During a sales cycle with Seismic, the rep held back specific pain points gathered from end-users to use in a follow-up email with personalized micro-demos. Instead of sharing everything in the first call, this unexpected, high-value touchpoint changed the course of the deal by demonstrating deep understanding.
Related Insights
Salespeople often rush to present a solution after hearing a surface-level problem, which leads to ghosting. Asking simple, open-ended follow-ups like "Interesting, tell me more" or "Is there anything else?" forces the prospect to reveal the true impact and urgency of their issue, building a stronger case for your solution.
After a discovery call, distill the conversation into three core problems. Structure your recap email around these points, explicitly stating, "I'm designing our demo around these three things for you." This confirms your understanding and builds anticipation for a tailored solution, ensuring the next meeting is highly relevant.
Leverage AI to conduct comprehensive research on a prospect's company, industry, and the specific individuals you're meeting. This allows you to bypass basic discovery questions and dive into more relevant, informed conversations, making the sales call more efficient and valuable for the customer.
Go beyond simple customization and build proposals using the customer's own words and lingo from discovery calls. Reflecting their exact language back to them proves you listened and understood their unique pain. This makes them feel heard and emotionally connects them to the solution, creating urgency.
Instead of asking standard discovery questions, top performers pose strategic questions that require joint exploration. This shifts the dynamic from a sales pitch to a collaborative problem-solving session, creating a deeper partnership and revealing unforeseen opportunities that standard questions would miss.
At the end of a call, ask to briefly review the 3-5 core problems discussed. This crystallizes the conversation and reminds the prospect of the seriousness of their issues right before you ask for a commitment. This makes them more likely to agree to a concrete next step because the value of solving their problem is top-of-mind.
Instead of a feature-focused presentation, close deals by first articulating the customer's problem, then sharing a relatable story of solving it for a similar company, and only then presenting the proposal. This sequence builds trust and makes the solution self-evident.
Instead of a typical first sales call that quizzes a prospect, Stripe implemented collaborative whiteboarding sessions. By jointly mapping the prospect's technical architecture, the sales team gathered deep insights while the customer received a valuable asset (their own architecture diagram), establishing a value-add relationship from the start.
Instead of asking prospects to educate you with generic questions, conduct pre-call research and present a hypothesis on why you're meeting. This shows preparation and elevates the conversation. Even if you're wrong, the prospect will correct you, getting you to the right answer faster.
Shift the first meeting's goal from gathering information ("discovery") to providing tangible value ("consultation"). Prospects agree to meetings when they expect to learn something useful for their role or company, just as patients expect insights from a doctor.
