Information Gathering: Open-Ended Questions

Everyone says, “ask open-end questions in sales.” But how are you supposed to know the right question to ask that sparks conversation?

Just focus on starting the sentence with who, what, where, when, why, and how. That will position it to finish in an open-ended way.

Sample open ended questions to ask:

• What is going on in your business these days?

• What are you up to this weekend? / How was your weekend?

• How did you get involved in the business?

• What prompted you to look into this today?

• If you were able to wave a magic wand, what would you like to see done differently?

• Is there anyone else involved in this decision?

  • If so, how do you think they will evaluate this program?

• Why isn’t this particular process / service working for you now?

• Many of our customers are reporting problems with A, B or C. How are these areas affecting you? What do you think of them?

• If you could overcome these challenges, what would happen to your company’s financial situation?

• If you were to make this happen, what would it mean to you personally?

• How would implementing these changes affect your competitiveness in the market?

• If you can’t solve this issue, what kind of difficulties does this mean for you moving forward?

• You mentioned you’re not having a good experience with your current provider, what are you hoping will be different with us?

• What do you like/dislike about your current process?

• What is your biggest headache with your business?

• How do you see this happening?

• How does that process work now?

• What is your timeline for implementing/ purchasing this type of service/ product?

• What other data points should we know before moving forward?

• What budget has been established for this?

• What are your thoughts?

• What concerns do you have?

• How do you measure that?