What Happens When SDR Attribution Is Broken? (Besides Bad Comp Plans)

Most teams think bad attribution just messes up compensation. And sure — when SDRs don’t get credit for what they drove, their pay takes a hit.

But the effects of broken attribution run deeper. They ripple through your team culture, GTM alignment, and even the credibility of your entire revenue organization.

Morale Erodes — Quietly at First

Put yourself in the SDR’s shoes: They made the first contact. They worked the lead. They moved it forward. And yet, when the deal closes? No credit.

Sure, they might not say anything the first time. Or the second. But over time? The best reps disengage. They stop pushing as hard. Or they leave for a company that will recognize their impact.

And when that happens, you don’t just lose a number on the leaderboard — you lose the culture of hustle that made your team great.

Alignment Between Teams Breaks Down

When attribution’s broken, SDRs and AEs start arguing over who sourced what. Marketing fights to prove they touched the lead. RevOps spends hours stitching together spreadsheets to explain it all.

The result? Meetings get tense. Collaboration gets harder. And instead of focusing on growth, your team focuses on defending their turf.

• SDRs feel undervalued
• Marketing feels under-credited
• Sales feels like they’re fighting uphill
• RevOps drowns in manual reporting

Your Boardroom Narrative Gets Distorted

When attribution’s broken, it doesn’t just hurt inside the org. It affects how your leadership tells the growth story to investors and the board.

Deals look like they came from nowhere. Campaign influence disappears. The top-of-funnel looks weaker than it is. And all of that can impact budget decisions, hiring, and even company valuation.

Your team *did* the work. But if your CRM doesn’t reflect it? That story never gets told.

Fixing This Isn’t About Fancy Dashboards

RevTruth doesn’t give you another dashboard to check. It gives you a nightly report of verified matches: here’s the SDR effort, here’s the opp, here’s what actually happened.

No more arguing over spreadsheets. No more credit fights. Just truth — clear, defensible, and fast.

If your attribution is broken, it’s costing you more than you think.