Close every sales interview like you close deals

Discovery & Qualification

BANT, MEDDIC, SPIN selling frameworks — know which questions to ask, how to qualify a prospect, and how to articulate your discovery process in an interview.

"Walk me through how you qualify a new lead using MEDDIC."

Metrics: What quantifiable business outcome are they trying to achieve? Economic Buyer: Who signs the check — and have I confirmed access? Decision Criteria: What are they evaluating vendors on? Decision Process: What are the approval steps and timeline? Identify Pain: What happens if they do nothing? Champion: Who internally is selling for me when I'm not in the room? I map each element in my CRM notes after every discovery call and flag gaps for follow-up.

Objection Handling

"Too expensive", "Not the right time", "Already have a vendor" — every common objection with a proven response framework that shows you can think on your feet.

"A prospect says 'We already have a vendor for this.' How do you respond?"

Acknowledge: "Totally understand — most of our best customers came from a competitor." Explore: "Out of curiosity, if there were one thing you'd change about your current solution, what would it be?" This opens a gap. If they name something, I align our differentiator to that gap. If they say "nothing," I say: "That's great. Would it be fair to keep us as a benchmark for your next renewal?" This plants a seed without burning the relationship.

Pipeline & Forecasting

Pipeline stages, conversion rates, quota management, pipeline coverage ratios, weighted forecasting, commit vs. best-case.

"Your quota is $500K this quarter. Walk me through your pipeline right now."

I maintain 3.5x pipeline coverage, so I'd need $1.75M in qualified pipeline. I segment into three buckets: Commit (90%+ close rate, contract out or verbal yes) — this should cover 70% of quota. Best Case (50-70% probability, in negotiation) — covers the remaining 30% plus buffer. Upside (30-50%, still in evaluation) — insurance for slippage. I review stage-by-stage conversion rates weekly and back into the activity numbers: if my demo-to-close rate is 25%, I need 20 demos to close 5 deals at $100K ACV.

Negotiation

Discount strategies, multi-threading, navigating procurement, creating urgency, anchoring techniques, dealing with RFPs.

"The prospect asks for a 30% discount. What do you do?"

Never discount without getting something back. First, I reframe: "Help me understand what's driving the ask — is it budget constraints, or are you comparing us to an alternative?" If budget: I offer to reduce scope or phase the rollout. If competitive: I reinforce differentiation on the pain they already told me about. If they push: "I can get you 15% if we close by end of month and do a 2-year term instead of 1." I always trade — discounts for longer commitments, faster signature, or case study rights.

Sales Leadership

Team management, coaching reps, territory planning, forecast accuracy, building a sales playbook, hiring and ramping new AEs.

"You inherit a team of 8 reps — 2 are crushing quota, 4 are at 80%, and 2 are below 50%. What's your 90-day plan?"

Week 1-2: Ride-along with all 8 — listen to calls, review pipeline, understand each rep's strengths and gaps. Top 2: Protect them. Don't burden them with process changes. Ask what's working and codify it into a playbook for the team. Middle 4: Highest leverage. Identify the one skill gap holding each back (discovery? negotiation? prospecting?) and run targeted coaching sprints. Bottom 2: Honest conversation. Set a 60-day performance plan with specific metrics. If the issue is effort, that's a hard conversation. If it's skill, pair them with a top rep for shadowing.

Behavioral for Sales

"Tell me about your biggest deal", "How do you handle rejection", "Describe a deal you lost" — sales-specific behavioral questions answered with metrics and storytelling.

"Tell me about the biggest deal you've ever closed."

Closed a $420K ARR enterprise deal with a Fortune 500 retail company. 7-month sales cycle, started as a $50K pilot. I multi-threaded across 4 stakeholders: the VP of Engineering (champion), the CTO (economic buyer), procurement, and legal. The key moment was when a competitor undercut us by 40%. I set up a technical bake-off where both solutions ran in their staging environment for 2 weeks. Our integration time was 3 days vs their 3 weeks — that killed the price objection. Expanded to $420K with a 3-year commitment. It taught me that in enterprise sales, speed-to-value beats price every time.