Quit being so damn smart all the time…

You're in “the Big Demo" with your prospect and her team. You just showed your product. 

It. Was Awesome. You rocked it. Everyone in the room is excited. For a few minutes.

Then the questions begin. They start slowly, then intensify.... Soon they're coming from every angle.

Bang! Zip! Boom! Zing!

But you're ready. You answer them. Every. Single. One. Exactly and precisely.

You leave feeling smart, proud even. It feels damn good to walk out of there with a little pep in your step and swagger in your stride.

You tell your co-founder – "Dude! We nailed every question! Can you believe some of the stuff they asked?"

You faced the interrogation and survived. You're tempted to move this opportunity to the "Closed-Won" column before you leave Starbucks. 

Then...

Nothing.

Nada.

Crickets.

You can't get them back on the phone. Your six follow-up emails – "just checking in" and "up for a quick call?" and "could we grab a few minutes?" and "I'm in the neighborhood tomorrow. How about I stop by?" all fall into the abyss.

What the hell happened?

Here’s what…

You didn’t LISTEN.

See.... It's not the question they want answered. The question didn't even matter – it was the REAL worry BEHIND the question that mattered.

"How many hours of tech support do you provide?" isn't a question about how late your engineers work. They don't care if your tech support is available 24/7, or by phone or email or carrier pigeon.

The REAL worry is – "How much support are we going to NEED?" The REAL worry is that you're a startup. They're thinking, "If we buy your software, I'm sticking my neck out for you, and if this thing breaks, I'm screwed."

"How many customers do you have right now?" isn't about your market share or logos.

The REAL worry is "How do I know you won't disappear in 3 months after my entire team is trained and we pull the plug on our old system?"

"Do you have a white paper that describes your APIs and SDKs?" isn't because they want to add a recommendation to their Tuesday afternoon Book Club.

The REAL worry is that your product will be hard to integrate with their legacy mainframe systems, and no one at their company has a clue on how to work on anything except SQL and .NET.

"Can you send me a data flow diagram?" isn't a question about how your product works. The REAL worry is that their customer data will end up on a Siberian server.

Instead of answering the question they're asking, LISTEN FIRST then ask THEM a question –

"That's a good question. Happy to answer. Mind if I ask - any reason in particular for that question?"

Get ready, because they may tell you the answer – that they're actually worried if your product really works, or whether or not they can get help when it breaks, or if they can confidently tell their Board that they're working with a real company.

The next time your prospect starts firing questions at you, quit acting like the gunner in the front row of your high school chemistry class. Ask your prospect WHY they're asking that question and maybe they'll tell you what they're REALLY worried about...

Give it a try. It worked for one of my clients this week and she added $250k to a project when she uncovered to the REAL worry behind these very same questions. (Kudos, Anne!)

- Scott "Smoke out the REAL Objection” Sambucci

P.S. Would you like to work with me for a day, alongside a small group of startup founders & CEOs just like you? I’m organizing a Full-Day, Intensive workshop in San Francisco in a couple of weeks… just send me a message or comment here and put “workshop" and I’ll send you the details.