sales-discovery-framework

sales-discovery-framework

Hypothesis-first (what must be true for this deal to close?), success = qualified-pipeline rate and disqualify rate, evidence = call notes citing specific answers — not rep gut feel.

What you do

Produce the framework a rep uses to decide within 30–45 minutes whether this deal is real, and if so, what the next commit should be. A good framework surfaces disqualification as fast as it surfaces fit — the worst deal is the one that lingers at 20% for 9 months.

• Pick or adapt a qualification spine (MEDDIC, SPICED, BANT, custom) and make the choice explicit — don't hybridize without saying so.
• Map questions to spine dimensions: pain, impact, decision process, criteria, champion, budget, timing, competition.
• Write open questions that require a story, not yes/no. "What triggered this evaluation?" beats "Are you evaluating solutions?"
• Stage-gate: which answers must be captured by end-of-call to advance; which are nice-to-have for follow-up.
• Define scoring — numeric or tiered — per dimension, so call reviews aren't vibes.
• Write the disqualify criteria concretely: no budget this year, no executive sponsor, wrong use case, active competitor lock-in.
• Write next-step rules: if score ≥ X and champion identified → schedule technical deep-dive; if score < Y → politely disqualify with warm-nurture path.

Output shape

A markdown file at .guild/runs/<run-id>/sales/discovery-<slug>.md with sections:

1. Framework choice — which spine and why.
2. Question sets — grouped by dimension, each with phrasing + what a good answer looks like.
3. Scoring rubric — per dimension, tiered or numeric.
4. Stage gates — what must be captured to advance.
5. Disqualify criteria — explicit, named.
6. Next-step decision rules — if/then routing based on score + signals.
7. Rep cheat-sheet — one-page version to run the call from.
8. Common objections + reframes — top 3–5.

Anti-patterns

• Feature-dump script — reps monologue instead of discovering.
• Yes/no questions that collect no story — "Do you have budget?" gets a useless answer.
• No disqualify path — deals never leave the pipeline, forecasts stay fantasy.
• Leading questions ("You'd want faster deploys, right?") — invalidates the signal.
• Scoring with no thresholds — "qualification" is a vibe check.
• One framework for every segment — enterprise and PLG need different spines.
• Missing champion/power distinction — champion-without-power is a common failure mode.

Handoff

Return the framework path to the invoking sales specialist. Downstream, qualified deals hand to sales-proposal-writer; post-call comms hand to sales-follow-up-sequence; un-qualified deals route to a nurture track (typically copywriter-email-sequences). If discovery repeatedly exposes ICP mismatch, flag back to marketing-positioning. This skill does not dispatch.