December 17, 2024
Over 50% of your prospects aren’t the right fit for your solution. If you're not qualifying them properly during discovery calls, you're not just wasting time—you're leaving money on the table.
Take our recent call with a sales leader for instance. Our prospect wasn’t concerned with tool complexity or the time commitment of new technology. Instead, they were focused on one thing: improving the quality of their sales process, with a ‘quality outweighs speed’ mindset.
As we delved further into the conversation, it became apparent that the prospect was looking to expand their tech stack to strategically improve their operations. They didn’t want yet another tool in their stack to speed things up but to offer better insights into their workflow.
What followed was a deeper, more insightful dialogue.
As we further discussed Sybill’s capabilities, the prospect was genuinely interested in the product’s potential to improve data accuracy and streamline information flow, including better CRM hygiene and automated data extraction.
Despite portraying a cautious approach and moderate buying intentions, we wrapped the call with a promising outcome: a follow-up meeting scheduled for the next quarter and a promising future collaboration.
The takeaway? A successful discovery call isn’t just about qualifying prospects and identifying pain points. It’s about understanding not only how but also when your solution truly aligns with your customer’s needs—an aspect that's often missed in many discovery calls.
A discovery call is the first genuine conversation with a prospect that sets the stage and tone for everything that follows. Yet in today's rapidly evolving sales landscape, this initial interaction has become increasingly challenging to navigate effectively. When rushed or superficial, the fallout cascades through the entire sales process – impacting not just the immediate opportunity, but potentially the entire customer relationship.
Modern B2B buyers have fundamentally transformed this landscape, becoming more informed than ever, typically completing 57-70% of their buying research before even making first contact. This shift means that by the time a sales representative connects with a prospect, the traditional approach to information discovery has already been dramatically altered. Paradoxically, this technological sophistication has only made prospects harder, not easier, to understand.
This complexity stems from critical factors like:
Our recent discovery call exposed the real issues behind ineffective conversations, reinstating how paramount it is to rethink our approach to initial prospect interactions.
Let’s dive into what makes a discovery call truly miss the mark.
We've all been guilty of falling back on those standard open-ended questions like:
The goal of your discovery call is to engage in meaningful dialogue.
While these questions are designed to encourage conversation, they often yield vague, uninspiring answers. Worse, they can actively frustrate prospects who feel like they're repeating information that should have been researched beforehand.
Your prospect's time is precious, and asking them basic questions you should already know makes you seem unprepared and erodes trust.
For years, sales professionals have emphasized building relationships without truly defining what that means. Many argue that rapport, honesty, and trust are the foundation for initiating business. But these traits are more akin to what you'd expect in a friendship, not necessarily a successful sales relationship.
Here's the truth: customers aren't looking to make friends; they're looking for results. And it's those deeper, more substantive relationships that drive those results. Building a meaningful business relationship goes beyond just being friendly; it requires understanding your customer's vision, fears, desires, and motivations.
One of the biggest mistakes in the sales discovery process is starting a conversation by dumping a list of product features on your prospect. Sure, it's tempting to showcase everything your product can do, but this approach assumes you already know what your prospect values most.
Paradoxically, discovering questions are more efficient if they don’t have the form of a question. Research shows us how a well-structured approach helps avoid negative or disinterested responses.
For example, instead of the typical “Can I be of assistance?” which usually gets met with “I’m just looking,” try something more engaging like, “Please take a look at our models, and feel free to ask if you have any questions.”
Moving forward, let’s explore some redefined strategies for crafting discovery questions that truly resonate with today’s buyers.
Before you even pick up the phone or hop on a video call with a prospect, take your time to gather as much relevant information as possible.
Digital intelligence is the key to setting a solid foundation for any sales conversation. By leveraging various online resources, you can walk into your discovery call not just informed, but well-prepared to engage with your prospect on a deeper level.
Moving beyond the tired “what keeps you up at night?” approach, here are 3 categories of qualifying questions that skilled sellers are using to drive meaningful discoveries:
Future-State Questions
Instead of focusing solely on current problems, these questions help prospects envision their transformed future:
Why it works: These questions trigger what psychologists call ‘prospective thinking,’ helping prospects connect emotional value to practical outcomes. They're also remarkably effective at uncovering unstated needs that traditional problem-focused questions miss.
Context-Expanding Questions
These questions help uncover the broader ecosystem of challenges and opportunities:
Why it works: These questions help you understand the full scope of the opportunity while demonstrating business acumen. They often reveal critical stakeholders and potential roadblocks that might not surface through traditional discovery.
Assumption-Challenging Questions
These questions help both you and the prospect question conventional wisdom:
Why it works: These questions demonstrate your industry knowledge while inviting prospects to think critically about their assumptions. They often lead to breakthrough moments where new possibilities emerge.
The Enunciation Revolution
Forget what you think you know about asking questions. The most effective discovery questions don't necessarily look like questions at all. Instead of asking “Can I help you?” which often triggers a defensive response, try reframing your approach. For example, you might say:
“I noticed you've been exploring solutions to improve sales quality. Could you share which specific areas of quality you're hoping to enhance?”
Or, instead of saying, “What features are you looking for?” try:
“We’ve seen clients use [specific feature] to achieve [benefit]. I imagine something like this could be helpful for you as well?”
This technique, championed by sales expert Tom Hopkins, focuses on enunciating your thoughts rather than directly asking questions. By doing so, you're fostering a conversation that feels less interrogative and more collaborative, inviting your prospect to dive deeper into their needs.
The Ownership Mindset
Another incredibly effective technique is the use of implying questions. These are designed to get the prospect to envision themselves using your product in a way that directly benefits their business. Instead of asking, “Would you use this feature?” ask something like: “When your team starts using these quality metrics, which departments do you see benefiting the most?”
Or, ask questions that challenge their thinking, like: “If this challenge persists for another year, how will it impact your long-term goals?”
This simple shift in phrasing makes a world of difference. It goes beyond selling a product or feature, encouraging the prospect to mentally step into their future, and imagining the positive impact your solution can have on their operations.
This subtle yet powerful psychological approach can make all the difference in moving the conversation forward.
The Collaborative Dance
The ideal discovery call isn't a monologue or a rigid interrogation or you blasting questions at your prospects.
Instead, it's a dance—a collaborative, back-and-forth exploration. While some sales advice suggests letting the prospect do the majority of the talking, the reality is that a true discovery call requires both parties to engage actively.
The key is to structure your call as a partnership where you're both uncovering insights together. Start by sharing relevant information about their industry, allowing them to refine or correct your understanding. From there, build on their responses with informed follow-up questions.
This collaborative approach creates a dynamic flow that helps both you and your prospect come to a shared understanding of their challenges and needs.
Selling is the art of asking the right questions to get the minor yeses that allow you to lead the potential customer to a major decision.
It’s a simple operation, and finalizing the sale is nothing more than the sum of all yeses. Sounds easy, right?
But here’s something nobody is telling or has told you about it yet:
The power of your discovery questions lies not just in their content but in their sequence.
Start with context-expanding questions to build a comprehensive picture, move to assumption-challenging questions to open new possibilities, and finally use future-state questions to create a compelling vision of success.
Instead of getting through a list of questions, the goal is to create a conversation that reveals:
Summing up, here is a curated list of impactful discovery questions from the blog, designed to engage prospects deeply and uncover critical decision-making factors:
P.S. These questions are designed to avoid generic pitfalls and inspire open, collaborative discussions with prospects, ensuring you uncover their true pain points and priorities. Feel free to modify or tweak them as per your requirements.
Every discovery call is a gateway to uncovering the unknown—both for you and your prospect.
“The one who asks, will lead”, said Aristotle in Ancient Times, revealing the impeccable role of the questions–leading the attention and interest of the customer towards purchasing. There’s no shortcut, formula, or universal script for discovery. It’s about meeting your prospects where they are, asking the right questions, and delivering insights that solve their problems in a way that feels tailor-made.
Moreover, every company believes their challenges are distinct, and they’re absolutely right. Even when two organizations face seemingly identical issues, several factors like culture, decision-making processes, and team dynamics can create vastly different realities.
Success, therefore, in discovery calls lies in embracing these nuances, tailoring your approach, and crafting solutions that resonate on a personal level.
Over 50% of your prospects aren’t the right fit for your solution. If you're not qualifying them properly during discovery calls, you're not just wasting time—you're leaving money on the table.
Take our recent call with a sales leader for instance. Our prospect wasn’t concerned with tool complexity or the time commitment of new technology. Instead, they were focused on one thing: improving the quality of their sales process, with a ‘quality outweighs speed’ mindset.
As we delved further into the conversation, it became apparent that the prospect was looking to expand their tech stack to strategically improve their operations. They didn’t want yet another tool in their stack to speed things up but to offer better insights into their workflow.
What followed was a deeper, more insightful dialogue.
As we further discussed Sybill’s capabilities, the prospect was genuinely interested in the product’s potential to improve data accuracy and streamline information flow, including better CRM hygiene and automated data extraction.
Despite portraying a cautious approach and moderate buying intentions, we wrapped the call with a promising outcome: a follow-up meeting scheduled for the next quarter and a promising future collaboration.
The takeaway? A successful discovery call isn’t just about qualifying prospects and identifying pain points. It’s about understanding not only how but also when your solution truly aligns with your customer’s needs—an aspect that's often missed in many discovery calls.
A discovery call is the first genuine conversation with a prospect that sets the stage and tone for everything that follows. Yet in today's rapidly evolving sales landscape, this initial interaction has become increasingly challenging to navigate effectively. When rushed or superficial, the fallout cascades through the entire sales process – impacting not just the immediate opportunity, but potentially the entire customer relationship.
Modern B2B buyers have fundamentally transformed this landscape, becoming more informed than ever, typically completing 57-70% of their buying research before even making first contact. This shift means that by the time a sales representative connects with a prospect, the traditional approach to information discovery has already been dramatically altered. Paradoxically, this technological sophistication has only made prospects harder, not easier, to understand.
This complexity stems from critical factors like:
Our recent discovery call exposed the real issues behind ineffective conversations, reinstating how paramount it is to rethink our approach to initial prospect interactions.
Let’s dive into what makes a discovery call truly miss the mark.
We've all been guilty of falling back on those standard open-ended questions like:
The goal of your discovery call is to engage in meaningful dialogue.
While these questions are designed to encourage conversation, they often yield vague, uninspiring answers. Worse, they can actively frustrate prospects who feel like they're repeating information that should have been researched beforehand.
Your prospect's time is precious, and asking them basic questions you should already know makes you seem unprepared and erodes trust.
For years, sales professionals have emphasized building relationships without truly defining what that means. Many argue that rapport, honesty, and trust are the foundation for initiating business. But these traits are more akin to what you'd expect in a friendship, not necessarily a successful sales relationship.
Here's the truth: customers aren't looking to make friends; they're looking for results. And it's those deeper, more substantive relationships that drive those results. Building a meaningful business relationship goes beyond just being friendly; it requires understanding your customer's vision, fears, desires, and motivations.
One of the biggest mistakes in the sales discovery process is starting a conversation by dumping a list of product features on your prospect. Sure, it's tempting to showcase everything your product can do, but this approach assumes you already know what your prospect values most.
Paradoxically, discovering questions are more efficient if they don’t have the form of a question. Research shows us how a well-structured approach helps avoid negative or disinterested responses.
For example, instead of the typical “Can I be of assistance?” which usually gets met with “I’m just looking,” try something more engaging like, “Please take a look at our models, and feel free to ask if you have any questions.”
Moving forward, let’s explore some redefined strategies for crafting discovery questions that truly resonate with today’s buyers.
Before you even pick up the phone or hop on a video call with a prospect, take your time to gather as much relevant information as possible.
Digital intelligence is the key to setting a solid foundation for any sales conversation. By leveraging various online resources, you can walk into your discovery call not just informed, but well-prepared to engage with your prospect on a deeper level.
Moving beyond the tired “what keeps you up at night?” approach, here are 3 categories of qualifying questions that skilled sellers are using to drive meaningful discoveries:
Future-State Questions
Instead of focusing solely on current problems, these questions help prospects envision their transformed future:
Why it works: These questions trigger what psychologists call ‘prospective thinking,’ helping prospects connect emotional value to practical outcomes. They're also remarkably effective at uncovering unstated needs that traditional problem-focused questions miss.
Context-Expanding Questions
These questions help uncover the broader ecosystem of challenges and opportunities:
Why it works: These questions help you understand the full scope of the opportunity while demonstrating business acumen. They often reveal critical stakeholders and potential roadblocks that might not surface through traditional discovery.
Assumption-Challenging Questions
These questions help both you and the prospect question conventional wisdom:
Why it works: These questions demonstrate your industry knowledge while inviting prospects to think critically about their assumptions. They often lead to breakthrough moments where new possibilities emerge.
The Enunciation Revolution
Forget what you think you know about asking questions. The most effective discovery questions don't necessarily look like questions at all. Instead of asking “Can I help you?” which often triggers a defensive response, try reframing your approach. For example, you might say:
“I noticed you've been exploring solutions to improve sales quality. Could you share which specific areas of quality you're hoping to enhance?”
Or, instead of saying, “What features are you looking for?” try:
“We’ve seen clients use [specific feature] to achieve [benefit]. I imagine something like this could be helpful for you as well?”
This technique, championed by sales expert Tom Hopkins, focuses on enunciating your thoughts rather than directly asking questions. By doing so, you're fostering a conversation that feels less interrogative and more collaborative, inviting your prospect to dive deeper into their needs.
The Ownership Mindset
Another incredibly effective technique is the use of implying questions. These are designed to get the prospect to envision themselves using your product in a way that directly benefits their business. Instead of asking, “Would you use this feature?” ask something like: “When your team starts using these quality metrics, which departments do you see benefiting the most?”
Or, ask questions that challenge their thinking, like: “If this challenge persists for another year, how will it impact your long-term goals?”
This simple shift in phrasing makes a world of difference. It goes beyond selling a product or feature, encouraging the prospect to mentally step into their future, and imagining the positive impact your solution can have on their operations.
This subtle yet powerful psychological approach can make all the difference in moving the conversation forward.
The Collaborative Dance
The ideal discovery call isn't a monologue or a rigid interrogation or you blasting questions at your prospects.
Instead, it's a dance—a collaborative, back-and-forth exploration. While some sales advice suggests letting the prospect do the majority of the talking, the reality is that a true discovery call requires both parties to engage actively.
The key is to structure your call as a partnership where you're both uncovering insights together. Start by sharing relevant information about their industry, allowing them to refine or correct your understanding. From there, build on their responses with informed follow-up questions.
This collaborative approach creates a dynamic flow that helps both you and your prospect come to a shared understanding of their challenges and needs.
Selling is the art of asking the right questions to get the minor yeses that allow you to lead the potential customer to a major decision.
It’s a simple operation, and finalizing the sale is nothing more than the sum of all yeses. Sounds easy, right?
But here’s something nobody is telling or has told you about it yet:
The power of your discovery questions lies not just in their content but in their sequence.
Start with context-expanding questions to build a comprehensive picture, move to assumption-challenging questions to open new possibilities, and finally use future-state questions to create a compelling vision of success.
Instead of getting through a list of questions, the goal is to create a conversation that reveals:
Summing up, here is a curated list of impactful discovery questions from the blog, designed to engage prospects deeply and uncover critical decision-making factors:
P.S. These questions are designed to avoid generic pitfalls and inspire open, collaborative discussions with prospects, ensuring you uncover their true pain points and priorities. Feel free to modify or tweak them as per your requirements.
Every discovery call is a gateway to uncovering the unknown—both for you and your prospect.
“The one who asks, will lead”, said Aristotle in Ancient Times, revealing the impeccable role of the questions–leading the attention and interest of the customer towards purchasing. There’s no shortcut, formula, or universal script for discovery. It’s about meeting your prospects where they are, asking the right questions, and delivering insights that solve their problems in a way that feels tailor-made.
Moreover, every company believes their challenges are distinct, and they’re absolutely right. Even when two organizations face seemingly identical issues, several factors like culture, decision-making processes, and team dynamics can create vastly different realities.
Success, therefore, in discovery calls lies in embracing these nuances, tailoring your approach, and crafting solutions that resonate on a personal level.
