Manual prospecting is no longer a sales skill—it’s a tax. In a recent Dataconomy interview
, Lusha CEO Yoni Tserruya explains why 70% of SDR time is wasted on admin-heavy prospecting and how AI-powered sales streaming flips the model. Instead of blank CRMs and hunting lists, reps now start their day with AI-curated prospect playlists—ready to engage, in real time.
Manual sales prospecting has long been treated as a core skill for SDRs. But according to Dataconomy’s recent interview with Yoni Tserruya, CEO of Lusha, it’s not a skill at all—it’s a tax.
“Manual prospecting is not a skill; it is a tax,” Yoni says. “Every sales leader knows it is painful, admin-heavy work that wastes 70% of a rep’s time, yet many still treat it as necessary. I do not buy that.”
Why manual prospecting is broken
The data paints a clear picture. Salesforce research shows sales reps spend only 28% of their time actually selling. The rest is swallowed up by administrative work and manual hunting. The result? Lower morale, higher burnout, and a slower path to revenue.
For Yoni, this is a misuse of human capital: “One starts with guesswork, the other starts with action.”
From hunting lists to sales streaming
The alternative is sales streaming—a model inspired by consumer tech like Spotify. Instead of building a playlist of songs from scratch, Spotify already knows what you want to hear. Lusha applies the same idea to prospecting.
By analyzing closed-won deals, CRM history, past searches, and live intent signals, the platform delivers AI-curated prospect playlists directly into a rep’s workflow.
Yesterday’s SDR opened a blank CRM. Today’s SDR opens a Lusha Playlist already filled with live, high-intent opportunities.
Redefining success metrics
This new workflow demands new KPIs. Vanity metrics like “dials made” or “emails sent” no longer cut it. In a sales streaming model, success is about time-to-engagement—how quickly a team responds when AI surfaces a live opportunity.
“Success is not dials or opens. It is time-to-engagement,” Yoni explains. “That is the new GTM muscle.”
A proactive tech stack
The shift to sales streaming fits a larger trend: the move from reactive to proactive go-to-market technology. Instead of waiting for humans to query a database, tomorrow’s GTM stack will surface opportunities in real time.
Yoni points to two big shifts:
- Autonomous lead generation → the system finds and qualifies leads without human effort.
- Intent-driven engagement → AI highlights why a lead is relevant now, not later.
But this requires trust. “The success of Sales Streaming depends on trust. That is why at Lusha, we only use verifiable, compliant data,” he emphasizes.
The evolved SDR
Does this mean SDRs are obsolete? Not at all—just evolved.
“The SDR role is not disappearing; it is evolving. I’m afraid there will be fewer SDRs, but each will have more impact,” Yoni says.
Instead of burning hours on manual research, reps can focus on what humans do best: building trust, connection, and judgment. The winners will be those who know how to work symbiotically with AI, interpret intent, and move fast when signals appear.
As Yoni sums it up: “Relevance is the new personalization.”
You can read the full Dataconomy piece here
FAQ: Sales streaming explained
A new model of AI-powered prospecting where reps receive live, curated lead playlists—similar to Spotify playlists—based on signals, intent, and ICP fit.
Because it wastes up to 70% of reps’ time on admin-heavy tasks instead of selling, leading to burnout and inefficiency.
In a streaming model, the focus shifts to time-to-engagement and conversion velocity, not vanity activity metrics.
It reduces manual work so SDRs can focus on high-impact tasks like building relationships and acting on live intent.
Sales streaming relies on trust. Without compliant, verifiable data, AI signals risk being wrong, leading to wasted effort.
