5 Most Powerful Sales Questions To Ask Without Sounding Salesy

- Now one of the most common misconceptions when it comes to sales is that to be a good salesperson you have to be the best talker. And this was especially true back when I was in college looking for different jobs or trying to figure out which job I should do. A lot of people said, hey, Patrick, you're good at talking, you should be in sales.

And although that is kind of true to a certain extent, after I got into the weeds and actually start selling and working at different companies, I've realized that the best sellers are not necessarily the best talkers, but, in fact, the best listeners. Because the truth is nobody wants to hear a sales person talk about how great they are or how great their product or service is, right? It's just not relevant to the person, and it's kind of annoying in some cases.

So what we're gonna do is we're gonna flip the script. And in this video we're gonna show you how to become a better listener by learning my five most powerful sales questions to ultimately listen, build empathy, and close more deals. Now, like I was just saying, the best salespeople are going to be the best listeners and to listen, you have to allow the prospect room to talk.

And how you do that is you wanna ask powerful, intriguing questions. Now these aren't just any regular questions that you just kinda throw out there. These are gonna be questions that guide the prospect throughout the entire sales process so that you can understand their pains, build empathy and basically solve their problems.

And the best thing about using these questions is that they're very subtle, they're very conversational and you're not going to sound salesy when you actually ask them. So by the end of this video, not only are you gonna learn my five most powerful questions to guide a sales process, but it's also gonna show you how to become a better listener, it's gonna show you how to build more empathy and rapport with your prospects, and ultimately it's gonna help you close more deals. And before we go ahead and get started, make sure you give this video a Like if you are excited to learn my five most powerful sales questions.

And if you haven't already, make sure you subscribe to the channel, because I'm gonna be releasing new sales training videos every single week. And if you want notifications, hit that notification bell. All right, so with that said, let's go ahead and move into question number one.

Okay, so when you are in any type of sales scenario, right? Where you're gonna meet with the prospect, either in person or talk to them over the phone, and the thing about this is that sometimes you start off with some small talk, you say, hey John, how's it going? And John says, oh, I'm doing well blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, right?

And you talk about the weather or whatever the case is. Now, where things can become a little awkward is that sometimes you wanna go ahead and start the meeting, but you're afraid to get it started, or you don't wanna sound too pushy as a salesperson. So what do you do to actually start a sales meeting in a nice, conversational way?

And to solve this, this is where question number one comes into play. So when you're sitting down face-to-face or when you're talking on the phone with the prospect, if you wanna start the meeting, this is all you have to say, hey, John, I wanna be respectful of your time. So do you mind if we go ahead and get started?

And John, or whoever you're talking to, is obviously gonna say, sure, let's go ahead and get started. It's simple as that. And why this question is going to be incredibly powerful, even though it seems so simple, is that you basically control the frame of the entire conversation.

And it's basically going the way you want. You wanna talk about exactly what you wanna talk about in the meeting. And this is a way to get the other person to agree to the direction that you wanna take them.

And best of all, you're getting down to business without sounding salesy, or push product down someone's throat. Not only that, but you're also building a micro commitment, right? You're asking a question, the prospect answers, sure, why not?

Let's go ahead and get started. And then you move on to more and more questions. And the more the prospect is able and willing to answer your questions, the more depth you can have as the conversation continues.

So let's go ahead and get into question number two. So once you get the meeting started and you say, hey, John, I wanna be respectful of your time, so do you mind if we go ahead and get started? John will say, sure, let's go ahead and get started.

Then what you wanna do is you want to ask another question to figure out exactly why they agreed to the meeting that you have right there in that moment. A simple thing you can say is, hey, John, I'm just curious, what got you interested in taking our call today? Whether it's a call or a meeting, you wanna just change the words depending on, but, same thing.

What got you interested in taking our call today? Now this is gonna be an extremely powerful question because not only is it an open ended question where the other person can basically say anything, but you basically get down to the reason for why someone even is investing their time to speak with you. And the reason why you wanna do this is because you're trying to identify a problem that the prospect, the person you're trying to sell to, has and align your solution to those problems so that when it's time to actually sell, it's very clear that whatever you're selling is something the prospect actually needs.

If you don't know why the prospect is in that meeting with you or is speaking with you, then it's very difficult to sell them anything because people don't like to be sold, but they love to buy. And if you don't understand why they wanna buy then you're not gonna sell. And the main thing you're really looking for when you ask the question, what got you interested in this call today, is you're really looking for a pain point.

You're looking for one major pain point that really sticks out for the prospect. And if you're able to solve that pain point, they're gonna buy your products and services. So when I ask, hey, John, what got you interested in taking the call today?

John might say, oh, you know, we wanted to do Facebook ads. We tried to ourselves, but we just lost a lot of money doing it. And we just don't know what to do.

So I just wanted to pick your brain and learn a little bit about you do. Sometimes it's literally as easy as that, where people have a clear problem and they just tell you up front and they don't wanna waste any time. And even if they don't, if they give you a little hint of problem, like, oh, you know, we tried Facebook ads, but it didn't work, for example, if you're selling Facebook ad services.

Then what you wanna do there is you wanna take that hint of pain, whether it's strong or not strong. It doesn't matter. But you find that pain and you wanna dive deeper into that pain.

And so asking question number two, which is what got you interested in taking this call today, basically scratches the surface level. Once you get that hint, then you dive deep. So once the prospect does give you some pains, all you have to do is ask more questions, like, oh, that's pretty interesting, John, can you tell me a little bit more about that?

Another question you can ask is, oh, that's interesting, John, how long has this been a problem? Basic surface level questions that you can use to dive deep into the prospect's pain. And once the prospect feels like you're actually listening, right, the key is to listen, is that they're just gonna to keep talking about their problems all day long.

And you're gonna write these things down and you're gonna get ready to sell and solve their problems. All right, so moving forward, we're gonna go into question number three. Now during the entire sales process, you're asking questions, you're understanding the prospect's problem, but this is a point that you absolutely need to clarify if you wanna sell your prospects and services to somebody.

So you just have to think of it like this. You have point A and point B, okay. Point A is someone's current situation, where they are currently at.

Point B is their desired situation where they wanna go. So if you're selling coaching services for helping people lose weight. Someone might be overweight.

That's their current situation. And the desire situation is they want to lose weight and be healthy. And all you're really doing is saying, hey, where are you currently at right now?

And where do you wanna go? Overweight, not overweight. Making a little bit of money, making a lot of money.

Depending on your products or services, all you're doing is getting them from point A to point B. So a question that you can use to start this conversation during that sales meeting is this. Hey, John, can you give me a sense of where you're currently at and where you're trying to go?

I mean obviously there's gonna be more context to it when you're in that sales meeting, but that's essentially it. Where are you currently at and where you wanna go? And no matter what you're selling, no matter what industry you're in, there's always this motion.

People are currently at a certain spot in their life, whether it's their health, their business, their finances, their relationships. And they always want to improve it in some way. And if your product or service can help them get to point A to point B, then it's gonna be so much easier to buy you whatever it is that you have.

Because the value is clear. If they buy what you are selling, they will get from point A to point B. And it's very clear exactly how you would do that.

And you're essentially just a vehicle to get them there. And the key is you really just wanna clarify the differences between point A and point B and make sure that both you and the customer understand that there is a separation between these two situations. And during the sales meeting later, towards the end, once you show them that you can actually help them get to their desired situation, it's gonna be so obvious for them to buy your products and services, because it's just clear, right?

You can help them get what they want. And if you are charging something that's fair for the value you are providing, then it's gonna be an easy sell if you can clearly define point A and point B and show them how you can help them cross that bridge. Now moving forward, we're gonna go into question number four.

Okay, so like I said before, you have this point A, point B, current situation, desired situation. But it's not enough just to show them that you can get them across the bridge. Not only that, but you have to identify anything that's already stopping them from doing it on their own.

Because if your product or service helps them get from point A to point B, but they think in their heads, why should I pay this person when I could do it myself, they're not gonna to buy whatever it is that you're selling. So the goal is you wanna make the prospect feel like they cannot get to their desired situation without your help. And all you have to do is ask what's stopping you from reaching your goals on your own?

What's stopping you from reaching your goals on your own? All we're doing is we're taking point A to point B and we're widening the distance as far as possible. We're making the prospect feel like they can't get to their desired situation on their own.

And on top of that, we're stacking in these challenges and trying to understand why the prospect cannot do it on their own. Not only we're widening the distance, but we're also putting these blockers which the prospect is already experiencing and making them aware that it's so difficult to do on their own that they need some kind of help. So once a prospect feels like, aw, man, I wanna reach my goals, but I can't do it because X, Y, Z and they start making all these excuses to why they can't do it on their own.

Now we're getting ready to actually show them how we can help them get to where they wanna go. And this actually leads us into question number five. So if you wanna start pitching your product or service, what you wanna do is you wanna first ask permission to actually sell.

Once you ask permission, people are more likely to listen to whatever it is that you say. So all you have to do is ask a simple question. What were you hoping I could do to help?

Now it seems like a very simple question. And you're right. It is a very simple question, but it's a very powerful one.

What were you hoping I could do to help? Now at this point, because the prospect has a very clear idea of where they are currently at and they have an idea of where they wanna go, but they know that it's difficult to get to their desired situation without some kind of help because they failed to do it in the past. Now what's naturally going to happen is the prospect is now going to ask you for help.

And they're gonna say, well, what can you do to help me get to where I wanna go? And once they ask that question then you have earned the permission to actually pitch your product or service. And once you do your pitch, then they're gonna be a lot more likely to listen to that pitch and seriously consider whether or not they should buy your products or services.

And so instead of you hard selling or pitching, the prospect is literally asking you for help and you completely reverse the situation. And this is really only possible because you asked so many questions throughout this sales process. You framed and controlled the entire situation until you got to this point where you asked the question, what were you hoping I could do to help you?

And at this point, once the prospect does ask that question, you go in for your pitch. And I actually have a whole separate video on exactly how you can pitch your product or service. So go ahead and check out the link in the description, or it could be somewhere on the screen.

But to summarize it for this video, those are essentially my five top questions when it comes to learning how to listen to your customer, understand what they want, and basically prep them to the moment where you can actually pitch your product or service. And that's really it, guys. All you have to do is ask these five powerful questions throughout your sales meeting.

It's gonna help you dramatically increase your conversions and it's gonna help you become a better listener so that you can become a better closer. Now if you enjoyed this video, and you can see how you can apply it to your everyday life and your everyday sale, go ahead and give this video a Like because every like does help this video reach new audiences. And if you wanna see new sales training videos every single week, go ahead and hit that Subscribe and notification bell.

And in the comment section, go ahead and leave your number one sales challenge because I'm always curious to know what kind of challenges you guys are facing in sales, so that I can make some new videos in the future using your feedback. So with that said, thank you for watching. And I'm gonna see you guys in the next video.