In sales, your first call with a potential client is crucial. It's where you lay the groundwork for understanding their needs and how your product or service can help.
But without a clear structure, it's easy to get off track and miss important details. That's why having a simple, effective plan in place is key.
In this article, we'll walk you through seven easy steps to create a solid structure for your discovery calls.
What is a discovery call in sales?
A discovery call in sales is an initial conversation between a salesperson and a potential customer. Its primary purpose is to uncover the prospect's needs, challenges, and goals to determine if the offered product or service is a good fit.
During the call, the salesperson asks questions to gather information, actively listens to the prospect's responses, and identifies opportunities to provide value. The discovery call helps both parties assess whether further discussion and exploration are warranted to move forward with a sales opportunity.
Why is a sales discovery call process crucial?
1. Helps in empathizing with prospects
Today’s prospects already have access to dozens of pieces of information about various products and services. They simply do not want loads of information about how many stars your services have on on clutch.co.
Instead, they are looking for someone who can understand their struggles and help in solving them. That’s exactly what a sales discovery call should do.
For instance, if your prospect is an HR manager you can ask about how they are dealing with the hiring process. Then empathize with their problems ‘I’m totally getting an idea of the efforts you are putting in. What if you use a tool that could ease the process?’
2. Offers relevant solutions
Imagine that your prospect is an IT manager who is dealing with a massive data breach, and you’re selling them project management software. What will be the result? An instant disconnect of the call.
A sales discovery call should offer a solution that targets and solves the prospect’s problems. The prominent agenda is to improve the prospect's life. In this case, sell a data backup software that can solve the manager’s problem.
3. Builds the foundation of the buyer’s journey
A discovery call in sales is a critical touchpoint between the company and the potential buyer. The right sales call can create a positive experience for the buyer and smooth his journey. Here, a sales rep should learn the prospects' core motivations and how the product can facilitate them.
4. Establishes the authenticity of the salespeople
If you follow the right sales discovery call structure, the prospect will start believing in you. This will happen only if the prospect feels understood, and your solution is relevant to him.
Once salespeople establish their credibility in understanding the prospect’s industry and problem, the prospect won’t hesitate in building the conversation from there.
5. Tailor experiences as per the prospects
A sales discovery call is more than just about selling your product to the prospect and making a profit. A perfectly executed sales discovery call will help you get an idea about the personality and communication style of your prospects.
It provides you an opportunity to design the proposals or show them a sales video in a way that the potential buyer wishes to receive the information.
7 easy steps to creating an effective sales discovery call structure
If you keep on exaggerating the epic-ness of your product and services, the prospect will start asking himself, “What about me?”. And clearly, this is not a positive sign in sales and a common sales mistake.
You should rather spend time and effort on understanding if the prospect actually needs your product.
If you keep on bombarding information on them, they will disconnect and move on. This will waste your time as well as theirs. Thus, it’s worth following a sales discovery call structure to close more deals.
If you want to win more deals, here is the sales discovery call structure you need to know.
1. Preparation for the call: The first step in creating a sales discovery call structure
Know your prospects even before they start telling you about themselves. This step serves as a helping hand before you get on the discovery call. Research about every prospect you are about to talk with.
Did your company already have conversations with them?
What specific things did they mention?
It’s also a best practice to research disqualified prospects as it helps cut them off from the list of future prospects.
Pre-call research before the sales discovery call should give you information about the prospect that is readily available. To get started in the preparation phase, you can do the following:
- Discover prospects on LinkedIn
The best place to find a professional is undoubtedly LinkedIn. Research the prospect on LinkedIn and note down what it is that they do. What are their past and current projects? Also, look out for their interests and the awards they got, and observe the similarities between your prospects and you.
- No LinkedIn? Google them instead
If they don’t have a LinkedIn presence, a simple Google search can come to your rescue. Search if they have any personal websites. Take note of what they have been doing for the past 3-5 years. You should also find out if they specifically need your product or service.
- Check if your lead is qualified or not before the sales discovery call
The main aim of a sales discovery call is to find out if the prospect needs your product or service or not. But for that to happen, you must portray your ideal customer. This means that you should include the tangible characteristics of your ideal customer.
Before you jump into figuring out who is your ideal customer, reflect and answer these questions:
- With whom I want to work?
- Is the market big enough?
- What are the job titles of my prospects?
- How can I reach them? Online or offline?
- What’s the ideal budget for my prospects?
- What industries are my prospects in?
In sales, you have to keep reminding yourself that disqualifying prospects is as important as qualifying prospects. You’re in the business of selling the right solution to the right person at the right time.
So, it’s better to keep disqualified leads at bay, save time, and direct your efforts in converting the qualified ones. It will strengthen your pipeline and stop you from wasting time on the wrong people.
Remember that around 50% of your listed prospects aren’t a great fit for your product.
the
In addition to helping you scope out your prospects, the preparation phase also helps you re-evaluate your product and services. If the prospects keep getting disqualified, then the problem might not be in them.
It’s the best time to review if your product is solving a common problem or if the market size is big enough. If you get the answer as NO, then it’s time you adjust your product and then review it again. This mindset can boost the overall productivity of your sales team.
2. Set the tone right with enthusiasm
The way you talk matters a lot. When you speak on a call with a prospect, always smile. Even if he can’t see you, your tone will tell him that you are smiling. This is the start of the second step of creating an effective sales discovery call structure. The next is to bring enthusiasm as you start talking with your prospects.
You must be excited about working with them. If you’re not, you need to re-evaluate your prospecting strategy. Remember that being enthusiastic also means that you are patient with what the other person says.
One method to use here is to mimic or repeat the main highlights of their sentences. This signals to them that you’re patiently listening to them.
“Oh, okay, so you recently joined as a Sr. content marketing manager in a startup and are now training a team of writers. That’s great. How are you dealing with this challenge?”
The more humane you sound in the call, the better will be the conversation. Nobody wants to talk to a person who keeps on ranting about the product features. Prospects want you to listen to them without rushing to the product features.
3. Confirm the sales discovery agenda
Confirm the agenda you described in the meeting invite mail. Let the prospects know what they can expect from the call. Ask them if they would like to add a subject that they want to talk about. From the very beginning, start building the rapport. Write down the information they share and ensure you address them towards the end of the call.
This step will make prospects believe that their time and voice matter. You are showing them that the sales discovery call will be a two-way conversation.
- I’m here to discuss X, Y, and Z. Which additional topics would you like to discuss?
- What are your expectations from this call?
After asking these questions, it’s a good idea to mention something you have found during the research. Mention the similarities you have with them and build the conversation from there. You can also show your curiosity about their past accomplishments and how they achieved them.
4. Understand prospect's pain points
Depending on what the prospects share with you regarding their business, you can search for opportunities. You can determine a plan that will help them become better in business or as a professional.
Start with conditional questions based on your research to see if your prospect qualifies for the minimal requirements. Then, start unearthing their pain, which they don’t even know exists. Ask questions to unravel their priorities and highlight common areas where your product can add value. Remember, empathizing with prospects is also a vital part of a winning B2B sales strategy.
For instance, you can ask: what challenges did you face while hiring the marketing team? How did you tackle X?
5. Ask the right questions and listen patiently
“The questions you ask are more important than the things you could ever say.” – Thomas Freese
Asking the right questions can give you a deeper understanding of your prospect. If you ask concise questions, you will target the struggles of your prospects and provide a prescription for them. This is where a sales discovery call script comes in handy. When you've pre-written an outline of what you're going to say, you bring confidence to the table.
A script also helps you ask the right questions to keep the conversation on track. It will save time for both of you. Getting a short and crisp answer from your prospect means your questions are directed to the exact pain points.
Remember, six out of 10 prospects want to discuss pricing in the very first call. Also, more than half want to understand how the product works in the sales discovery call. This perspective can help formulate a successful discovery call process.
Another crucial point here is to listen to the answers. Ideally, a sales rep should talk 45% of the time, while 55% of the time will be dedicated to prospecting talking.
The science is simple: the more you listen, the more they will trust you.
6. Develop a vision and present a solution
In this step of the sales discovery call structure, you need to shift the conversation from your prospect’s frustrating struggles to innovative solutions.
Now you are talking about solving the cause of pain rather than gathering them up. At this step, you need to make the prospect believe that his problem can be solved using your product. Present the Unique Selling Proposition of your product and how it can target the problem.
To make this effective, you can leverage social proofs to build their trust in your product. In early sales discovery calls, prospects want to know how their peers solved a similar problem. You can grab this opportunity by showing them a real-world customer example or a use case.
In this step, you need to design the conversation to move from emotional decision-making to rational decision-making. This is the point where you show your prospect that he can also achieve better results using your product like others.
The secret here is to keep building the trust of your prospects and back the product with enough validations.
7. Schedule your next sales discovery call before closing
This is an important part of the sales discovery process; keep converting your prospects. Every qualified lead counts, so don’t stop after you get success with a big prospect. The effective sales discovery structure is a process and not a one-day event.
Tell them what are the next steps and ask for their opinions. Write a sales email that converts to ensure that you keep things in a loop. If the sales discovery call went as you planned, the next step would be a product demo to demonstrate how your product solves their pain points.
Hence, before you hang up, schedule the next meeting with the prospect.
Sales discovery call script: Questions to ask in a call
Top sales performers ask around 11-14 questions per discovery call.
It’s not just about the number of questions you ask but also about how targeted the questions are.
Here are some questions that help in building a conversation and increasing engagement:
Sales discovery questions to understand challenges
- How did you go about solving problem A that you mentioned?
- How long does it take for you to decide X?
- Tell me a few things about your current process.
- Which specific areas are you looking to improve?
Medha
Sales discovery questions to understand needs and motivation:
- What prompted you to consider our product?
- How will picking the right tool can ease your process?
- Which one thing would you want from a solution?
- I remember you mentioned how you dealt with X challenges in your organization. How will the process be affected if you consider a tool?
Sales discovery questions to understand the compatibility of your product with their Current tool:
- What were your expectations when you bought that product?
- How do you aim to use that product in other areas?
- Can you talk about your implementation process?
Krish Ramineni
Maximizing sales discovery calls with Fireflies
Fireflies.ai is an innovative AI-powered app that helps you record, transcribe, summarize, and analyze online and offline conversations. By creating a database of all your customer interactions, it can help you review and refine your discovery call strategy and structure.
Here's how Fireflies.ai can help you fully leverage sales discovery calls:
- Automated Meeting Notes: Fireflies.ai automatically transcribes and summarizes your meetings, making it effortless to capture key points and action items.
- AI-Powered Search: Quickly find important information within your meetings using Fireflies.ai's powerful search capabilities, saving you time and effort.
- Collaboration Tools: Effectively collaborate with your team by adding comments and reactions to specific parts of conversations and easily sharing meeting notes to collaboration apps like Slack and Notion. You can also snip and share key moments as soundbites.
- Conversation Intelligence: Analyze meetings using Fireflies.ai's conversation intelligence feature that tracks speaker talk time, sentiment, and key metrics. Use these insights to coach teammates and improve processes.
Vibhanshu Dixit
- Workflow Automation: Automate workflows from meetings by letting Fireflies.ai fill out your CRM, create tasks, and share meeting recaps to keep your team informed and organized.
- Real-Time Knowledge Base: Fireflies.ai creates a self-updating knowledge base from all your voice conversations, ensuring that valuable insights are readily accessible to your entire team.
- Flexible Integration Options: Fireflies.ai seamlessly integrates with various platforms and tools, including Google Meet, Zoom, Salesforce, and Slack, providing a tailored solution to fit your workflow.
With Fireflies.ai, you can revolutionize your sales discovery calls, streamline your workflow, and drive better business outcomes.
Get started today and unlock the full potential of your sales efforts.
Make Your Sales Discovery Call A Success With Fireflies
Transform sales discovery calls with Fireflies.ai: automate notes, analyze conversations, and collaborate effortlessly for better outcomes.
Try Fireflies for free!Conclusion
A perfect sales discovery structure is ever-evolving. Based on your experience and understanding of the prospects, you should re-evaluate your product as well as your discovery strategy. You also need to remember that not every prospect will convert, and that’s fine.
If your sales discovery call wasn’t effective, you would find the prospect backs up towards the end. Your success metric of sales discovery calls should depend on the meeting quota and the success the customer achieves using your product. With tools like Fireflies, you can easily coach your sales team and make the discovery call process easier.
