An outsourced SDR agency usually charges a monthly retainer of $3,000 to $15,000, or a fee per meeting somewhere between $250 and $5,000, and many add a setup fee of $5,000 to $10,000 and a minimum term of three months or more. In the six-month example below the bill comes to $22,000 to $43,500, before you know whether the meetings are any good. Below is how each pricing model works, a worked six-month comparison, what the agency does and does not do, and the contract terms to settle before you sign.
These figures come from agencies and from the blogs they publish, not from an independent survey, and the two guides we read disagree with each other. We name them so you can check. Treat every range as a place to start the conversation, since the real price is set in a quote.
The five ways agencies charge
SalesRoads, an outsourced sales company, lists five models on its own pricing page: a flat monthly retainer, a fee per appointment, a hybrid of a base fee and performance bonuses, commission on revenue, and fixed-price projects. The first three are the ones you will see most. Here is what two published 2026 guides report for them.
| Model | RevNew guide (July 31, 2026) | Modern Inbound guide (August 16, 2026) |
|---|---|---|
| Monthly retainer | $3,000 to $15,000 a month. Cold calling only from about $3,500, email plus phone plus LinkedIn $4,000 to $8,000, dedicated onshore teams $9,000 to $15,000 and up | $2,000 to $15,000 and up a month, with contracts from 3 months to 2 years. SalesRoads' full SDR package is quoted at $9,950 per 4-week engagement |
| Fee per meeting | $250 to $1,200 per qualified meeting | $500 to $5,000 per meeting: about $500 for small-company buyers, $2,000 to $5,000 for companies with 1,000 or more employees |
| Hybrid | $2,000 to $5,000 base plus $150 to $400 for each meeting above an agreed floor | About $2,000 to $6,500 a month base plus a per-meeting bonus tied to a return target |
| Setup fee | Not stated | $5,000 to $10,000, which the guide says most engagements carry |
| Fractional SDR (one part-time person) | $2,500 to $4,000 a month | Not stated |
The per-meeting prices differ by a factor of four at the top. The reason is mostly the buyer: a meeting with the owner of a 20-person company costs less to book than one with a vice president at a company with thousands of staff. Another reason is the definition. Modern Inbound says per-meeting charges apply to meetings that "land on the calendar" and does not say whether a no-show or a reschedule counts. That sentence is worth more attention than the price.
A worked six months under three contracts
Here is the same job priced three ways, with made-up round numbers picked from inside the ranges above. Say a company in Columbus that sells payroll software to restaurant groups hires an agency for six months. Assume 5 meetings across the first three months while the agency builds lists and warms its sending, then 8 meetings a month for the last three. The RevNew guide describes a 60-to-90-day stabilization period, which is why the start is slow. That is 5 + 24 = 29 meetings.
| Contract | Terms (assumed) | Six-month cost | Cost per meeting |
|---|---|---|---|
| Retainer | $6,000 a month for 6 months plus a $7,500 setup fee | $43,500 | $1,500 |
| Pay per meeting | $500 a meeting plus a $7,500 setup fee | $22,000 | $759 |
| Hybrid | $3,500 base for 6 months, bonus of $300 for each meeting above a floor of 24 for the six months (4 a month on average) | $22,500 | $776 |
The arithmetic: retainer, 6 x $6,000 = $36,000, plus $7,500 = $43,500, divided by 29 is $1,500. Pay per meeting, 29 x $500 = $14,500, plus $7,500 = $22,000, divided by 29 is $759. Hybrid, 6 x $3,500 = $21,000; 29 meetings against a floor of 24 is 5 above it, 5 x $300 = $1,500, total $22,500, divided by 29 is $776. The per-meeting contracts cost less here because you pay only for what arrives. Read the setup fee and the meeting definition closely on those, since that is where an agency can make up for the risk it carries. Now suppose the agency delivers 12 meetings instead of 29. The retainer costs $43,500 divided by 12, or $3,625 a meeting, because it is paid the same whether or not meetings arrive. The per-meeting deal costs 12 x $500 = $6,000 plus $7,500 setup, $13,500 in all, or $1,125 a meeting.
What you get for the money
- A list. The agency builds or buys a list of people who match the buyer you describe. Ask how many people it will contact a month and how it verifies emails.
- Sending set up. Many agencies buy separate domains and inboxes for sending. Ask whose they are, because that decides what you keep when the contract ends.
- The writing. Emails, call scripts and follow-ups, usually written by the agency and approved by you.
- The work of reply handling and booking. Someone reads the answers, qualifies the interested ones and puts a meeting on your calendar.
- A report. Meetings, replies and sends, weekly or monthly.
What you do not get: someone who knows your product the way you do on day one, a person who closes, or any promise that meetings turn into customers. Meetings are the unit most contracts count. Customers are what you need. If your meeting-to-customer rate is 1 in 10 and a meeting costs $759, a customer costs about $7,590 in agency fees before your own time. Only you can say whether your customer is worth that.
Contract terms to settle before you sign
- Minimum term and exit. Three months is common and two years exists. Ask what happens if the first 90 days produce nothing.
- The meeting definition. Written down: who qualifies it, whether a no-show counts, whether you can reject one, and the fee for a reschedule.
- The setup fee. What it pays for, and whether any part comes back if you leave in month two.
- Who owns the sending domains, inboxes and the list. If they own them, your reputation with those inboxes stays with the agency.
- Whose name is on the emails. If your name and company appear in the message, your reputation is on the line even though a stranger writes it.
- Approval. Whether you see the copy before it goes out, and how fast an edit is applied.
- Compliance. The agency sends on your behalf. The FTC's CAN-SPAM guide for businesses says the law "makes no exception for business-to-business email" and tells companies to monitor what others do on their behalf, because you cannot contract away your legal responsibility. It lists penalties of up to $53,088 for each separate email in violation. Ask how the agency handles opt-outs, which must be honored within 10 business days, and what physical address appears in the footer. Our page is cold email legal covers the rules.
When an agency is the right choice
An agency fits when you know what you are selling and to whom, a meeting is worth several thousand dollars to you, and you have someone ready to take every meeting. It also fits when you want to try outbound for one quarter without hiring. It fits badly when you are still working out your buyer, because the agency will spend your retainer testing the same questions a cheaper tool could test, and the month-three report will not tell you why nothing worked.
The decision between an agency, a hire and software is mostly a decision about where the judgment sits. Cold email agency vs software and a cheap alternative to hiring a salesperson compare them from other angles, and AI SDR pricing shows how software vendors charge for the same work.
The same budget, spent on software
The retainer range of $3,000 to $15,000 a month is the number to hold against the price of software that does the sending. Software that does the sending is priced from tens of dollars to a few thousand a month, as the AI SDR pricing page above shows. What it does not include is the agency's strategist, who can change the pitch after a bad month, or a person on the phone. If you have the strategy and need the volume, software covers the volume. If you need both, an agency is paying for judgment, and the contract is the place to say how much of it you get.
Rocketship, which we make, is the software side of that comparison. Frontier is $79 a month and covers up to 210 emails a day from up to 3 inboxes with 1,500 credits and one teammate; Mission Control is $1,499 a month, with up to 3,500 emails a day from up to 50 inboxes, 30,000 credits and 25 teammates, which is the plan for a larger program with several people involved. It finds the buyers, reads their websites, emails them from your Gmail, follows up and books the meeting, and you take it from there. Compare the plans or try Frontier for 7 days (card required) next to your agency quotes.