Use Reverse Surveying to Reverse Rejection in Your Sales Process

By the FeedGap Team

Sales engineers and account executives are challenged to grab the attention of prospects. Prospects
lack time and attention and respond to limited vendor messages. As a sales professional, you need to
stand out and be creative. Your goal should be to establish trust and provide value in an articulate,
authentic and simple manner (as simple as practical). To do this, leverage what physicians do when they
first meet with a patient. They run some quick and reliable diagnostics that easily gather patient
information and transform that into insight for the next step.

This experience described above is sometimes the opposite of what happens in a sales process. A sales
process will either a) bombard the prospect with features and benefits or b) overwhelm the prospect
with a battery of questions that likely have no benefit back to the prospect if answered. That is where
reverse surveying (i.e. diagnostic tools) can be used in a highly effective manner. Reverse surveying is
the creation of a series of concise statements organized around your values, features and benefits that
the prospect rates. This is similar to the physician asking the patient to respond to questions or
statements they ask in their process. Yet unlike traditional survey tools where the prospect likely
receives nothing in return for their information, reverse survey diagnostics give the prospect immediate
information. The data is calculated using a variation on Net Promoter Score (NPS) methodology that is
credible and valid and presents color-coded scores by question and category. What’s more is that each
section prescribes guidance back to the respondent so they can understand not only their biggest gaps
but how your solution can narrow or eliminate those gaps. This is like the physician counseling the
patient on the treatment options based on their diagnostic results.

Reverse surveying has multiple benefits. It is innovative as most prospects would not get immediate,
curated results. It is engaging because the prospect is doing a diagnostic to understand the health of
their business. It is credible because the calculations are methodology sound. It is trustworthy because
the consultative guidance offers credible advice.

Reverse surveying can be a pain without technology. That’s why FeedGap exists. We are a technology
that allows our users to simply author custom diagnostic tools along with the automated scored output
and guidance. These tools are easy to build and can be deployed in marketing campaigns or materials or
in unique and personalized prospect messages. They’ll have higher click rates and completion rates than
most other tools because they are active vs. passive forms of engagement.

Go to www.feedgap.com to see samples or reach out to them at go@feedgap.com. FeedGap is free
right now so if you’re reading this, and you want to try something new, contact us at for a free account.