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This edition is sponsored by Kixie, with Kixie you can start enabling your sellers to spend less time waiting for prospects to pick up the phone and respond, and more time having qualified sales conversations
Click Here to get a free inside look at the value of the tool!Hey Sales RX'ers,
It's getting rough out there, isn't it? With layoff season continuing to blossom into 2024, your job as a high-status seller is more important than ever.
I recently had a chance to share some discovery ins and outs with a large group of sellers in Germany at an SKO. The problem with discovery is that it can turn into a box-checking exercise quickly and make our prospects feel like they are being interrogated.
Instead of shining a light in their face asking "where they were the the night of the murder," try to go to the other side of the table, partner with them to open up the books, and have a CONVERSATION.
If you ask the right questions in the right format, you can typically answer multiple questions you might have all at once.
At The Sales Doctor, there are 4 foundational questions we train and coach sellers to ask.
"When we talk to (XYZ TITLES), and even in a perfect world we typically find that they struggle in one of 3 key areas: Area X, Area Y, or Area Z. If everything in your process stayed the same but one of these areas had to be fixed, which one would it be?"
This question is so important because asking the prospect what their challenges are is super lazy. You should already know an expert on the 3 core challenges your buyer persona has, and PROMPT your buyer to give you insight on which one is most important to them.
It's also a nice way to help them feel like you aren't requesting massive change management because while all areas might need help, you are only asking them to focus on ONE right now.
You also prevent prospects from saying NOTHING is the problem and refusing to let you leverage their challenges as a reason to buy from you because you are calling out that "even in a perfect world", which means, of course, they are going to struggle with something.
"Interesting, what makes you say that?"
Asking them to simply expand on that challenge area, and why they picked that challenge area will help you gather CONTEXT around the challenge.
This in turn can quantify its ranking on their priority list of challenges to solve. You might gain nuggets about how "my boss is asking us to do XYZ" or "the board wants us to do XYZ".
Now you're gathering some insight on their internal communications and priorities as well as the lexicon, or way in which they internally speak about certain challenges.
"What is the team currently doing to solve that challenge, or what have they tried in the past?"
You can't show someone how to get somewhere if you don't understand what level of expertise they have in the matter. You need to understand historically what they have tried (so you don't repeat negative history), which will also help you uncover what kind of objections you might get around your solution or the change management required for your solution.
As you can imagine, this also establishes further credibility for your subject matter expertise, wherein you are now showing them that they don't have all the answers they think they do, and you have your entire customer base and results to back up your claims.
"What will it mean for your business, more importantly, your role, if this challenge doesn't get solved?"
This is not an easy question to ask, but it will drive urgency toward getting your sale moved through the funnel. Most deals stall because reps don't dare to be upfront and ask this question.
It's the high-status reps that close deals at a higher rate and faster clip than their cohorts because they are okay with quantifying the business and personal consequences of inaction.
The cost of inaction is just as important as the costs associated with an investment in your solution, and this is a massive urgency driver you can use in your favor.
So there it is. The 4 key questions that should be part of your discovery call before digging into the workflow, operational logistics, or bothering them for who is going to be signing the check.
Remember, people live with pain, but they solve problems. It's your job to show them what they don't know.
Stay prescriptive ya'll 🩺
Get a free consultation and review of your current Go-To-Market playbook by booking an intro call below.
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