40 great business to business sales questions

40 Questions for Business to
Business (B2B) sales
“I keep six honest serving-men
(They taught me all I knew);
Their names are What and Why and When
And How and Where and Who.”
Rudyard Kipling
Richard Lucas
February 2015
www.richardlucas.com

Introduction
• I’ve been in business for more than 30 years
• Good questions are vital to sales
• Sales are essential to business
• I decided to share

Good questions are vital for sales
The stereotypical salesperson talks too much
Good questions
• help us understand a client’s situation,
objectives, priorities and challenges
• forces us to listen and show respect
• Give us time to think and prepare the right
responses

What are “Good questions””
Open Questions that
- cannot be answered ‘yes’ or ‘no’
- gather information so we can assess if
we can help them .
- draw attention to the issues/problems
of our client, that we can help with

Qualification and elimination
questions
• Encourage clients to say “no”
• make sure we are talking to people who want
to do business with us
• Stop us from wasting time when our potential
clients do not appreciate what we can do for
them
• Enable us to work with people and
organisations that value what we do

Famous advocates of questions
• Tony Robbins Why we do what we do TED talk
“I'm the "why" guy.””
• TPS Root cause analysis. The 5 Whys
• Rudyard Kipling - The Elephant’s Child.
• Simon Sinek “Start with Why”
So… “forty great questions for business to
business” sales

What
1 what are you doing now
2 what do you want to do in the future
3 what is wrong with the way things are now
4 what is that person’s name
5 What would the value be if we can solve
this problem for you ?

Who
6 who is responsible for the topics we are interested in
7 who else will be involved in a decision
8 who is the Technical Director
9 Who was that extra person in the meeting.
10 Who will be working these machines after we install our
system
11 who is in charge ?
12 Who else should I be talking to in your organisation

Why
13 do they want to talk/call/agree to see to us ?
14 do they think we will solve their problems
15 why do they want whatever it is we are selling

Where
16 will our system be being used
17 Where are the
- computers we are meant to interface with.
- keys
- passwords !! (North Korea take note)
- are the people who will let us in at night
18 where are the people who normally work here ?

When
19 do you want a system implemented by
20 did you start thinking about this type of solution
21 do you expect to take a decision
22 will this system need to be function
23 when do you need a quotation by

How
24 big is your budget
25 often does this problem occur
26 are decisions about new investments made
27 is the fixed asset register controlled
28 long it takes to make a shipment
29 much does the current process cost you
30 much time do we have

Qualification
• We don’t want to waste our and the
prospect’s time.
• It is important to assess the level of interest
chance of a sales.
• Do they have a budget, and how much is it?

End of meeting “Is” questions
(The end of a meeting can be a good time to fire in a question
when the client is relaxed and their guard is down)
31 there anything else we should have talked about
32 there anything else you want to ask us
33 there anything that is not clear
34 there anything other than price that you do not like about our
offer
35 the status quo acceptable
36 On the phone calling back prospects where we lost “ is our
competitors installation/implementation going well?”
37 everything OK ?

If
‘If’ questions are for pre-closing, assessing our
chances
39 If we make a proposal which solves the problems
you have described, am I correct in understanding
that you will place an order? (‘no’ or ‘maybe; is
useful information, stops us wasting time on our
proposal.
40 If you order now, we will be able to install in next
week, when shall we come

Remember
• Don’t ask questions and fail to listen to the
answer
• to repeat back what you think the client has
said for confirmation.
• To ask for the order

Summary
• We are doing potential clients a favour. We offer
improvements on the status quo. We are better than just
anyone
• Do your homework, know your product, know the client
organisation, see the world from the client’s point of view
• Ask for help, be creative. “I’m going to be in xxx next
Wednesday, could I drop in ?”
• Know you are competing against
• Remember the taxi meter - doing nothing also costs

More info
• Richard Lucas blogs at www.richardlucas.com,
is on Linkedin , runs the TED and TEDx Fans in
Poland, the Wojtek the Soldier Bear group,
and the TED and TEDx Fans Tavel and meetup
club on Facebook, hosts Open Coffee Kraków
and co-founded Wintrepreneurs and is on
Soundcloud and will soon be podcasting.
I played with TED-ED here

40 great business to business sales questions

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40 great business to business sales questions