Rising Tide Startups

Most people avoid cold calls. Gabe Lullo built a multi-million dollar company on them. Gabe Lullo didn’t take a traditional route to the top. He started in the trenches, working the phones as an SDR, and built his way up to CEO of Alleyoop, a global sales development firm making over 11 million cold calls a year. Along the way, he juggled rejection, resilience, and yes—actual juggling. In this episode of Rising Tide Startups, host Kevin Prewett sits down with Gabe to unpack the real story behind scaling a sales-driven company from scratch. With a degree from the Barney School of Business and more than a decade running his own sales, marketing, and training firm, Gabe brought deep experience in recruiting and leadership before ever stepping into the CEO seat. He shares how those early roles, from executive search to culture-building, shaped how he leads today. Gabe also unpacks why sales development should be treated as its function, why cold calling still works, and how product-market fit makes or breaks a