.
When don't you need an AI sales agent?
If you sell to 30 big accounts your reps know by name, an agent adds little. Your reps already watch those accounts. If your CRM doesn't know who owns what, fix that first. One client had leads sitting in HubSpot that no one had called. Getting those to sales mattered more than any AI could. And if your team can't keep up with the leads it already has, more outreach makes it worse. Start with lead scoring.
Examples by industry
The best first play depends on how you sell. These pages go deeper.
- Distribution: waking up past buyers who stopped ordering.
- Building products: following dealers who come back to your site.
- Construction: following up on bids so jobs aren't lost to silence.
AI sales agent questions
Can an AI SDR replace a sales development rep?
For most growing companies, no. It can take over the research and first drafts, which frees a rep to spend more time on calls and proposals. The relationship and the judgment still sit with a person.
Will buyers know an email was written by AI?
The email goes out under the rep's name after the rep has read and approved it, so the rep stands behind every word. Drafts that sound generic get rewritten, and we tune the instructions until the tone matches your team. If your company has a policy on telling buyers about AI use, we build it into the plays.
How do we stop the agent from emailing the wrong people?
Clean ownership in HubSpot, a do-not-touch list for key accounts, daily caps on each play and a rep approving drafts while the play is new. We set all four before it runs.
Does this work for buyers who expect a phone call?
Yes, if you use it that way. The agent can create a call task with talking points from the account's history, instead of an email. Many teams that sell by phone prefer this.
What should we measure in the first month?
Reply rate on approved drafts, meetings or quotes that came from them, how many drafts reps approved without edits and how much rep time it saved. We record the starting numbers before the agent runs.
Can the agent qualify new inbound leads too?
Yes, though that's usually a custom AI workflow. It checks whether the company already buys from you, sorts simple requests from bigger ones and routes each to the right rep with a draft reply.
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Find out if an AI sales agent fits your team
On the call we'll look at your accounts and your sales team, and tell you whether an agent is worth it, which play to start with and what to fix first.