Handoff

A Handoff is the structured transfer of ownership and context from one team to another in the revenue process. The most critical handoffs are:

• Marketing to Sales (MQL → SDR)
• SDR to AE (qualified meeting → opportunity)
• Sales to CS (closed-won → onboarding)

Handoffs matter because they are the highest-risk points in the revenue lifecycle where information and context can be lost, damaging the customer experience and confidence.

The Three Critical Handoffs

1. Marketing to Sales

• Defines when a lead becomes sales-ready
• Ensures SDRs get the right context
• Requires fast, SLA-driven follow-up
• Poor alignment leads to ignored leads or irrelevant outreach

1. SDR to AE

• Transfers discovery details, identified pain, and agreed next steps
• Prevents AEs from restarting discovery and forcing prospects to repeat themselves

1. Sales to CS

• Captures what was promised, success criteria, and key stakeholders
• Directly impacts onboarding quality and early churn

What a Good Handoff Includes

• Clear ownership transfer with a specific date and person
• Documented context (notes, recordings, key contacts)
• Defined SLAs for response time after the handoff
• A warm introduction instead of a cold reassignment

RevOps Application

RevOps is responsible for designing and operationalizing handoffs by:

• Designing handoff processes
• Building automation and CRM workflows that trigger handoffs
• Defining SLAs for each handoff
• Creating standardized handoff templates
• Tracking metrics like time-to-first-contact and overall handoff quality