How to run a Discovery Call?

How to prepare for the meeting?

• Don’t just jump into the call, do your research!

Also, remember to send a “nice to meet you email” and ask 1 or 2 discovery questions, and this gets the conversation started and helps drive engagement and attendance rates.

• Make sure they’ve accepted the meeting invite.

If you’re not sure, send an email or call to ask them to confirm. If there’s no response, ask if there’s a better time. 

Remember, they also have full days and probably receive emails and calls from other prospectors. So try to stand out from the crowd by personalizing your outreach, showing interest in their pain points, and sharing content related to their situation.

• Maintain contact.

Add them on LinkedIn. It’s one more touchpoint and another chance for them to find something that will help them connect with you.

Also, send a reminder email the day before. Something like “Looking forward to meeting with you tomorrow to discuss X.”

And send a gentle reminder if a prospect is more than 5 minutes late to the meeting.

• What to do after the meeting?

Post-call, send a call summary of their top 3 pains, how you can help, and the next steps immediately after the call. Don’t wait until the end of the day, or it’s less likely to happen. 

How to run a great discovery call?

Recap previous actions. Sometimes calls get pushed out for weeks, and people can forget why they agreed to a call. 

A quick 30-second summary of why you think they took the meeting and how you can help will set everyone’s expectations for the calls.

Restate what you learned from their call if this is a second or third call, especially if someone else ran the first call.

People hate saying things a second time because the company they’re talking to isn’t great at sharing call notes. 

• Understand the desired outcome for the call (on both sides):

1. Are you trying to book a meeting, get a commitment for a deal, etc.?
2. Map out the pieces of information you want to learn.
3. Map out the objections that you’re likely to encounter.
4. Set the agenda at the top of the call and let the prospect know your goals. 
5. Ask them if they have anything they’d like to add to the agenda or any questions they’d like answered. 

• Play catch and release.

They’ll ask you to tell them what you do or how it works, but you must resist the temptation. 

Instead, throw it back at them by acknowledging their question and then asking permission to ask them a few questions so you can calibrate the conversation to their context. 

Try to guide the conversation with questions. Don’t necessarily script but have a game plan. And don’t forget to ask open-ended questions. 

• Go in for the close!

Always talk timing. It’s great to have goals, but they’re meaningless unless you understand the context behind their timing.  

It’s not good enough to know what their timing is. You need to understand why. 

And when you feel like you’ve learned what you need to for this call, you need to deliver a summary and see if you missed anything.

• Make a recommendation.

Make your recommendation for the next step based on what your previous customers have found helpful and confirm. 

And to help you confirm their attendance get the next step booked live on the call. Have them open their calendar and send them a meeting invite.

Don’t let those deals fade out in between the noise. You’ve been through this process before, and the more advice you can give them about how the process will go, the more they’ll think of you as in control.

Let me know if you found this information helpful, and don’t hesitate to reach out if you want to share your tips and tricks to nail discovery calls. I love learning from all of you. :)