Sales discovery questions, written from the prospect's own website

Search for sales discovery questions and you get lists. What are your goals? What's your budget? What's your biggest challenge this year?

They're reasonable questions. They're also questions anyone could ask without opening the prospect's website, and nothing in them shows you looked at their business before the call.

There's a more specific source, and it's free: the prospect's own website. A homepage is the business explaining itself to a stranger. Where it goes quiet, there's a question worth asking, and the answer is something you can put in your proposal.

This post shows the method on a real homepage. We can't publish a prospect's website, so our own site, klarnio.com, plays the prospect, using Klarnio's audit of it from 5 October 2026. Every quote below is taken word for word from that page and that audit.

Why start from their website

Three reasons.

1. The question proves you prepared. "What's your biggest challenge?" could go to anyone. A question that quotes their homepage can only go to them.
2. It's about their customer, not your service. You're asking what their visitors need to hear, and that's their business, not your service.
3. The answers are your scope of work. Every gap the prospect confirms is a line in your proposal, in their own words.

Step 1: Find the gaps before the call

Read the prospect's homepage the way their customer would: first screen first, on a phone, as a stranger. Then check it against the three questions every visitor brings:

1. Is this about my problem? (Struggle)
2. Can I trust it? (Evaluation)
3. What happens after I say yes? (Growth)

Each question breaks down into checks you can mark yes or no. Our website audit checklist lists them all. Mark every check the page doesn't answer. Those are your gaps.

For klarnio.com, the audit found five gaps across 19 checks. Here is what it said was missing under each question:

Step 2: Turn each gap into a question

A gap is something the page doesn't say. A good discovery question asks the prospect for exactly that. For each one, note what the answer gives you, because that's what goes in the proposal.

Struggle: ask about the moment and the cost

The first gap is the trigger. The audit's note:

"Nothing says what happened yesterday that sends someone here: a client asking why the site brings no leads, a pitch on Thursday, a relaunch that flopped."

The questions to ask:

1. "Think of the last three customers who got in touch. What had just happened for each of them that week?"
2. "If they hadn't found you, what were they about to do instead?"

What the answer gives you: the trigger, in their customer's words. That line belongs on their first screen, and it's a strong first line for your proposal.

The second gap is the cost of waiting:

"The page costs the alternative ($500 to $3,000) but never states what the broken page costs the visitor in lost enquiries, wasted ad spend or time redoing copy."

The questions to ask:

3. "What does it cost one of your customers to leave this problem alone for another month?"
4. "Is that a number you've measured, or an estimate?"

What the answer gives you: either a real figure their page can use, or an honest gap. If it's an estimate, don't let anyone put a guess on the page. Write the sentence with a visible blank, "Every month this stays broken costs a business like yours AMOUNT", and fill it once someone has counted.

Evaluation: ask how their buyers decide

Klarnio's page passes all seven trust checks, so there's no missing piece to ask about. The audit still flagged the order: the price, the comparison and the no-charge promise sit far below the first screen. A complete page can still answer in the wrong order.

The questions to ask:

5. "When someone compares you with the alternatives, what do they ask about first?"
6. "When your last customer said yes, which thing on your website did they mention?"

What the answer gives you: which proof to move up the page. If buyers ask about price first and the price is a long scroll down, that's a fix you can name and scope.

Growth: ask what happens after the yes

Growth had three gaps. Two of the audit's notes:

"Only a footer address exists; no line says who answers, for what, or how quickly once you are paying 20 to 149 EUR a month."

"The re-audit card shows a first score and a deliberately empty second card, so no one on the page has ever travelled from before to after."

The questions to ask:

7. "After someone pays, who do they talk to first, and how quickly?"
8. "Think of a customer who's been with you for a while. What's different for them now?"
9. "Is there a reason that story isn't on your website yet?"

What the answer gives you: the after-the-sale story the page is missing. Sometimes the answer to question 9 is "we never asked", and the fix is a customer conversation, not a rewrite.

Step 3: Open with one sentence from their page

Your first line sets up the call. Pick one heading from their page that fails the three tests from our first post: a visitor can't picture it, nobody could prove it wrong, and any competitor could say it.

On klarnio.com, the audit marked this section heading as failing all three:

"Not another SEO score."

The opening line:

"Your homepage has a heading that says 'Not another SEO score.' If a visitor only read that line, what would they think you are?"

It's built to start a conversation: it's about their page, not your pitch. It's specific enough that they know you read the site. And it's a question, not a verdict: they can answer it, and the answer tells you how they see their own business.

Three rules for the opening line:

1. One sentence from their page, not three. You're starting a conversation, not presenting a report.
2. Ask, don't grade. "What would a visitor think?" invites an answer. "This heading is weak" invites a defense.
3. Don't open with a score. A number in the first minute invites an argument about the method. A sentence from their own page invites a conversation.

Step 4: Ask what their customers would say

Klarnio's paid plans include an interview kit: four questions for the site owner to ask their own customers. For klarnio.com, the first one is:

"Take me back to the day you first pasted a URL into Klarnio: what had just happened with that page or that client?"

On a discovery call, turn it around. Ask the prospect how their customers would answer:

10. "Take me back to the day your last customer first got in touch. What had just happened?"

If they know, write it down: it's the trigger their page is missing, and you heard it before anyone else. If they don't know, you've found work that comes before any rewrite. A few short conversations with their customers would answer it, and that can be the first line of your scope.

Ten discovery question examples, in one list

Every question above, ready to copy into your call notes:

1. Think of the last three customers who got in touch. What had just happened for each of them that week?
2. If they hadn't found you, what were they about to do instead?
3. What does it cost one of your customers to leave this problem alone for another month?
4. Is that a number you've measured, or an estimate?
5. When someone compares you with the alternatives, what do they ask about first?
6. When your last customer said yes, which thing on your website did they mention?
7. After someone pays, who do they talk to first, and how quickly?
8. Think of a customer who's been with you for a while. What's different for them now?
9. Is there a reason that story isn't on your website yet?
10. Take me back to the day your last customer first got in touch. What had just happened?

Use only the ones that match a gap you actually found. Asking all ten turns a discovery call into a questionnaire.

Do this before every call

Give yourself ten minutes before the call. The full routine, with a one-page prep sheet, is in how to prepare for a discovery call. In short:

1. Open their homepage on your phone and read only the first screen.
2. Check the three questions: is this about my problem, can I trust it, what happens after I say yes? Mark each gap.
3. Write one question per gap, and note what its answer would give you.
4. Pick one failing sentence from their page to open with.
5. Bring the interview question for the moment they ask what you'd do first.

You can also audit a prospect before your call with Klarnio. Paste their URL and the report lists the gaps under each of the three questions, with the audit's notes, and quotes the sentences on their page that fail. You still write the questions: the report gives you what to ask about.

We're deciding whether to build a version that does this for you: Call Prep. The prospect books a call and types their website, Klarnio audits it, and a brief with the gaps, the questions and the line to open with arrives before the meeting. It isn't built yet. If you'd use it, join the waitlist.

Frequently asked questions

Audit a prospect before your call

Paste your prospect's URL into Klarnio. In two to three minutes you get both scores, the gaps under each of the three questions, and the exact sentences on their page that a visitor won't act on, quoted word for word. Where a rewrite needs a fact the page doesn't give, it leaves a blank rather than inventing one.

It's free, needs no account, just your email.