Discovery2Win!

"It is good to have an end to journey towards; but it is the journey that matters in the end."–Ursula K. Le Guin 

Does the discovery process ever, really end? At every stage of a sales cycle, you will uncover and need to address deeper buyer motivations and needs. Organizing this information in a way that will be easy to use and access across the buyer's process can be a challenge. We are looking to deliver a better buyer experience from start to finish. Delivering a better buyer experience is one byproduct of properly conducted discovery throughout the buyer journey. 

In many sales organizations, sales methodologies dictate how discovery is run, and how subsequent deals are structured. At 2Win! Global, our discovery training supplements any existing sales methodology with soft skills and frameworks that assist you in getting the most from your client engagements at all stages of selling and customer cycles. 

Discovery in Modern Sales Cycles 

According to Gartner research, buyers find software sales increasingly complex. When a buyer comes to you with their own research and specific requirements in mind, you risk complications if your communications are not aligned from discovery to demo. Insights that don’t make it from discovery into the demo can cost sellers deals. Aligning your teams before discovery with the right communication is essential to building organizational value. 2Win structures your discovery goals around gaining stakeholder trust, asking the right questions to determine what exact value buyers are looking for, and identifying where you stand the best chance of accelerating your deals and obtaining critical buy-ins. 

In 2025, we are witnessing a real revolution in software sales where buyers are emerging who already have a clear grasp of their requirements and a good understanding of where you rank against your competitors before they even contact you. This changes the dynamics of many traditional discovery motions. It's no longer just about obtaining information and insights. It's about being able to synthesize your findings to communicate how you will be the best partner for your clients. 

Where is discovery taking place in your sales cycle? Are you asking the right questions? Are you agile enough in your sales engagements to be able to adapt to shifts and challenges? Discovery goals rooted in the present moment of every engagement facilitate and grow sales. To be present in these engagements and unearth the deepest insights, having structured frameworks to follow is effective for building confidence in being successful in these interactions. 

CDIM™ Discovery Framework

Ideally, we walk into a client meeting fully prepared, knowing exactly what they want to see. We have excellent tools to gauge interest like demo videos with heat maps that provide ways to understand who has seen the micro demos and what they are interested in seeing. We want to use every piece of information and beyond in our interactions.  When delivering the final demo, we look for nuances about the client’s needs in real-time. To be more present and take advantage of face time with customers, the CDIM™ Discovery Framework is a perfect tool. 

The CDIM™ Discovery Framework provides sales teams the tools to quickly adapt, gather insights, and keep conversations on track despite distractions. This framework is taught in our Discovery2Win and Success2Win training programs, and the magic of the CDIM™ Framework is how it helps you uncover a client's core motivations and needs while building trust and rapport. 

"The 2Win methodologies have been incredibly valuable to my success in pre-sales and will continue learning and honing my skills with those methodologies."

- Chad Andrews, Director, Presales OMS | Koerber 

The Four Pillars of CDIM™: Current, Desired, Impact, Metric

There are four pillars of the CDIM™ Framework that focus on discovery conversations and give you a clear understanding of client goals so you can communicate your value to meet their organizational objectives. The pillars are below. 

Current: How are they solving this problem now?

Understanding their current state offers insight into opportunities for improvement and how your solution might fit. For example: "How do you currently notify the next person in line when a document changes?" 

Desired: What would an ideal solution look like?

Often, clients share their desired outcomes while describing their current state. Clarify and align by paraphrasing: "If I understand you correctly, you’re looking for more clarity about what was changed and what needs to happen next." Resist the urge to jump to offer solutions at this stage—keep digging deeper.

Impact: What difference would solving the problem make?

Discuss the benefits of reaching their desired state. Understanding the potential impact reveals their motivations. For instance: "If you had more clarity on the next steps, what impact would it have on your process?"

Pro Tip: Restating the desired state before discussing impact helps maintain focus and control of the conversation.

Metric: How do they measure success?

Explore how they quantify success and who tracks these metrics within their organization. This can also reveal key decision-makers: "Do you have any ideas on how to measure the success of these improvements?"

Pro Tip: Offer examples to guide the discussion if they’re unsure how to answer.

Using CDIM™ to Win Deals 

A common use case for CDIM™ could include a scenario of connecting your solution to a project or challenge that already has stakeholder attention. Craft a demo that addresses that specific situation and include and use your client’s acronyms, project names, and industry jargon. Aligning with their language builds credibility and by showing their use case, you show you are really listening to their concerns. The CDIM™ Framework helps you listen with intent and create customized solutions. You can continually use the framework in discussions and get deeper insights. 

Discovery on the Fly with CDIM™ 

Discovery on the Fly is how we define the ability to uncover client needs and adapt your sales approach in real time during a client engagement or demo. Even with the best preparation, unexpected questions, shifting priorities, or new stakeholders can shift conversations and priorities. Applying CDIM™ on the fly helps you pivot and meet the new challenge, keeping deals moving. By combining active listening, strategic questioning, and situational awareness, Discovery on the Fly enables you to tailor your demo or presentation to new information as it arises, build deeper connections, and show clients you are attentive, flexible, and focused on their interests.

L3™ Objection Management Framework

Don’t “handle” objections. Turn them into an opportunity to grow your influence. The L3™ Framework guides sales, presales, and client success conversations and is one of the cornerstones of Discovery2Win. Hard questions probably will not dominate client engagements, but how you respond to them can determine the end result of the interaction.  The L3™ Framework is structured to turn objections into opportunities through principles of active listening and behavioral economics. Master this framework, and your discovery will help strengthen relationships, uncover deeper customer needs, and build trust. 

L3™ is comprised of three key components, Listen, Lead, and Land. Our training for Active listening includes four techniques—paraphrasing, clarifying, empathizing, and validating. Each stage helps understand a customer's concerns and demonstrates genuine engagement, which builds professional empathy. Remember to keep practicing the steps of active listening until the objection is fully understood, then respond strategically. 

We teach three strategies for leading the conversation forward: a straight response, a deferral, or a pivot. Each of these responses guides a conversation, whether you address the objection directly, are postponing for more information, or redirecting the conversation. These are some of the most difficult moments in sales discovery. Using a structured framework helps maintain confidence and keep emotions in control. The last step of the L3™ Framework is to Land, confirm you addressed the objection, measure the impact on your social capital, and move on.  

Not every objection can be resolved immediately, but acknowledging concerns and guiding the conversation toward the next step maintains momentum. Reinforce the conversation's value, set the stage for future discussions, and conclude with a clear call to action. We teach the exact mechanics of these frameworks in role-play scenarios and with exercises that can include challenges that you have experienced in your roles. L3™ turns the most challenging moments into very meaningful opportunities that can turn the tide on deals and gain favor for your solution. If you would like to read more about the L3™, click here! 

Crafting a Win Plan 

The Win Plan is another strategic framework taught in 2Win Global’s training programs. The Win Plan is a dynamic framework that maps deals and helps organize sales activities for sales and presales teams. It offers a structured approach to client interactions, identifying key stakeholders, and aligning organizational goals and solutions with client needs. The Win Plan guides the process of integrating discovery and creating a customized value proposition that resonates with client priorities, including how to measure success and development of an engagement strategy that drives consensus among decision-makers and adopters to help close deals. 

Building a Win Plan in the Discovery2Win training program involves three steps: mapping the deal, framing your message, and refining your approach through ongoing discovery. Mapping the deal helps sales teams understand where the opportunity originated and the motivations driving it. We teach participants how to break down deals into either an exploratory deal, where your team initiates the conversation, or directed, where the customer has a specific need. We also categorize them as initiated by operational users or leaders. Recognizing these dynamics helps shape engagement tactics with stakeholders so your solution is positioned properly. 

Once the deal is mapped, the next step is to frame the messaging. You can refer back to CDIM™ and connect the strategic initiative with the operational impact and capabilities your solution offers. By structuring your message around these layers, and players, you ensure conversations are demonstrating value. There will of course be gaps in information and sales teams do their best to prepare narratives that position themselves as strategic partners. Finally, to fill gaps, your Win Plan requires discovery “on-the-fly.” 

It might seem counterintuitive that we teach the Win Plan Framework in our Discovery2Win, but planning where to fill information in a structured way yields additional insights when there are other engagements. There are two other types of discovery: technical discovery, which clarifies the operational changes needed to support a strategic initiative, and business impact discovery, which assesses how operational changes influence organizational goals. We teach your teams to continuously refine a Win Plan with real-time insights to drive deals forward with confidence. 

Your Capstone Presentation 

Are you ready to put it all together? Using the Win Plan, CDIM™ learnings and questioning techniques, and the L3™ objection handling, you create a capstone presentation that outlines a deal and how the new learnings apply. This is a feature of all 2Win training. We train in your sales moment and address your challenges. The capstone presentation is immediately transferable and often based on a real-life scenario. Participants are given peer review feedback and facilitator feedback, and then awarded badges. Putting together the frameworks into a scenario reinforces the learning and prepares participants for the field. 

Ready to Discover? 

Buyers are approaching sellers equipped with much more knowledge than five years ago. With so much knowledge and work already put into the sale on the buyer side, adding value and asking the right questions, being confidently prepared for objections, and being able to map a Win Plan, increases deal velocity and reduces potential friction. 2Win's Discovery2Win training teaches tactical lessons in handling objections and strategic organization of deals, to properly execute and organize discovery findings throughout a software sales cycle. These skills break down complex sales for both the seller and the buyer and deliver better experiences. Schedule a consultation here if you would like to learn more about our Discovery2Win training.