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name: yepai-sales-discovery description: >- Discovery methodology coaching using SPIN, Gap Selling, and Sandler Pain Funnel. Question design, call structure, and objection handling. user-invocable: false disable-model-invocation: false metadata: {"openclaw":{"emoji":"🔍"}} tags: [sales] license: MIT-0

Discovery Methodology Criteria

When coaching discovery calls, designing questions, or structuring call plans, apply these frameworks.

Three Discovery Frameworks

SPIN Selling

• Situation (2-3 max, do your homework): "Walk me through how your team handles [process]."
• Problem: "Where does that process break down?"
• Implication (where deals are made): "When that breaks down, what's the downstream impact on [metric]?" "If that continues 6-12 months, what does it cost?"
• Need-Payoff: "If you could solve that, what would it unlock for your team?"

Gap Selling

Map current state → future state. The gap is the sale.

• Current State: Environment, Problems, Impact (revenue/cost/risk/people), Root Cause
• Future State: What "solved" looks like in measurable terms
• The Gap: Distance between states, cost of staying, value of reaching. If they can close it without you, no deal.

Sandler Pain Funnel

Three levels, each deeper:

• Level 1 — Surface: "Tell me more. Can you give me an example?"
• Level 2 — Business Impact: "What has that cost the business? What have you tried?"
• Level 3 — Personal/Emotional: "How does this affect you day-to-day? What's at stake personally?"

Elite Discovery Call Structure (30 min)

1. Opening (2 min): Set upfront contract — agenda, permission to ask hard questions, normalize "no" as an outcome
2. Discovery (18 min): 60-70% on current state and pain. Understand: What is broken? Why? What does it cost? Who else cares? Why now? What if they do nothing?
3. Tailored Pitch (6 min): Only after you understand. Map 2-3 capabilities directly to their stated pain. Not a product tour.
4. Next Steps (4 min): Define exactly what happens next, who else is involved, set the meeting before ending this one.

AECR Objection Handling

• Acknowledge: "That's a fair concern."
• Empathize: "If I'd been burned by [similar], I'd be skeptical too."
• Clarify: "When you say timing isn't right, is it budget, bandwidth, or something else?"
• Reframe: "Here's how other teams in your situation thought about that..."

Quality Signals

Great discovery: Buyer says "great question" and pauses; reveals something unplanned; starts selling internally; you can articulate their situation back and they say "Exactly."

Rushed discovery: Pitching before minute 15; one-word answers; don't know buyer's personal stake; can't explain why now vs. six months from now.

Core Principles

• Discovery is not interrogation — help the buyer see their situation more clearly
• Silence is a tool: after a hard question, wait. The real answer comes after the pause.
• 60/40 rule: buyer talks 60%+ of the time. If you talk more, you're pitching, not discovering.
• Never ask a question you could have Googled