Kong Inc. is a leading developer of API and AI connectivity technologies, and they are seeking a Sales Development Representative to work with the Sales team in developing and leading inbound and outbound campaigns. The role involves building strong relationships with clients, managing leads, and nurturing early phase opportunities to maximize sales potential.
Responsibilities
- Work with the Sales team to develop and lead inbound and outbound campaigns from idea generation through to qualified call
- Develop strong sales and product knowledge and interact with IT and business decision-makers via telephone, video, LinkedIn, and email
- Update lead and prospect activity in Salesforce to ensure effective lead management
- Set qualified introductory meetings for the Sales team
- Nurture early phase opportunities for future pipeline potential
- Exceed monthly and quarterly opportunity quota
- Build strong relationships with our marketing team and Account Executives, where we pull together to maximize the win for our business
- Invest in your self-development, focusing on the skills and attributes that will make you successful in your core role and get you set for future success
- Have met your new team and had fun playing with some new tools
- Become a part of the wider Kong family
- Have had a successful sales boot camp training
- Have a good understanding of what makes Kong’s product offerings so special
- Understand how our Account Development, Marketing and Account Executive teams all work together
- Be comfortable talking to clients on the phone about Kong
- Have worked with our Account Executive team on your first opportunity
- Have shadowed a ton of calls and practiced several role plays
- Started delivering your ramp quota
- Know our sales funnel inside and out, and feel confident to add value to our sales org
- Show clear delivery of our sales methodologies
- Provide insights to both our Account Development and marketing organizations to help us to continue to iterate and improve
- Delivered against your ramp quota
Skills
- 1-2+ years of strong sales or customer-facing experience with public sector markets, including government, state, municipalities, education entities
- A self-starter with a track record of hitting and exceeding goals
- A ‘hunter' mentality - comfortable prospecting, cold-calling, and following up on incoming leads and a strong desire to win
- Ability and willingness to learn, react to and share lessons learned across the organization
- Open to feedback and can apply to your daily workflow
- Outstanding communication skills including both phone and written communication as well as active listening
- An extraordinary character with an incredible drive for success, high work ethic, curious by nature, and obsessed with smashing sales goals
- Validated time leadership skills and ability to work independently and through coaching
- Desire to work in a driven and fast-paced environment
Company Overview
Kong is a cloud-native platform that powers API-led connectivity for developer productivity, automating security, and microservices. It was founded in 2017, and is headquartered in San Francisco, California, USA, with a workforce of 501-1000 employees. Its website is https://konghq.com.Company H1B Sponsorship
Kong has a track record of offering H1B sponsorships, with 8 in 2025, 6 in 2024, 4 in 2023, 12 in 2022, 6 in 2021, 1 in 2020. Please note that this does not guarantee sponsorship for this specific role.