One of the vital tasks for your startup business is discovery calls. These set the mood for your eventual interaction with a prospect. And they can also lead to a successful closure of the deal.
As such, such calls are an art in itself. You should know how to do it right and make a successful first entry. Let’s discover the secrets of making that happen and generating more success for your business.
Understanding Discovery Calls
In its simplest definition, a discovery call is the first conversation your company has with a prospect that has shown interest in your product. The goal here is to learn more about the customer and their concerns. That opens the opportunity for booking them on a second call with a more knowledgeable account executive.
Image from Sales Hacker.
In this regard, the discovery call is often considered the same as the cold call. But in the realm of B2B, there is a notable distinction between the two. With discovery calls, the prospect already showed interest in your product and is more likely to expect your call. Or they might also be the ones to initiate the call.
Meanwhile, cold calls involve prospects who might be interested in your product but have not yet shown outward signs of being so. As such, they might not expect your call. Your goal here then is to convince them to take action and connect with you.
Why Discovery Calls Matter For Your Startup Business
At this point, you already have a good idea of why discovery calls are essential for the startup business. But you will better appreciate it once you have a clearer understanding of what it offers.
Helping Prospects Better Understand Your Startup Business
Image from CiviCom.
As mentioned, discovery calls reach out to prospects who have already shown initial interest in your product. These prospects might have already conducted their research about you. During the discovery call, you build upon that initial knowledge and give them more information to help them decide.
Gauging Your Chances Of Landing A Deal
Even if the prospect is already interested in you, it is not always a shoe-in. The discovery call lets you better gauge your chances. Through it, you can determine information like the prospect’s influence within their organizations and their business pains. This information helps you better qualify them and formulate an engagement strategy.
Show That You Are Invested In The Prospect’s Success
Beyond the strict business benefits, the discovery call allows you to establish more rapport with prospects. Here, you get to show them early that you are truly invested in helping them achieve results. That would give them a stronger desire to see what you offer.
How Your Startup Business Should Do Discovery Calls
Like any other outbound calls your startup business makes, you need to be strategic about discovery calls. Here, it isn’t just about you being able to convince your prospect to schedule a callback. Consider how to make the experience worthwhile for them.
Planning The Discovery Call
One thing to make sure of when doing a discovery call is that it should have a clear purpose. Think about what you want to achieve for the prospect. For instance, you might want to help them deal with a specific issue.
Image from Aviso.
Once you have a goal, research more about the prospect and the particular issue. Chances are, you will learn more about their concern than what they initially hinted. Social media is handy for this, as it lets you dig deeper into their thoughts.
Drafting The Discovery Call
Your next step is structuring the call you want to make. That helps you better see the direction of the call and determine whether you are making the right moves. You can either go with a full script or just have talking points to guide the conversation.
Nevertheless, here are the main sections that you want to incorporate.
- Introduction: Tell the prospect who you are and why you are calling them. You should also deliver your value proposition within 20-30 seconds.
- Expectations: Explain the purpose of your call and how it will unfold with the prospect. You can also provide them with some of the key points.
- Discovery: In this section, you start proving more of your prospect’s needs through a series of questions. You can also ask them about their ongoing work.
- Solution: This is where you offer your product or service as a solution for the prospects’ needs. Soft selling will help them better warm up to what you offer. You might also want to take other actions like dealing with objections from them.
- Additional actions: During the closing phase of the call, you and your prospect should come to a mutual understanding of what further actions they can take. For instance, this can lead to the scheduling of the next call.
Bear in mind that you can change this basic structure as you need. Consider how your startup business operates and determine how it would match the prospect’s habits.
The Questions Your Startup Business Should Be Asking
As mentioned above, the discovery call’s main purpose is to understand your prospect better. The key to that is asking the right questions to them. Note that this varies with the type of call you are making and the goals you have. However, here are some of the categories you want to include.
IImage from UpLead.
Questions That Set The Stage
These questions let you prepare the prospect for the conversation. It also helps validate your early research and establish the direction.
- What is your role in the company and day-to-day activities?
- What metrics are you responsible for?
Questions That Qualify
Using these questions, you can determine if the prospect is suitable to be a customer. You also clarify their business goals and identify their pain points.
- What are your goals (financial, customer-related, operational)?
- When do you need to achieve these goals?
- Do you have problems in [areas related to your product]?
- What is the source of your problem?
- What do you think a successful solution would be like?
Questions That Disqualify
To be thoroughly sure that the prospect is a suitable customer candidate, you should also ask questions that might disqualify them. Here, you will need to find the things that can make them decide against your product.
- What are your primary roadblocks in using the solution?
- What is the approximate budget you plan to spend on the solution?
- Where would your funding come from?
Questions That Establish Your Next Steps
The last questions determine where you and the prospect heads next. Note that there might also be more specific questions that you can throw in depending on the situation.
- Who else is involved in choosing a solution?
- Have you purchased a similar solution before?
- What are the potential curveballs that you might encounter?
- How can I make this easier for you?
Getting Help Doing Discovery Calls For Your Startup Business
Doing these discovery calls requires considerable focus and expertise to yield successful results. Virtua Solutions is ready to help you here. Our sales agents are highly trained in connecting with prospects the right way. Contact us today and let’s help your startup business.