GAP Selling

Question 1

What is the main reason you lose sales?

Answer 1

You haven’t diagnosed your customers problem and it’s the problem that drives the sale, not your product

If you can’t diagnose a problem, you can’t make a sale

Question 2

What is a way to build credibility in your company with the prospect?

Answer 2

Longevity. People have a bias to favour things that are proven over a long period of time. Don’t bore people with telling them though. Client stories yes, long winded accolades, no.

Question 3

What is the only thing that inches you towards a sale? 3 things

Answer 3

Proving you understand the customers problems and the impact of those problems.

Proving you know their current state and hold the key to getting them to their future state

Proving the change they face is worth the money and time

Question 4

What do prospects care about?

Answer 4

Solution to their problems. They don’t give a shit about you.

Do not tell people. Show them. They will find out about your company online and do research.

They need to be shown solutions to their problems, not told about them.

Question 5

Every time you engage with a customer, what should you ask yourself?

Answer 5

Ask: what am I giving?

And the answer should be: industry insights, market insights, solution to a problem.

Not, more info about myself

Question 6

What is a trusted advisor in sales?

Answer 6

We have the client’s best interests in mind when selling. We aren’t just blindly trying to push them into maximum ARR.

We build long term relationships.

Question 7

What do we sell?

Answer 7

Solutions to specific, root-cause problems.

Not products to generic / superficial problems

Question 8

What is the Gap?

Answer 8

Finding out how bad / painful today is, and how good / happy tomorrow could be.

The bigger the gap, the bigger the urgency to change

Question 9

What’s a weak discovery?

Answer 9

It just looks to find the features a client might like and present them.

This gives your champion a really difficult job to sell internally.

Question 10

What’s a strong discovery?

Answer 10

It uncovers the current state and the real problems. It’s all about problems.

This allows your champion to sell the future state which is easy.

Question 11

What 5 areas of questioning should you structure your discovery around?

Answer 11

FACTS - how they operate

PROBLEM - challenges they experience

IMPACT - how the challenges affect the org

ROOT CAUSE - fundamental issues causing these problems

EMOTION - how these problems make them feel

Question 12

What does MEDDPICC stand for?

Answer 12

Metrics - what’s the impact of UpSlide for the client?

Economic buyer - who has the power to buy UpSlide?

Decision criteria - what criteria are they using?

Decision process - what steps do we need to follow to get UpSlide in?

Paper process - what are the logistics?

Identify pain - what are the issues that UpSlide is solving?

Champion - who is going to promote UpSlide internally?

Competition - who / what am I competing with to get this deal signed?

Question 13

What is a good question to ask someone who is diverting you to their Director / Senior?

Answer 13

‘What is important to them to see in order to justify this spend?’

Question 14

What is SPIN all about?

Answer 14

It’s all about finding the current state. You cannot elicit change without first understanding the current stage.

Question 15

What are the 5 critical elements of your prospects current state?

Answer 15

• the facts of their situation
• their problems
• the impact of those problems
• the root cause of those problems
• the emotional impact of those problems

Question 16

How do you find the facts in the situation part of a discovery?

Answer 16

To find facts, you need to know how they are functioning day to day in fine detail.

E.g. You need to know exactly how they build documents, who is involved, what documents they produce, how many, on what basis, to which clients etc. you need to know it all

Question 17

If you’re not selling a product, what are you selling?

Answer 17

You’re selling a solution to their problems, and a solution to the impact those problems are having on the business

E.g. long turnaround time on project deliverables = problem

Losing deals, losing time to pitch for more deals, losing revenue = impact

Question 18

What is the root cause?

Answer 18

The root cause is the fundamental issue causing the problem.

E.g. problem = inconsistent brand / formatting in slides

Root cause = improper tooling to help automate from the get-go, far too manual process to review

Question 19

What does the future state represent?

Answer 19

It represents pleasure. Current state = pain.

Future state = pleasure.

Question 20

Why is the future state so important?

Answer 20

Because without a future state, the prospect cannot calculate the value of your product.

Humans are creatures of comparison. We need a current and future state to compare how bad it is now and how good it could be in future.

Question 21

What actually helps you close deals? Tip: it isn’t like ability

Answer 21

Expertise. The other person liking you doesn’t matter very much.

What makes someone buy is proving value and solving problems. That’s it.

Like ability just depends on the type of yes or no you get (a nice one or a nasty one)

Question 22

The best salespeople could drop out of their sales team and start a…

Answer 22

Consultancy in the field of sales they work in.

Why? Because they know so much about that industry that they can provide expert value to the prospect

Question 23

The best salespeople could drop out of their sales team and start a…

Answer 23

Consultancy in the field of sales they work in.

Why? Because they know so much about that industry that they can provide expert value to the prospect

Question 24

What is a common trait in salespeople that actually damaged their sales?

Answer 24

The need to be liked. 80% of bottom performers in sales have a desire to be liked by the client. Only 7% of top performers have this trait.

Don’t be liked. Be knowledgable, be a challenger. This will get you deals.

Question 25

How do you start your questioning in a discovery? Give examples.

Answer 25

By asking PROBING questions and finding out the facts.

E.g. tell me a bit about the documents you’re creating

Help me understand the structure of your team

Could you please describe the current process for creating these documents?

Could you walk me through the process of reviewing documents?

Question 26

After asking probing fact finding questions, what’s the second thing you do in the discovery? Give examples.

Answer 26

Discover the problems. You will most likely know the problems based off the facts, so ask leading ‘how’ questions.

E.g. how do you manage to produce all your deliverables on time?

How do you ensure all documents going to clients are perfectly polished?

How do you find the reviewing process?

Question 27

What do you need to banish from your prospects answers?

Answer 27

Open-ended, vague answers.

E.g. ‘we’re not making as much revenue as we’d like’

• push back here: ‘help me understand what that means. What does ‘enough revenue’ mean to you?

Question 28

What’s the third step of the discovery process, after fact finding and hunting problems?

Answer 28

Uncovering the impact of the problems on the business.

Here you need to ask PROVOKING questions.

E.g. what happens when data changes last minute and you need to make updates to the slides in your deck?

Has there even been a time when…?

If your practitioners were able to access this content on demand in PPT, what do you think would happen?

Question 29

What do you need to avoid when asking provoking questions?

Answer 29

Avoid telling them how bad their situation is. Just ask questions and let them work it out for themselves.

Question 30

What are some good root cause questions?

Answer 30

Why do you think this problem is happening?

How do you think your current processes are affecting this?

Question 31

What is a validating question?

Answer 31

It’s a question that makes sure you’re on the same page as your customer

‘Sounds like XYZ is your biggest challenge. Is that right?’

‘Is it fair to say…?’

Question 32

What MUST you ensure you continue asking about during the discovery?

Answer 32

Future state. Find the future state.

This can come at the end of the discovery but ask questions like:

‘How would you like to be producing documents?’

‘How much time do you wish your deliverables took to be perfect?’

‘How many more pitches do you want to complete?’

Question 33

What’s the CRM challenge?

Answer 33

Get someone to go into your pipeline and pick a deal at random. You pass the CRM challenge if you can go through all MEDDPICC criteria without looking. It should be very specific to that prospect

Question 34

Why do you need quantifiable numbers?

Answer 34

It helps find the gap.

If you can get a figure about how long they’re spending on deliverables or how many deals they’re missing out on, you can then build the gap.

E.g., the customer wants 5 pitches a month, they’re at 2. The gap is 3 extra pitches.

Question 35

How many features, MAXIMUM, should you show on a demo?

Answer 35

Never more than 6

Question 36

What type of questions should you not be asking in a demo?

Answer 36

Never ask questions beginning with if, because it suggests you don’t know. You should know it all by now as you’ve done the discovery.

e.g., if you ever struggle with linking then…

Question 37

2 questions you should be asking mid-demo?

Answer 37

Can you see how this will improve your [pain]?

Do you see how this will fix your [pain]?

Question 38

Powerful 4 words to use when you need to push back on a prospect?

e.g., when the decision criteria don’t align with the future state

Answer 38

I’m confused. You said…

Question 39

What 2 questions to ask about decision criteria?

Answer 39

How are you going to decide what’s the best solution for you?

What will be the most important factors in helping you make your decision?

Question 40

How does the effort of you and the prospect change over time?

Answer 40

You should put more effort into a deal as time goes on

BUT CRUCIALLY - so should your prospect. If they aren’t putting in more effort, it’s a red flag

e.g., helping write business cases, prepping you for a meeting with decision makers etc.

Question 41

What do you do when your prospect goes dark?

Answer 41

Don’t panic, firstly; sending a load of emails + calls will just scare them off.

Instead, be DIRECT

Say, ‘I’m confused. You said:
- restating of current state
- reminder that avoiding you is keeping them from future state

e.g., I’m confused. You said you were tired of your deliverables taking too long to be produced, and you agreed that UpSlide would improve your project turnaround speed and get you to pitch for more business. So I’m surprised I haven’t heard from you. Has something changed? Were you able to solve your problem?

Question 42

How do you handle objections in gap selling, after you’ve done the disco/demo?

Answer 42

Don’t just ask clarifying questions back. Use the magic 4 words.

‘I’m confused. You said… Can you help me understand?’

Question 43

What are prospects buying from you?

Answer 43

Solutions to their problems.

Question 44

What is it crucial you do once you have the current state and future state?

Answer 44

You MUST calculate (using actual numbers), the gap. So you MUST get numbers.

Currently producing 10 pitches a month but want 20? The gap is 10 pitches.

Currently at 10% growth but need to hit 20% next year? The gap is 10 growth.

Question 45

When you can quantify the gap using numbers, what are you selling?

Answer 45

You’re selling a numerical value solution to their problem.

You’re selling £10mn growth, or 10 extra pitches. What would they pay for that?

Question 46

If a prospect gives you a number on revenue targets (for example) to help you find the gap, what should you do?

Answer 46

You should dig even further.

If they say they need to hit £10mn next year, ask why? Why £10mn?

They probably need to hit that to keep shareholders happy or to go public. Whatever the reason, FIND IT

Question 47

How can you deal with customers who say: ‘I don’t want to answer any more question, I just want to see the product’?

Answer 47

You should say that doing a demo would be completely pointless without understanding their business more. You need to know their current state to know which parts of the product to show.

Question 48

If you’re feeling fearful over a deal closing, why is that?

Answer 48

It’s because you haven’t found the gap

It’s because you don’t have the information needed to influence buyers

It’s because you aren’t gap selling

Question 49

How does the balance of power (and hence the responsibilities) shift throughout a sales cycle?

Answer 49

At first you have no power and need to earn it through gap selling and being a trusted advisor

But as the relationship builds, you will get level with the prospect. At this point, you shouldn’t just bend over for anything they want.

When it’s an equal partnership, there needs to be equal give and take.

Question 50

How do you deal with objections in gap selling?

Answer 50

Four magic words (as always):

‘I’m confused. You said…’ and then link back to the pains you identified and the dream state they want to achieve

E.g. if they say they want to go with someone cheaper, just ask ‘

Question 51

How do you deal with someone who says your product is too expensive?

Answer 51

Always go back to the discovery and always say the magic four words. If you’ve done the discovery properly, price shouldn’t be an issue.

‘I’m confused. You said slow deal velocity was a key reason you aren’t hitting your 20% growth targets. You agreed UpSlide can speed up your cut deal time in half and help you grow by 20%. Given this, help me understand why you find this too expensive?’

Question 52

How should you tweak outbound first meetings? What advantage does this bring?

Answer 52

Make sure you frame the conversation before you dive in.

E.g., ‘As a brief intro, UpSlide is the go-to finance industry plug in across Word, PPT, Excel + Power BI. We work with the likes of [XYZ competitors] to help them solve ABC challenges. So with that as the context, and bearing in mind I reached out to you, what made you take the call?’

This means they don’t talk off topic + keeps it relevant

Question 53

If someone keeps giving you an answer like ‘we want to do things more efficiently’, how can you respond to get them to open up?

Answer 53

Give examples of other similar clients you have worked with and why UpSlide was important to them initially:

E.g., for HSBC ‘efficiency’ meant juniors being happy and preventing burnout

for Singer Capital Markets ‘efficiency’ meant managing brand reputation and brand identity

for Greenhill, ‘efficiency’ meant increasing deal velocity and getting to market faster

so what does efficiency mean for you?

Question 54

What question should you ask before you finish discovery to make sure you are driving urgency on the buyers’ side?

Answer 54

“This might be a silly last question but X seems like a really huge priority.

Fast forward 90 days, are we okay if that problem is still there? Or are we committed to solving this as soon as possible?”

If they are committed now, great.

If not, find out “what trumps X as an even bigger priority today?”

Question 55

What is the correlation between your urgency and the prospects’ urgency?

Answer 55

Prospects will match your urgency.

If you’re quick to send follow ups, quick to ask questions + quick to call when they go quiet then they will bring speed to the process.