Every Way to Buy Meetings. Compared Honestly.
Retainer agency, in-house SDR, live transfers, or pay per meeting. Each model bills you for a different unit, and the unit decides your real cost per meeting. Here is the whole market with sources, the trade-offs, and the cases where our model is not the right buy.
What each model actually sells you
There are four ways to buy B2B pipeline: a retainer agency, an in-house SDR, live transfers, and pay per meeting. Each one bills a different unit, and the unit is the whole decision. We sell pay per meeting, and we still built this page to show you where the other three win, because a buyer who understands the market picks better vendors. New to our model? Start with the B2B overview.
| Model | What you pay for | When you pay | Guarantee | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Retainer agency | Activity: seats and touches per day. Market band runs $2,500 to $15,000+ per month, most commonly $3,000 to $12,000. | Every month, meetings or not. Ramp months billed at full rate. | Booked-meeting guarantees are rare on published pricing pages. | Continuous multi-channel outbound with dedicated, named SDRs. |
| In-house SDR | A full-time seat: salary, commission, benefits, data, tools, management. Industry estimates run $9,800 to $14,200 per month fully loaded, roughly $700 to $1,150 per qualified meeting. | Every month, including the ramp months before full pipeline. | None. If the rep quits, the pipeline stalls with them. | Complex technical products and teams building a long-term sales org. |
| Live transfers | A prospect on the phone right now. Verified pricing runs $25 to $75 per transfer. | Per transfer, commonly counted as delivered once the call holds about 120 seconds. | Thin. The hold-time trigger pays whether or not a real conversation happens. | Phone-close shops with reps on the phones all day. |
| Pay per meeting | A qualified meeting on your calendar. Market bands: around $80 at the SMB floor, $150 to $600 mainstream, $600 to $900 premium qualified, $1,000+ enterprise. | Per delivered meeting. A zero-meeting month costs zero. | Only as strong as the vendor's trigger, criteria, and replacement policy. Ours: booked plus double-confirmed, criteria you sign, free no-show replacement. | Demo-based and consultative teams that want pipeline priced as an outcome. |
Two caveats on the numbers. The in-house SDR figures are industry estimates, not audited payroll data. And the pay-per-meeting bands describe the market, not our rate: ours is quoted for your industry and qualification depth on a short call, with a one-time setup quote and zero retainer. The full mechanics are on the pricing page.
Four comparisons, written like a buyer would want them
Each page below takes one alternative apart: published pricing, billing mechanics, the math per meeting, and a straight section on when that model beats ours. No competitor reputation claims, no invented reviews. Just the terms both sides publish.
VA Horizon vs SalesHive
SalesHive publishes real pricing: $7,000 to $12,000 a month for US teams. We run the per-meeting arithmetic on those tiers and lay out when their multi-channel human team is the better buy.
Read the comparison →Pay Per Meeting vs Retainer Agencies
The retainer band runs $2,500 to $15,000+ a month, and it buys activity, not meetings. What that does to your cost per meeting, plus the cases where a retainer is still the right call.
Read the comparison →Pay Per Meeting vs In-House SDR
Industry estimates put a fully loaded SDR at $9,800 to $14,200 a month, before you count ramp time and management load. Hiring still wins for complex technical products. Run the numbers on both.
Read the comparison →Live Transfers vs Booked Meetings
Transfers sell an interruption. Booked meetings sell a commitment. Verified transfer pricing, the 120-second billing trigger, and which unit actually fits your sales motion.
Read the comparison →Four questions that expose any lead gen offer
Pay-per-appointment has a known failure mode: vendors booking junk volume to hit invoice counts. Retainers have their own: effort without outcomes. These four questions expose both, whoever is pitching you. Including us.
Question 01
What exactly triggers a charge?
Activity logged, a 120-second call, a booked meeting, or a held meeting? UK operator Newson prices billing on held meetings at 3x its booked-meeting trigger. The market itself is telling you the trigger is the whole game. Get it in writing before anything launches.
Question 02
Is qualification defined in writing?
If "qualified" lives in the vendor's head, every dispute about junk meetings ends in their favor. Demand a written definition, signed by both sides before launch. Ours is a one-page doc you write with us at kickoff, and a meeting outside it is free.
Question 03
What happens on a no-show?
Free replacement within a set window is the standard buyers should demand; DemandNexus frames it exactly that way. Our version is the 10-minute rule: not held within 10 minutes of start, replaced free within 5 business days. You never pay for a ghost twice.
Question 04
Can you audit every billed unit?
Ask for the evidence behind each charge before you sign, not after the first invoice. Every meeting we bill ships with the SMS transcript where the prospect chose the time, plus the confirmation log. The full system is on the how it works page.
Quick answers on comparing models
Which lead generation model is the cheapest per meeting?
Are these comparisons biased toward pay per meeting?
Can we run pay per meeting alongside a retainer agency or in-house team?
What should I ask any appointment setting vendor before signing?
B2B resources
Everything in the B2B division
Done comparing? Get your number.
A 15-minute call gets you a per-meeting rate for your industry, a setup quote, and answers to all four vendor questions above. No retainer, no monthly fees, ever.
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