A big part of any sales cycle is doing our research, and often this means conducting research meetings, or interviews. Asking the right questions is critical to our success in this activity.

There are certain questions we ask in a sales context that truly work for us. These are the kinds of questions that can get a contact or a coach to say, "I have to think about that. No one's ever asked me that before." A great type of question that many of us use to get to this point is the "Dream Question". This is a type of question that gets people to drop their assumptions as they answer us.

Too often, a well-intentioned contact will answer our question in context with reality. We may not want that. For example, you ask the contact, "How might you resolve this issue?" They say, "We'll just have to make due until 2005." Why 2005? What issue got in the way for the contact, and what opportunities might we have if they answered it differently? Maybe, in this case, it was because they didn't have any available budget to address the issue until then.

What if instead we ask, "If budget or resources weren't an issue, how would you resolve this issue?" That might open the contact's mind to dreaming or speculating or wondering. They might respond, "Well, if budget weren't an issue, we would implement a solution [service/technology/system/consulting...] immediately. That would be so great! That would solve the problem and make our lives so much easier."

As value-oriented companies, this is just what we need to hear. Perhaps we have financing available that can ease their burden. Perhaps we can use this information to help us get to the decision maker (who has resources). Perhaps, by assuring the contact that there may be a number of ways we could help, we might develop a coach who could assist us in gaining access to the decision maker. There are a lot of ways we can leverage this information. We just have to get it in the first place. That's where the "dream question" comes in. It just may be a great tool for us to use to help make research meetings more valuable.