Get them to tell you how to close them.

Hey {{first_name|team}},

I get calls all the time from sales leaders who are frustrated because their salespeople aren’t closing deals.

“We need to get better at asking for the sale.”

And that’s where they’re wrong.

Yes, you have to ask for the business. But if you want to become a better closer, the training and skill development rarely belong at the closing table. They belong at the value positioning stage.

That’s what discovery is for.

Most salespeople are pitching product instead of showing up as a trusted advisor. A true consultant. They’re explaining what they sell before they’ve asked the questions that tell them what the customer actually needs.

Then they’re mystified when the whole conversation boils down to price.

It is NEVER ONLY ABOUT PRICE.

Yes, cost is a consideration. But there is always something else more important. What does he need to accomplish? What can’t he afford to have go wrong? What would make paying more worth it to him?

Your job is to be a detective and figure that out. Capito?

Your customer knows what he values in a vendor and what he needs to see before he makes a change. Stop pitching long enough to find out.

Get him to tell you how to close him. Then position your value around what he told you matters.

Last week we handled objections. This week, let’s work on the discovery that gives your recommendation a reason to matter.

Quick reminder on what discovery is actually for. People make a change for three reasons and only three: pain, fear, and opportunity. Opportunity is the fun one to talk about, which is why newer reps camp out there, but it's the one he's least likely to spend money on. Fear is stronger. It's why we buy insurance and why deadlines and discounts work. Pain is the strongest of all, and it's the one that builds a partnership fastest. So you're not hunting for a problem you can solve. You're hunting for the thing that hurts him today.

People put more weight on a conclusion they reach themselves than a pitch you hand them. So discovery isn't where you tell him things. Don't ever tell him something you can ask him. Your job is to help him say it out loud.

Here's the question I open almost every sales conversation with:

Every piece of that question has a job. "I've been talking to a fair number of folks" tells him you're out there in the coffee shop hearing what everybody's dealing with, and that buys you a little authority. "Every one of them seems to have a couple three things" tells him it's normal to have problems, so he doesn't have to pretend he doesn't. And "what are those for you?" brings it right back to him with a question small enough to answer.

You asked for two or three. He'll usually give you one, maybe two. Don't pounce on it. First - say, "Thanks for sharing that. What else?" Then ask it again, and again, until it's just about to get a little weird or you run out of time. What else? What else? What else? Keep taking notes.

The surface answers come first because they're easy to say. Sometimes the thing that matters most is the one he almost leaves off the list. "What else?" gives him room to get there.

I learned how much this matters when I was about 28, sitting outside the office of the president of Murphy-Brown, one of the biggest names in pork, with sweaty palms after a four-hour drive. About five minutes into the meeting I realized he thought I was somebody else entirely. He wasn't expecting to talk about training at all, and I was pretty sure I was about to get shown the door. So I asked him the two-or-three question. He was polite enough to answer, and I kept asking what else. The inevitable dismissal turned into a robust 45-minute convo, then a proposal, then the biggest sale I'd made up to that point in my career.

My friend, the psychology of this question works. When you follow true process in sales, it works. And it will get you repeatable, dependable results - so you are not always guessing.

Once the what-elses run dry, don't start pitching. Go back to the bottom of the list, where the stuff he almost didn't say is sitting, and pick the one that sounds like it cost him something. "You mentioned that one field last year. Tell me more about that." Or the calves that didn't wean like they should have, or the closeouts, or the product trial that didn't pan out. Tell me more. What happened there? Why do you think it happened?

Then ask the question that turns a story into a number: "How much did that cost you?" Or, if it hasn't happened yet, "What would that cost you if it happens again?" Now you can both see the gap between where he is and where he could be, and the gap is where your value lives. That's not being a jerk. That's helping him make a better decision for his operation, and sometimes that better decision is doing business with you.

Somewhere in all that telling you more, he's going to hand you a feeling word. That's your cue to switch plays.

The Echo. It shows up the second a customer hands you a feeling word without meaning to. "Stretched." "Frustrated." "Honestly, I'm just tired of it." Most of us hear that and immediately start solving. We've got the product, we've got the program, we've got the story about the guy two counties over who had the same deal.

Don't. Take the one emotional word he used, hand it right back to him as a question, and then say absolutely nothing.

Here's why it works. You are not asking him to explain himself to you. You are asking him to explain it to himself, and he will, because silence after a real question is uncomfortable for the guy who hasn't said the true thing yet.

His first answer might be the one he has said forty times this month because it’s easy to give. Give him room to get past it. The next answer may tell you something you can actually work with. And the only thing standing between you and that answer is your own mouth.

The rep who fills that silence with "yeah, everybody's stretched right now" just paid for it. He'll get the bill in November when he hears "let me think about it" and has no idea why.

Two ways to blow this one, so let me save you the trouble.

Don't run it in the first five minutes. Before any trust exists it reads like you're taking notes for HR. Let him tell you how things run today, let him get comfortable, and when the feeling word slips out, that's your cue. Miss it? Hold onto the word and bring it back later. "You said stretched earlier. Tell me more about that."

Don't upgrade his word. He says "swamped," you say "swamped." Not "overwhelmed," not "underwater," not whatever sounds smarter. The second you improve his word it becomes your word, and he'll answer your word instead of telling you the truth about his.

Four seconds. That's the whole ask. Four seconds feels like a year when you're the one not talking, and it's the highest paid four seconds in this business.

The opener only changes in one spot from barn to barn: the thing they want to do better. "Get the most out of this crop." "Put more pounds on these calves." "Tighten up the closeouts." "Get more out of that trial he ran." The Echo is identical everywhere. All that changes is the word he hands you, and you should know what you're listening for.

Before you wrap up, find out how he decides who earns his business.

“Hey Dell, when it comes to the vendors that have served you best, what do you like the most? The least?”

“When it comes to making your decision on which inputs to go with, other than cost, what are the most important factors?”

Don’t help him answer. You want his list, not yours. If he says service, ask, “What does good service look like to you?”

Then use what he tells you. If relationship is on his list, bring it home:

“You say relationship is important to you. How do you prefer I go about staying in touch, following up, and serving you as a vendor?”

Let him spell it out. How often? Phone call or text? Stop by, or make an appointment? What deserves a heads-up, and what just wastes his time?

He’s telling you how to earn the business and how to keep it. Write it down. Build your recommendation around what he told you matters. Then follow through the way he asked you to.

Monday's close, October 12: December corn finished at $4.83/bu, up 3¼¢. November soybeans were $12.87¾/bu, down 4¼¢, and December Chicago wheat was $6.72¼/bu, up 1¼¢. On the livestock side, November feeder cattle finished at $341.10/cwt, down 85¢; December lean hogs were $68.37/cwt, up 55¢. November Class III milk closed at $16.07/cwt, down 3¢. These are futures, not the bid at his elevator or sale barn. Source: Brownfield Ag News, October 12 closing report.

What it means Tuesday: fall is the debrief season in every lane, and it is the easiest discovery door you get all year. "How'd it come out compared to what you thought?" works on a yield monitor, on weaning weights, on a set of closeouts, or on a product trial he ran last spring. Real question, real answer, and it gets you a whole lot further than a price does. Ask it, then run the Echo on whatever he grumbles about. He will hand you a feeling word inside of two minutes. They always do.

This week the tape is mine, and I come off looking like a rookie.

I sent a proposal to two leaders at a co-op, built around 14 people going through our program. I was proud of it. Nice piece of work. The reply came back fast: "I believe this was a mistake on headcount. We are planning on sending 7 folks, not 14."

Here's what I'd done. One of them had mentioned the people on his team. I took that number, added it to the total of 7 they'd given me, and decided in my own head that each of them was sending 7. Nobody ever said that. I made it up, and then I built an entire proposal on top of a number I invented.

One question would have saved me. "When you say 7, is that 7 total or 7 from each of you?" One short question. I didn't ask, because I was comfortable, and comfortable is where assumptions live.

So I wrote back: "Then I entirely misread your last email. I will redo the proposal and send it back over to you." Rebuilt it, had it back in their inbox inside the hour, and we're fine. No real harm.

But notice where the mistake showed up. Not in discovery, where I made it. At the proposal stage, two weeks later, in an email I had to open with an apology. That is where discovery failures always surface, long after they're cheap to fix. Every vague answer you let slide in September becomes an objection in November.

Three things:

Want a head start? Before your next big call, tell Jericho what you know about the account and let him build your discovery questions with you. Then tell him how it went afterward and he'll show you what you missed.

And the one you'll hear from me every week. You are always training your customer how to treat you. The rep who fills the silence is teaching his customer to wait on a rescue. The rep who counts to four is teaching him that around here, we say the true thing. Pick which one you want to be known for.

Every play we've run so far now has its own one-page printable, with the words to say right on it. Print this week's Discovery card and tape it up where you'll see it before your first call of the day. Missed an issue? Catch up here:

All four printables are right below. If your email app hides them, just reply with the word PRINTABLES and I'll send you the set.

If you lead a team and something in here hit a nerve, I'd love to hear what's going on. Maybe your reps keep getting stuck on price, or your discovery calls sound more like product tours. Grab some time with me and tell me what you're seeing. No slide deck, just a real conversation about your team.

And if you're planning a 2027 sales meeting, dealer event, or annual conference, I'm booking speaking dates now. Send me a note and let's talk about what your people need to hear.

One more thing, and forgive a proud dad. My daughter Maggie just closed the biggest deal of her life. She's committed to play Division 1 (middle blocker) at the University at Buffalo on a full scholarship, Class of 2028. Years of early mornings, long drives, and showing up when nobody was watching. Same lesson as everything in this newsletter: the process works when you work the process. Go Bulls!

Be safe out there this month. It's a good season to slow down in the yard and speed up in the conversation.

Grow your momentum,

Mark Jewell
The Momentum Company

P.S. Many of you are opting in to get the Playbook in audio. It's a series, about 5 minutes each, sent to your phone by text one morning at a time. Each gives you a play you can run that same day, from getting the appointment to handling the objection to building relationships that hold up when markets get tight. Text PLAYS to 984-282-1124 and your first one will be waiting.