20 Must-Ask Sales Discovery Questions in 2025 (With AI-Powered Meeting Notes from Votars)

In today’s hypercompetitive B2B landscape, closing deals in 2025 isn’t just about having the best product—it’s about asking the right questions. That’s where sales discovery calls come in. They help you uncover pain points, qualify leads faster, and accelerate your pipeline.

But if you’re still trying to jot down messy notes while actively listening, you’re at a disadvantage. That’s why thousands of sales professionals now rely on Votars AI—the smartest multilingual meeting assistant—to automatically record, transcribe, summarize, and highlight key moments from your calls.

This guide combines the top 20 sales discovery questions you should ask in 2025, with insights on how to use Votars’ AI-powered transcription and CRM integrations to turn those questions into deals.

🤔 What Are Discovery Questions in Sales?

Sales discovery questions are targeted inquiries that help you understand a prospect’s business challenges, objectives, and buying criteria. They are critical for:

• Qualifying leads quickly
• Customizing your pitch
• Identifying blockers
• Mapping out the decision-making process

With tools like Votars, you can go beyond asking questions—you can track which ones actually moved the needle using our speaker-based summaries and CRM-friendly note exports.

🔓 1. Open-Ended Sales Discovery Questions to Kick Off

These questions help break the ice and give your prospects the space to describe their world in their own words.

Top examples:

• “Tell me about your company’s priorities this quarter.”
• “How does your team currently approach [problem]?”
• “What does success look like for you this year?”
• “What are the biggest inefficiencies in your current process?”
• “Which metrics are you responsible for improving?”

💡 Tip: With Votars, these open-ended answers are auto-tagged by topic, so you can quickly find the moment your prospect mentioned their revenue target or pain point—no manual note-taking needed.

🚨 2. Discovery Questions to Uncover Pain Points

Once you’ve broken the ice, it’s time to get specific. Pain point discovery is where you build urgency.

Top examples:

• “What challenges made you look into [your product category]?”
• “What’s been frustrating about your current solution?”
• “What have these problems cost you—in time, money, or missed opportunities?”
• “How are you measuring the impact of these challenges?”
• “What would a perfect solution look like to you?”

🧠 Pro Tip: Use Votars’ AI to auto-summarize pain points by topic, and instantly sync them to your CRM. Perfect for follow-ups or handoffs to account execs.

❌ 3. Disqualifying Questions to Save Time

Not every prospect is worth chasing. These questions help you politely identify poor-fit leads.

Smart disqualifiers:

• “What’s your timeline for solving this problem?”
• “Do you already have a solution in place?”
• “What kind of budget have you allocated?”
• “What would prevent this project from moving forward?”
• “Are you the final decision-maker?”

📍 Bonus: With Votars’ speaker diarization, you can see who said what—even in a group call—so you know who to loop in next.

🚀 4. Follow-Up Questions to Drive Next Steps

You’ve built rapport and qualified the lead—now guide them toward a decision.

Effective follow-ups:

• “What’s your process for evaluating new tools?”
• “Have you worked with vendors like us before?”
• “What’s your preferred way to see a demo—live call or async walkthrough?”
• “Who else should we involve in this conversation?”
• “Can I follow up with you on [specific date]?”

🛠 Workflow Hack: Votars lets you auto-generate action items from these responses and send them directly to Notion, Salesforce, or HubSpot.

✅ Dos and Don’ts During Discovery Calls (2025-Style)

✔️ Do:

• Research the company and person beforehand
• Use AI tools like Votars to record and transcribe
• Ask layered, specific questions
• Listen more than you speak
• Summarize key insights at the end (or let Votars do it!)

❌ Don’t:

• Rely on memory or manual notes
• Ask generic or easily Googleable questions
• Jump to pitching too soon
• Ignore verbal cues or tone changes

🧠 How Votars Enhances Your Sales Discovery Calls

Votars isn’t just a Zoom note-taker. It’s your sales enablement AI:

• 📄 Records + transcribes in 74+ languages
• 🧑‍💼 Auto-tags speakers, topics, and pain points
• 🧠 Summarizes meetings with GPT-4o level context awareness
• 🔄 Integrates with your CRM and calendar tools
• 📊 Gives you searchable, exportable notes, transcripts & call highlights

Whether you’re qualifying cold leads or running an enterprise demo, Votars ensures you never miss a moment—and you’re always prepared for what comes next.

🏁 Close Deals Smarter with AI-Powered Sales Discovery

In 2025, the best sales teams are powered by AI—not guesswork. Asking the right questions is essential, but capturing and using those answers efficiently is what separates top performers.

With Votars, you’re not just asking smarter questions—you’re building smarter sales systems.

👉 Ready to transform your discovery calls? Try Votars Free Today – The Ultimate AI Note-Taker for Sales Teams.