When Success and Engagement Depend on Excellent Outcomes
Understand the dynamics and approach to ensuring successful engagement when the stakes are high and you require excellent and collaborative outcomes
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Presales professionals need to listen more than question their customers
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Situation
To build lasting customer relationships, we must actively listen and ensure customers feel both heard and understood.
As presales professionals we have all encountered sales conversations where questions feel more like an interrogation than a dialogue. Perhaps you have seen or been that sales engineer who rapid-fires technical questions without absorbing the customer's actual pain points. Or maybe a teammate keeps interrupting a client's explanation with their own solution assumptions.
We know that is not the best way to build relationships and understand our customers' pain points - so what can we do differently?
Turning Point
The turning point is recognizing the need to slow down enough to ask questions that help customers articulate their challenges—questions that say, "I want to properly understand your business needs."
True listening—attentive, solution-focused, customer-centric listening—requires more than technical curiosity.
It requires genuine presence.
When we listen with intention in presales, our questions become invitations:
- For honest problem-sharing discussions
- For vulnerability about technical challenges we may not understand of have a solution for
- For collaborative solution-building
- For long-term partnerships
This kind of intentional listening transforms the presales process across all key touchpoints:
- In discovery calls, it uncovers the real technical requirements and business drivers
- In demos, it helps tailor solutions to specific needs and use cases
- In technical design sessions, it reveals architectural constraints and preferences
- In proof of concept planning, it surfaces critical success criteria
- In solution workshops, it facilitates better stakeholder alignment
- In team collaborations, it aligns sales and technical perspectives
- In customer success handoffs, it ensures smooth knowledge transfer
Practice
Wherever we engage with customers or colleagues, this type of listening is one of the most powerful ways to demonstrate genuine partnership.
Asking questions in your technical sales role is just the beginning — listening is where true solution alignment starts.
So, the next time you're in a customer meeting—pause. Create space for the customer's complete response. Stay present with their explanation. Remain curious, but don't let your questions overshadow truly understanding your customer..
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