Never Ask A Question That Forces A Lie

As a salesperson, it’s your job to create an environment to get the truth from your prospect. More times than we’d like to admit, our prospect lies to us or withholds valuable information. They do this to maintain the upper hand and out of fear of looking bad or making a mistake. Creating an environment to ensure you get the truth from your prospect is a key component to an effective and efficient sales qualification process.

When you ask a question like, “Are you the decisionmaker?” or any version of this, you’re most likely going to get a “yes.” This is at best only partially true and often a lie, so don’t set them up that way. A line of questioning better designed to get a more complete picture of the opportunity and what steps you need to take in your sales process would be…

“Can you give me a sense of who else cares about this?”

“Who else has a stake in this?”

“Can you share a bit more about who else is going to weigh in on this decision?”

Do not ask questions that can be answered with a yes or no. They are closed-ended and not helpful. Even in your prospecting outreach, a question like “Do you have time to talk this Friday?” is much more likely to get a no even if they’re available. When people are boxed in, they tend to react with resistance and half-truths.

Be more thoughtful about your approach to asking questions and take responsibility for any ways that your questions and how you frame them are getting you lied to. The more skillful you are at asking open-ended, spacious questions (and then shutting up and listening to the answers!) the more information you’ll have to inform your qualification process.

Stay curious and vigilant about getting to the truth of what’s going on with your prospect and how you might be able to help them. Be a consultant with high intent to be helpful and try to forget (at least for a moment) about your agenda to close the deal. That agenda is often what causes you to ask closed, leading questions. Remember—never ask a question that forces a lie.

Onward.

Tom

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