Why “Tell Them Something They Don’t Know” Is Bad Advice in B2B Sales

At meetings with an SVP-level buyer or higher, the data indicate a strong negative correlation between asking discovery questions and closing deals. Once you’ve asked a few questions, every additional question with a busy senior buyer decreases the odds of success. On average, successful meetings here involved about 4 questions while unsuccessful meetings averaged 8. For meetings at lower levels, however, successful sales calls averaged 11 to 14 questions. When developing your strategy, keep in mind that lower-level managers are gatekeepers; their job is to vet vendors and their products. Senior-level managers, on the other hand, focus on business issues, which makes them more receptive to insights.

Read more @ HBR.