Your first sales discovery call can be intimidating. We’ve put together an easy step-by-step guide on how to run the perfect sales call to help you connect with prospects.
The discovery call is one of the most crucial parts of B2B sales. As the seller, it’s your opportunity to get to know your prospect and introduce them to your business.
In some ways, it’s kind of like a first date. And if you had the opportunity to get some background information on the person before you met on your date, wouldn’t you jump at the chance? Without discovery, you could invite your date to dinner at an all-meat Texas BBQ restaurant when they’re a vegetarian!
So you may be wondering, okay—How do I get started? What sales discovery questions should I ask? How do I even run a discovery call?
Lucky for you, this guide breaks down everything you need to know about a discovery call.
We’ll give you three easy steps to run the perfect sales discovery call. Ready to get started?
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A sales discovery call is typically conducted live via phone or video meeting. In the call, the goal is to uncover and understand your prospect’s problems. You do this by asking detailed questions to achieve mutual understanding.
The whole point of a discovery call is to determine if there’s a problem or pain point you can identify, dissect, and uncover. You can’t sell something to a prospect if you don’t understand their situation.
Sales Stuff Explained: Discovery Calls
Rather watch than read? The Sales Feed team asked top sales experts how to make the most of a sales discovery call on this episode of Sales Stuff Explained.
What’s the Difference Between a Discovery Call and a Consultation?
A discovery call is usually the first call between a salesperson and a prospective client. A consultation call, on the other hand, occurs after the prospect has agreed to move forward toward purchase.
During a consultation, the salesperson provides additional information and guidance to the client, ensuring they have all the information they need to make an informed purchase decision.
In short, the main difference between a discovery call and a consultation is that discovery calls are about exploring the client’s needs, while consultations are about providing solutions to meet those needs.
How Do You Prepare for a Sales Discovery Call
The reason to hold a sales discovery call is to listen to your prospect and dig into what it is they do and what they want to do better. Ultimately, if you don’t take the time to identify your prospect’s needs, your “perfect” solution for their problem will be useless.
(Imagine if you were shopping for a pair of stylish shoes to wear to an event, and the salesperson suggests a show-stopping sandal, but the event is happening in the middle of the winter. The solution just isn’t a good fit for your specific needs.)
Regarding the best way to prepare and focus, winning sales professionals use the discovery phase to ask questions to understand the prospect’s situation without emphasizing their own company or the product they sell.
Below, we’ll give you the play-by-play to help make the most out of your sales discovery calls.
The most crucial step of the perfect sales discovery process is the most important: the research.
Research Before Your Discovery Call
Before jumping on the call, give yourself details about your prospect(s), their business, and any possible challenges they may have.
As a salesperson, your discovery call with a potential client is often their first impression of you and your company. So, it’s essential to make a lasting, professional impression. Preparing for the call by researching your prospects, their business, and any possible challenges they may have can give you the information you need to make your conversation effective and set you apart from your competitors.
Researching your prospects before your call allows you to better connect with them by personalizing your conversation and demonstrating that you put effort into understanding their business. This approach can enhance your credibility and show interest in solving their unique business challenges. By learning about the prospect’s business, products or services, customers, competitors, etc., you can identify how your solution can help solve their challenges.
How to Uncover Relevant Information About Your Prospects
Look to these areas to try and discover as much as possible about your prospective customer.
Consult their social media profiles, such as LinkedIn, Twitter, and TikTok, for insights into their business operations, unique needs, and interests.
Look for common acquaintances and mutual connections, which can be used as ‘foot-in-the-door’ during your conversation and increase your chances of building a solid rapport.
Company websites, news articles, and industry reports provide insights into business challenges, competitors, and other critical understandings so you can adjust your value proposition to match the unique requirements of each prospect.
Remember, discovery calls are about building relationships, so show your prospects you care about their business and unique challenges. Take time to prepare, make a great impression, and position yourself as the go-to person for their business challenges.
Research-Based Discovery Question Examples
Here are a few research-based discovery questions examples to uncover pre-discovery ahead of your call:
Whether you consider all or part of the sample questions above, going into the call well-prepared with some research on your prospect makes them feel appreciated. Plus, you get to skip the boring, obvious questions and jump right into the targeted, more meaningful ones.
Sales Discovery Guide Uncover your prospects' problems and build relationships faster and start picking out the champions. Get the Guide
Uncovering the Prospect’s Needs
The reason to hold a sales discovery call is to listen to your prospect and dig into what it is they do and what they want to do better. Ultimately, if you don’t take the time to identify your prospect’s needs, your “perfect” solution for their problem will be useless.
(Imagine if you were shopping for a pair of stylish shoes to wear to an event, and the salesperson suggests a show-stopping sandal…but the event is happening in the middle of the winter. The solution just isn’t a good fit for your specific needs.)
The best sales professionals use the discovery phase to ask questions to understand the prospect’s situation without emphasizing their own company or the product they sell.
Below, we’ll give you the play-by-play to help make the most out of your sales discovery calls.
What Not to Do in a Discovery Call
You feel confident about your research. Still, before hopping on that call, there are some things to avoid doing or saying during this crucial conversation, as they could quickly sour the rapport and goodwill built up until that point.
Some top no-nos for what not to say or do on a sales discovery call include:
Talking too much: nerves might get the better of you, or you may be eager to jump in and start talking about what you can bring. It is essential to give the prospect plenty of space to talk about their situation, challenges, and priorities.
Assuming too much: Avoid making assumptions about the buyer’s business, goals, or budget without gathering information. Instead, ask open-ended questions that encourage dialog and help uncover the prospect’s unique needs.
Being too pushy: No one likes feeling pressured or rushed into making a decision, so it’s essential to balance enthusiasm and respect for the buyer’s timeline and decision-making process.
Failing to do research: Do not skip the research phase. Preparation is key to making a great impression during a discovery call. Failing to do basic research on the prospect’s business or industry can be a major turnoff and may cause the prospect to question your credibility.
By avoiding these common pitfalls, building rapport, and understanding the buyer’s unique needs, you’ll increase your chances of success during a discovery call and throughout the sales process.
How to Run a Discovery Call
Okay, so you’ve researched and contacted your prospect. Now it’s time actually to run the discovery call. We’ll dive in below on some basic guidelines to get it right, like how to start a discovery call and keep things on track.
How Do You Start a Discovery Call
Small talk is the best way to start your discovery and your chance to use your research and put it to good use. But don’t just blurt out everything you know about the prospect in two minutes—that would be overwhelming. Pace yourself and do it in a way that makes an excellent first impression while showing your prospect that you’ve done your homework.
You never know if someone’s going to be a small-talk person. If you’ve got one of those people, make sure you ask them questions that relate more to them personally. Maybe it’s going on their Instagram and asking about that steak dinner they had last night— where they went, how it was etc.
Nick CegelskiTime by PingSenior Account Executive
Here are examples of small talk topics you can kick off with and bonus points if you connect it with something you saw on their LinkedIn profile:
Plans in the upcoming days/weeks
Vacation or travel plans
Their hobbies and interests
Entertainment (movies, shows, etc.)
Current location
Set Expectations
Now that you’ve gotten the small talk out of the way, set up expectations.
Expectations could include the following:
How long the meeting will take
Key agenda items
Who else will be attending the meeting
Outline all of these expectations in your original email to set up the discovery call, but it’s a good idea to briefly reinforce them once on the call.
Again, don’t start throwing your questions at them. Otherwise, you may risk turning off the prospect entirely. Instead, remind your prospect that this call concerns them and their needs. You want to understand their current framework or process and where they want to be.
When you set up expectations, this is called an upfront contract. This contract ensures that you and your prospect are on the same wavelength.
What Questions Are Asked in a Discovery Call?
Your questions may vary, but general guidance on what to ask on a sales discovery call should all come from a common place: Striving to build an understanding of your prospect’s current situation. Here are some guidelines when it comes to asking questions.
Getting the answers to what’s driving the prospect, what they want to achieve, or what are the big challenges they have takes time. You only earn the right to access this information by building a sense of connection and trust with the prospect.
Andy PaulSales Enablement PodcastHost
Each sales rep’s questions may vary, but they all come from a common place: Striving to build an understanding of your prospect’s current situation. Here are some guidelines when it comes to asking questions.
How to Start Strong
A great way to open is with questions for inbound leads is something like: “What caused you to reach out?” Otherwise, if the call is outbound, try: “What made you take this call?”
From there, you’ll work to get a clear understanding of how things work in their day-to-day.
Ask Command Questions
Now is the perfect time to ask command questions like “Walk me through…” or “Tell me about…” Command questions are great tools to get your prospect talking.
Asking command questions can be useful to elicit specific responses from others. They often begin with a keyword or phrase such as “what,” “how,” or “can you.”
Using these questions, you can guide conversations, facilitate decision-making, and gather valuable information.
Identify Three to Four Problems
The next part is to learn about three or four problems your prospect is facing with their current solution. Make sure to also ask them about the impact those problems have on their business.
These questions don’t have to be super sophisticated. Basic questions like “What would you like to accomplish today?” or “Could you tell me a little bit more about that?” can sometimes get the best answers.
At the end of the day, this is a listening exercise, so don’t make your prospects feel like they’re being cross-examined. Ensure your prospect feels heard, and use softening statements to break up your questions.
Softening statements can include:
I’m curious…
Could you tell me…
This might seem like a weird question…
Do you mind if I ask…
For some more context…
You said that…
I don’t know how to ask this…
Based on what you’ve said so far…
Use this opportunity to connect on a human level with the prospect. Be interested and ask good questions.
Summarize What Was Covered on the Discovery Call
Now that you understand your customer’s problem better try summarizing what you’ve heard in your own words from start to finish.
Even if it means having a pit stop midway through the conversation, reiterating what you’ve heard from the prospect so far will ensure you’re going in the right direction and that everything is accurate. Summarizing can help clarify misunderstandings between you and the prospect and crystallize their business goals.
Moving Through Next Steps
Wow, we’re almost through the sales discovery call! Now’s when you’ll gauge if your prospect wants to proceed and find out how their company brings on new tools.
Here are some discovery questions examples you could ask the prospect during this phase:
When were you hoping to have a solution in place?
Who else will need to be part of the evaluation?
Is there a budget already set aside?
Who’ll give the final approval?
Is there anyone else who might find this conversation valuable?
Is there anyone that might feel left out if we don’t include them?
It can be normal to realize that maybe things won’t work out between you and the prospect. Studies show that at least 50% of your prospects are not a good fit for what you sell. If things don’t work out now, politely say your goodbyes and leave that door open for the future.
However, let’s assume that all your amazing, well-researched, and thoughtful questions have led you to believe that you do have a great solution for this prospect and their need. In this case, it’s time to talk about the next steps.
Free Cheat Sheet Grab the sales discovery call cheat sheet.
You made it! All your efforts during the discovery call have paid off, and now it’s time for the next steps post-sales discovery call.
Your next call will likely be a more in-depth demonstration of your product or service. At this point, you may want to set an agenda for that call now. This way, the prospect can see the value in actually showing up. One effective method for the next steps is to send your prospect a follow-up video.
With the right prompts, tools like ChatGPT are great to help with prepping for discovery calls. Leveraging AI tools like ChatGPT can help you quickly research and prep for a discovery call with potential prospects and gain valuable insights into their business needs.
ChatGPT provides deep learning technology that helps sales reps become more efficient at researching customer data, analyzing the data, and developing questions that will lead to the most successful discovery calls.
The AI-based platform also allows you to quickly identify trends in customer data, which can give you an edge in uncovering and addressing customer needs during the sales discovery call.
ChatGPT’s conversational AI also provides an intuitive way to interact with customer data. Using natural language processing (NLP), ChatGPT can develop leads from conversation transcripts by understanding the context of questions prospects ask during the initial interaction. This can help create a more personalized customer experience during the discovery process.
Using ChatGPT for a discovery call requires preparation beforehand to set up your AI assistant for success. One caveat, right now, it’s only able to access information up til 2021, so use discretion with that in mind.
Sales Discovery Call AI Prompts to Try
Here are some general prompt guidance ideas you can use as you prepare for your call:
Ask open-ended questions about what could the customers’ goals or problems be solved so you can better understand their wants or needs before moving forward in the conversation.
Identify any unique customer requirements for their industry or space and ask how to potentially meet those expectations.
Use analytics collected from previous interactions with similar customers or prospects to formulate discussion topics to find common ground between you and the customer or prospect.
Ask ChatGPT to identify those three to four potential problems your prospect could face in their particular situation/industry.
Ideate on some softening statement ideas or command questions you could pull into future discovery calls/have in your back pocket.
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The Discovery Call Finish Line
And voila! You just mastered the perfect sales discovery call.
If you follow these steps, you’ll be on your way to a successful discovery call. And if you’re ready to learn more, this episode of Sales Feed’s Full Funnel offers ten additional tips to help you run better discovery calls.
Sales Discovery Guide Uncover your prospects' problems and build relationships faster and start picking out the champions. Get the Guide
This post was originally published on May 16, 2022. It was updated on June 15, 2023.
