If your discovery calls feel rushed, unfocused, or fail to convert into second meetings, this episode breaks down how to fix it. You’ll learn how one question builds trust quickly, uncovers financial clarity, and keeps you from wasting time on conversations that go nowhere.
🎧 Want to hear the full conversation first? Listen to Revenue Rewired Episode 34: This One Thing Accelerates BizDev on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or Amazon Music.
If you have ever tried to cram every qualifying question into a 30-minute call, you know it creates friction. You walk away with scattered notes, no clear path to ROI, and sometimes no next meeting.
In this episode of Revenue Rewired, I (Jay Feitlinger, CEO of StringCan Interactive) break down what actually matters in a discovery call with our COO, Sarah Shepard, who has been on both the sales side and the buying side of BizDev conversations.
After years of refining our process for our own agency and our clients, one truth became obvious.
It is to earn the next meeting with confidence. The best way to do that is to understand the financial impact of solving the problem.
That is where the “one thing” comes in.
The single most important question in any business development conversation is:
“What is the value of one new customer to your business?”
When a prospect can clearly articulate that number, whether annually or across lifetime value, everything else becomes easier. Now we can reverse-engineer what marketing and sales support should deliver, what ROI looks like, and how to frame the engagement in financial terms that matter to the executive team.
Without this clarity, every recommendation feels subjective. With it, every dollar spent is tied to bottom-line outcomes.
When we understand customer value, it helps us:
If we cannot determine this number, it becomes difficult to scope future phases or justify pricing.
It happens often, even at the C-suite level. When it does, we do not push. We help them unpack it.
We might ask:
Eventually, they might say, “Wow, I guess every new client is actually worth $600K to $900K to us.”
That moment creates alignment and trust faster than any clever pitch.
Sarah often points out that many BizDev conversations start from a place of distrust or frustration. Maybe the prospect had a bad relationship with a previous agency. Maybe they were assigned the meeting and feel defensive.
That is why we always:
✅ Do the homework before the call
✅ Show we understand their world
✅ Set expectations for how the call will flow
✅ Explain that the goal is clarity, not interrogation
When people feel seen, they open up. Once they open up, they are more willing to share the financial context behind their business decisions.
We learned the hard way that trying to cover a long list of discovery questions in one call feels robotic and overwhelming. That is when we restructured our approach to be:
We also make it clear that the next meeting will go deeper only if there is mutual alignment. This reduces pressure and creates a sense of partnership.
We use this same financial clarity framework when helping clients fix revenue leaks such as low lead quality, broken marketing-to-sales handoffs, unclear sales follow-up, and overall pipeline friction.
It is also a core reason we wrote the book Revenue Rewired. The book outlines the biggest areas where revenue is lost and explains how to rebuild a stronger, more aligned revenue engine around financial impact.
Q: What is the most important part of a discovery call? A: Getting clear on how much one new customer is worth so you can immediately tie your solution to measurable financial outcomes.
Q: What if the prospect does not know their lifetime value?
A: Guide them through it. Building the number together builds trust and positions you as a strategic advisor, not just a vendor.
Q: How do I avoid overwhelming a prospect in a first meeting?
A: Focus on the outcome of securing the next conversation by showing you understand financial context instead of overwhelming them with too many qualifying questions.
Q: What causes discovery calls to stall or fail?
A: Too many disjointed questions, no financial anchor, and a lack of clear preparation or empathy.
Q: How do I build partnership instead of running an interrogation?
A: Show research, acknowledge their perspective, ask meaningful business questions, and co-create clarity.
Once I centered my discovery calls around one financial question, I stopped chasing data points and started earning trust faster. Prospects became more engaged, next calls were easier to schedule, and sales velocity increased because everything was rooted in bottom-line impact.
When you know the financial value of solving the problem, you can confidently engineer the return.
If you are ready to tighten your discovery process and drive ROI with clarity, connect with our team.