How To Avoid “Death By Discovery” in Outbound Opportunities (ft. Jen Allen-Knuth)

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What’s up everyone! It's Jen Allen-Knuth and today I’m taking over the 30MPC newsletter.

(If we haven't crossed paths before, I spent 18 years as an Enterprise seller driving $50M+ in sales at Gartner and Challenger Inc. I'm now the founder of DemandJen and these days, you can find me hosting SKO keynotes and workshops that help sales teams rethink how they earn buyer trust.)

Here's a lil secret about discovery with outbound-originated opportunities.?

Many of us were taught that the purpose of discovery is to “understand the customer's needs” so we can map our solution back to those needs and show how we help.?

Here's the fatal flaw in that theory.?

If we're asking our customers to tell us their needs, chances are, they'd tell our competitors the same thing.?

So, the odds that our solution will be meaningfully different from our competitors are slim.?

As a result, customers commoditize us around the one area they CAN tell a difference.?

Price.?

How can we approach discovery differently to avoid this? Here’s my 5-step process.

Let’s roll!

Step 1: Identify What the Company Is Trying to Achieve + Seek to Understand What You’re Missing as an Outsider.?

Budget follows company objectives. Start by doing prep on what the company is trying to achieve this year.?

For public companies: find this on the Investor Relations page (in the CEO Letter to Shareholders, their annual report, or their investor presentations).?

For K12 or Universities: Google “SCHOOL NAME Strategic Plan”.

For private/startup: Prompt ChatGPT “Find the most recent interviews where FOUNDER of COMPANY is speaking about their company goals.”

Bring the relevant objective(s) to the call and frame it with:

“As an outsider, it sounds like this is what your business is looking to achieve this year. But, what did I get wrong?”

Step 2: Introduce an Underappreciated Threat to Achieving That Objective.

Let’s say the CEO of a startup said they are aiming to 2x subscription revenue from Enterprise accounts by 2026. You’re trying to sell them an HR tech tool.

The talk track could sound something like:

“One of the things we hear that makes that tough is finding Enterprise sales talent that is willing to leave big tech and come to a startup. But, how is that different from what you’re seeing?”

Executives dread generic, open-ended questions. Instead, we’re offering a POV and seeking to be corrected.

Step 3: Name the Common Ways Companies Usually Solve For This Problem & Empathize Why They Aren’t “Bad” Ideas.?

Here’s how that sounds:

“Often, the way we see CXOs addressing this problem is by XYZ. Reason being, it’s ABC (ABC = it worked really well last year, it’s cheaper, etc.) How is that different from the way you’re addressing it today?”

Our goal here is to prompt a correction. By correcting us, we learn more about how they’re solving the problem today.?

Step 4: Introduce Evidence That Contradicts Those Beliefs & Assumptions.?

Our goal isn't to tell them they're wrong. We don’t earn trust that way.

Our goal is to introduce an enemy to the prospect’s current beliefs/assumptions that breaks it.?

The key is to make it so we aren't attacking the person, but rather, exposing them to something environmental that is creating an unintended negative consequence.

Use the language of “we” here. Example: “We were surprised to find…”.

“We” puts us on the same side of the table. It removes the finger-point.

Step 5: Give Them a Way to Size Those Negative Consequences.?

This is NOT an ROI formula. That's what happens IF they change.?

This is about COI (cost of inaction). What happens if they don't change??

If COI is new to you, here’s a deeper dive on what it is and how to do it.

So, What Next?

Now that you’ve piqued their curiosity, suggest that they collect the inputs needed to calculate the size of the pain, and bring those to the next call.?

Don't assemble or sell the solution yet.?

Just agree that you’ll explore the size of the pain together, to see if this is even an area worth exploring.?

Discovery shouldn't feel like death by 1000 questions, or a qualification exercise so that we can pitch our stuff.

It should feel like two colleagues exploring a problem together.

When approached this way, discovery convos are one of the best places to drive a competitive wedge. Not around our product. But, around our ability to be a strategic partner to how the prospect thinks about their own business.?

***

That's a wrap folks!

Want a deeper dive on this??

I run this as a workshop for SDR/AE/AM/CS teams, using actual target accounts your team is trying to win.?

Contact me at [email protected] to learn more.?

Or, catch me every Sunday morning for my weekly newsletter.?

Happy hunting!? ?

DemandJen

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Cheers folks.

-AF