Business Development Representative

Pinecone; New York (NY); On-site; USD 70,000 - 110,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Comprehensive health coverage

401(k) Plan

Equity award

Flexible time off

Paid parental leave

Annual Company Retreat

WFH Equipment Stipend

Job summary

Pinecone, based in New York, seeks a Business Development Representative to energize our self-serve funnel and convert usage into qualified sales opportunities. You will blend product-led growth with a high-velocity revenue engine, partnering with Revenue Ops to craft personalized, scalable outreach.

You'll collaborate with Sales, Customer Success, and Solutions Engineering to accelerate PLG adoption, build automation, and push for measurable outcomes such as PQLs and conversion improvements.

Qualifications

• 1–2+ years in a BDR/SDR role in a fast-paced technical startup.
• Comfortable bridging product usage to revenue in a PLG + Sales model.
• Able to engage technical personas (Founders, ML Engineers, Data Scientists) with credibility.

Responsibilities

• Drive sales opportunities by engaging high-potential users and guiding them toward sales.
• Execute personalized, data-driven outreach to connect with AI practitioners and decision-makers.
• Surface Product-Qualified Leads (PQLs) with clear expansion potential.
• Collaborate on GTM automation to reduce manual prospecting (Clay, n8n, Zapier, Retool).
• Innovate with AI-assisted personalization, shareable sandbox links, LinkedIn DMs, and voice notes.
• Provide feedback on inbound quality, friction points, and persona trends.

Skills

BDR/SDR experience

PLG + Sales hybrid

Technical persona communication

Data-driven mindset

Proactive learner

Tools

Clay

n8n

Zapier

Retool

Gong

Loom

Job description

About Pinecone

Pinecone is the leading vector database for building accurate and performant AI applications at scale in production. Pinecone's mission is to make AI knowledgeable. More than 5000 customers across various industries have shipped AI applications faster and more confidently with Pinecone's developer-friendly technology. Pinecone is based in New York and raised $138M in funding from Andreessen Horowitz, ICONIQ, Menlo Ventures, and Wing Venture Capital.

About the Team and Role

As a Business Development Representative, you’ll be the primary catalyst for user activation and expansion. You will work at the critical intersection of our Product-Led Growth (PLG) motion and our high-growth revenue engine.

Your core mission is to identify high-potential users within our self-serve funnel and proactively convert them into qualified sales opportunities.

You are part researcher and part automation hacker. You will partner closely with our Revenue Operations team to combine creative outreach with GTM (Go-To-Market) engineering workflows (using tools like Clay, n8n, Zapier, etc.) to deliver personalized, data-backed touchpoints at scale. You'll collaborate closely with Sales, Customer Success, and Solutions Engineering to accelerate our PLG motion, turning a robust sign ups & usage funnel into a predictable revenue engine and setting a new standard for AI-native GTM.

Responsibilities

• Drive Sales Opportunities: Proactively engage users exhibiting high-potential usage signals (e.g., specific API patterns, advanced feature experimentation, new workspace invites) to guide them toward opportunities for the sales team.
• Identify & Convert: Execute highly personalized, data-driven outreach sequences to connect with AI practitioners, technical leads, and business decision-makers. Your goal is to understand their platform behaviors and signals in order to generate qualified sales leads.
• Surface PQLs: Partner with RevOps and Growth to analyze product telemetry and surface Product-Qualified Leads (PQLs) with clear expansion potential (e.g., users building RAG, Agents, semantic search, or recommender systems).
• Work on GTM Automation: Collaborate with RevOps to build and maintain scalable sales automation workflows using tools like Clay, n8n, Zapier, Retool, and our own product's query insights to dramatically reduce manual prospecting.
• Innovate on Engagement: Go beyond standard outbound. Use AI-assisted personalization, shareable technical sandbox links, LinkedIn video DMs, and voice notes to provide tangible value in every interaction.
• Create Feedback Loops: Work cross-functionally with Product and Marketing to provide direct feedback on inbound quality, user friction points, and emerging persona trends from the front lines.

Requirements

• Has 1–2+ years of BDR/SDR experience in a fast-paced, technical startup—ideally in developer tools, data infrastructure, or the AI/ML space.
• Deeply understands modern PLG + Sales hybrid models and is energized by the challenge of bridging product usage to revenue.
• Is comfortable and credible when speaking to technical personas (e.g., Founders, ML Engineers, Data Scientists) and can translate complex product value into tangible business outcomes.
• Possesses a "guide" or "teacher" mindset, genuinely motivated by helping users solve problems and achieve "aha" moments that lead to deeper product adoption.
• Thrives in ambiguous and fast-changing environments; you have high agency, are proactive, and are guided by data.
• Is passionate about AI, automation, and GTM innovation. You naturally use tools like ChatGPT, Clay, Gong, and Loom to be more effective.
• Loves metrics (PQLs, conversion rates, consumption) but doesn’t wait to be told what to do, constantly iterating on playbooks and documenting what works.

Bonus Points

• Direct experience with vector databases, LLM applications, embeddings, or developer ecosystems.
• You've built your own prospecting automations or played with tools like Navattic, Salesroom, Regie.ai, or n8n.
• You have worked in a pod-based or "full-cycle lite" GTM setup where BDRs are responsible for driving adoption and consumption metrics, not just booking meetings.
• You can show examples of creative, high-value outreach you've designed.

Perks & Benefits

• Comprehensive health coverage including medical, dental, vision, and mental health resources
• 401(k) Plan
• Equity award
• Flexible time off
• Paid parental leave
• Annual Company Retreat
• WFH Equipment Stipend

Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging (DEIB) are the cornerstone of everything we do at Pinecone. Studies have shown that women and people of color are less likely to apply for jobs unless they believe they meet every one of the qualifications in a job description. Our top priority is finding the best candidate for the job and if you are interested in the position, we would encourage you to apply, even if you don’t believe you meet every one of the qualifications listed in this posting. All qualified applicants will receive considerations for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, age, disability, marital status, familial status, sexual orientation, pregnancy, gender identity, gender expression, national origin, ancestry, citizenship status, veteran status, and any other legally protected status under federal, state, or local anti-discrimination laws.