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tags: Module 7
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# Asking questions: A simple framework

:::success
**You're in step 3 of a discovery call:** Need Discovery
:::
Let's recap:
- [x] You have a precise list of information you'd like to know after your discovery call
- [x] You've done your research
- [x] You opened the call by establishing rapport through some small talk
- [x] You've set the agenda for the call and you're ready to dive right in...

We're now at the main part of the meeting: Need discovery!

You have two main objectives during this phase of the call:
* Determine whether the prospect has a need worth solving
* Secure buy-in - have the prospect acknowledge your solution would add value to them
 

## Peel the onion

😉 Remember this graphic ....


You have already learned to use a mix of closed- and open-ended questions to assess your prospects current situation, their pain and what implications result from experiencing and solving the pain.

But how to build a conversation around that, right?

This is what we are going to tackle now: how to combine the questions to build up discovery conversations and eventuell get to the core, the impact, of your prospects needs.

## A simple framework

Let's do a quick recap of the earlier learning unit on how to drive the quality of a conversation. There are three main question types (or use cases):

1. Situational questions
1. Pain questions
1. Impact questions

When and how to use?
1. **Situational:** Mostly closed questions. Find out facts and background info on your prospect to validate things found in your research & find out if they are qualified. Used to start the conversation. Would limit to 3-4.
1. **Pain:** Mostly open questions. Find your prospects' pain. Should be the majority of your call.
1. **Impact:** Open questions. This is where the magic happens! Here you want to identify what the discovered pain / need means for your prospect and what impact it would have if you solved it. You ask for impact once and after you have discovered a solid challenge.

:::success

✅ How to combine them:

* You start with situational questions ( S ),
* go deeper with pain questions ( P )
* and fully understand and provide value with impact questions ( I )!
:::

 
See the following graphic that shows the dynamic of how to combine different question types.


Credit: Inspiration taken from "Winning by Design" and Jacco van der Kooij
 

Example for Hyrise Academy:

> Me: "Prospect, you have recently hired 5 SDRs, correct?" ( S )
> Prospect: "Exactly, and we are looking for 10 more."
>
> Me: "Great and from what I saw you don't have a sales enablement team yet?" ( S )
> Prospect: "Not yet, but it's top of my list, we are currently working on a concept."
>
> Me: "Got it. I saw, you have hired career changers with no prior sales experience." ( S )
> Prospect: "Exactly, we really do like hospitality profiles."
>
> Me: "What is your current process to onboard and train them without a sales enablement team?" ( P )
> Prospect: "We have an onboarding process but no structured sales training yet. To tell you the truth, it's me and my best two AEs mentoring the new SDRs on the job. But yeah, it takes a lot of my top performers' time and I feel we still don't provide the support needed..."
>
> Me: "I can imagine, especially when having hired 5 new SDRs recently. How much time do you think it takes you per week?" ( I )
.....

:::info
**Practical tip:** Share context on what problems your company helps other customers solve. Why? Experienced salespeople provide value by asking great questions that make their prospects realize they have a problem that needs solving. However, junior salespeople often need practice asking good questions. During this time, their prospects may get inpatient, feel interrogated and may not see the value. Even more so when the salesperson works at a company that is relatively unknown. In these cases it helps to frame the discovery part of the conversation by **briefly summarizing the problems your company helps their customers solve**. It makes your prospect think and see value early on in the conversation.

Example, starting at the agenda:
> **You:** {Name of prospect}, I appreciate you joining our call today.
The purpose of this conversation, {Name of prospect}, is for me to learn more about your situation and decide whether how we may be able to help. When this call ends, the goal is for you to have all the information you need to decide whether you’re interested in learning more. If you are, we’ll plan the next step together, and if you’re not, you’ll tell me straight up so we don’t waste anyone’s time. Is that fair?
> **Prospect:** Absolutely!
>
> **You:** Great - I’m certain that we can achieve this in 30 minutes, which is what I’ve set aside. Does this still work for you?
> **Prospect:** Yes, 30 minutes sounds great.
>
> **You:** Great. I’ve planned to ask how you currently go about ABC, what your objectives here are and then explain how we may be able to help. Do you think there’s anything we should add to or remove from that agenda?
> **Prospect:** Nope.
>
> **You:** Sounds good! Let’s begin.
>{Name of prospect}, many companies we work with, especially in your industry, struggle with problem A (e.g. finding talented salespeople) and problem B (e.g. having the bandwith or expertise to effectively train junior salespeople).
> I have seen that you are also looking for SDRs, right?
> **Prospect:** As a matter of fact, we have 5 open SDR positions right now. It seems impossible to find them.... .

Voilá, you have now entered the discovery part of the conversation.
:::

## Best practice tips

**1. Once you shift up a gear, do not shift down again**

Remember that questions control the speed and the quality of a conversation. Closed-ended, situational questions like "How many people do you have on your sales team?" are asked to get a conversation going and establish rapport as well as trust. After asking a couple of situational questions (no more than 3-5!) you go deeper and "shift up a gear" by asking open-ended pain questions.

Once you have done that, you do NOT go back to asking situational questions. Why? It just kills the natural flow of the conversation and your prospect's engagement curve my drop. Keep going deep with pain and impact questions.

 
**2. Summarize pain points**

Something that great SDRs and AEs do to establish trust and show that they are actively listening is to summarize their prospect's discovered pain points. In fact, it's very effective before asking impact questions. Let's demonstrate using another Hyrise example.

> Me: "Prospect, you have recently hired 5 SDRs, correct?" ( S )
> Prospect: "Exactly, and we are looking for 10 more."
>
> Me: "Great and from what I saw you don't have a sales enablement team yet?" ( S )
> Prospect: "Not yet, but it's top of my list, we are currently working on a concept."
>
> Me: "What is your current process to onboard and train SDRs without a sales enablement team?" ( P )
> Prospect: "We have an onboarding process but no structured sales training yet. To tell you the truth, it's me and my best two AEs mentoring the new SDRs on the job. But yeah, it takes a lot of my top performers' time and I feel we still don't provide the support needed..."
>
> Me: Alright, so you have 5 SDRs on the team already and hopefully 10 more in the short term. With the onboarding covered by you and your best AEs, this takes a lot of your time while still not providing the support your SDRs need. You are not alone, this is what a lot of companies do at the moment. How much time do you think you and your AEs would have to invest weekly for 10 new hires? (Summary)
>
> Prospect: Puh, good question. Assume 3-4 hours per SDR weekly, so this adds up to 30-40 hours... wow.
>
> Me: "What else could you / your AEs do with that time?" ( I )
> Prospect: "Work on more opportunities and close more deals."
>
 
**3. Ask for impact on a personal level**
Ok, the following is advanced stuff. We are sharing this for the super curious and hungry among you 🥸 .

When asking their prospects for the impact of a problem or a solution, most salespeople only ask on a business level. Meaning, they try to find out how much time or money a certain problem is wasting. However, decision makers in business are one thing first and foremost: human beings. And human beings often take decisions out of personal motivation. Consequently, you should ask for impact on a personal level!

Example:
> Me: "You are spending 20 hours a week on training your new SDRs. What does this mean for you personally?" ( I )
> Prospect: "Essentially, it means that I need to work longer hours to get things done that I didn't get to during the day. It also means less time with my family and newborn baby... ."

This is super important and extremely powerful information! Knowing this, you understand what may really drive that person's decision, urgency and need.

 
**4. Prepare questions before each discovery call**

The above is just one of many possible examples of how to combine situational, pain and impact questions. What you should do in practice is to prepare a set of questions - situational, pain and impact - you want your prospect to ask during a discovery call. That's one of the reasons why preparation for discovery calls is so important.

You can easily think of situational and pain questions as part of your call preparation. Impact questions are specific to each pain point you identify, so you need to actively listen and tailor your impact question accordingly. However, here are some examples:
* What does {challenge ABC} mean for you / your company / your team?
* What are the consequences of {challenge ABC} for you / your company / your team?
* What could you do with the time / money if {challenge ABC} didn't exist?

 
This concludes the section on effective questioning. No worries, you will get plenty of opportunities to practice and test these. Let's now turn towards the missing half to effective need discovery: active listening! 👂

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