You got ahold of the person you were after and are trying to qualify them to see if your solution could be a fit. What are the best questions to ask? The obvious answer: Open-ended questions. Most reps know this, but there's an easy and powerful technique that you may not know about. It's an easy acronym (or famous baseball player) to remember and is something to fall back on whenever you are in a qualifying situation. It's referred to as the TED-W (Ted Williams) approach.
The "TED-W" Approach
T - Tell me...
E - Explain to me...
D - Describe for me...
W- Walk me thru...
Examples of TED-W Questions:
Tell me about a time when you ran into a snag using (X) product.
Explain to me how you go about solving for (X) today.
Describe to me the process you go through to accomplish (X).
Walk me through how you go about (X).