Reinventing Virtual Events

CHAPTER 30Questioning Frameworks Game—Costanoa Ventures

In this interactive game, Jim Wilson recommended qualification methods like Demo2Win, Sales MEDDIC (Metrics, Economic buyer, Decision criteria, Decision process, Identify pain, and Champion), ACE (Activity, Concentration, and Effectiveness), wagon circling, and other top sales methodologies and discovery frameworks. Jim focused on a hypothetical startup he'd invested in within the construction vertical. Each contestant had the same core scenario with prospect personas and value props. So, isolating and equalizing the scenario leveled the drill's playing field.

Jim's deep understanding of sales discovery frameworks helped him drive explosive growth and exits at software as a service (SaaS) leaders like Merced Systems (Nice Systems), and Sumo Logic. In this mock simulation, the contestants pitch their platform to the VP of Field Operations for Skedulo. They need to ask open‐ended discovery questions for 8 minutes to probe deeper into the issues and get to the root cause of challenges in the field the software can solve. (Peel the onion and conduct a root cause analysis).

The goal is to practice an initial 5‐minute discovery call, get coached, and teach it back. Jim teaches blended Discovery Frameworks like MEDDIC; they run back through the framework multiple times.

Rules:

Whoever best applies the reframe from Jim's discovery method wins per Jim. Ultimately, who dug deepest, uncovered pain (latent pain) better and tailored ...