Higher Order Questioning - A Practical Guide

I am feeling a little impatient. I want to get some information to everyone on an area that drives me crazy.

This is when a sales professional enters into a discussion with the best of intentions - to discover some of the business issues the client is facing - in order to understand the fit with his/her organization's products or services. But during the course of the discussion, when the client is providing MANY opportunities for meaty discussion, the intrepid salesperson simply glosses over the issues with a "that's great" or "very interesting"...

Let's go through a simple process here: We will assume all of the niceties and pageantry have occurred with the client and we are into some level of discussion on wants & needs.

1. Let's get to some semblance of a list of issues, objectives, problems, priorities - whatever you want to call them. Please make sure this list is accurate and complete - validate this with the client. A great question: "Is there anything else?" or "what others do you believe would need to be addressed?".
2. Let's prioritize this list. Which of these areas would the client wish to address first. Use whatever manner of questioning to get the client to select but keep in mind that you will only be able to discus a few of these (if your lucky). Best to discuss the one that is most relevant to the client. Sample questions: "This is a great list. If we were to select only a couple of these to discuss today, which would you suggest we discuss?" or "If we were only able to address one or two of these issues which would be the priority?".
3. Time to understand all we can about the issue. How is it defined? How does the client know it is an issue? what is or isn't happening in the organization that should or shouldn't be? How do they measure "stuff" around this issue?, etc. Bottom line folks - get as much GOOD information as you can surrounding the issue. Sample questions: "Perhaps you can tell me a little about issue X?" or "You mentioned issue X as a priority, what is letting you know that this is an issue?".
4. Now you have to determine what success in addressing the issue might look like. Let's paint a picture here people. How would the business change? What results would be derived? What would have to happen and what changes would need to be made in order to address this issue NOTE: I am not a big fan of the following question but it may be useful in some instances; "What would it mean if you did nothing?". I am still trying to figure out when this is not insulting to the audience.
5. Now determine what addressing the issue will mean from a financial perspective or how other metrics may be affected. If clients are reluctant to provide details get them to guess - best estimate, gut-feel, whatever it takes. Let's just determine whether addressing the issue is significant enough that our solution even makes sense (i.e. be sure the potential benefits are much larger than the potential investment in your products or services).

That's all I wanted to cover today. The key to this is to slow down during the conversation and ask yourself this question: "Do I know enough about or fully understand what the client just said?" - and since you are asking this of yourself your ego shouldn't be in the way!

Have fun folks.

Cheers

Steve