Interviews provide an opportunity to dive deep and uncover blind spots and new drivers. 

In general, buyers typically spend 20 to 30 minutes on an interview whereas they frequently drop out of a survey after just two to three minutes. Therefore interviews are a critical component of any win-loss program. They build upon the data from other channels by adding new layers of context and insight. 

An effective win-loss interview is structured as a conversation, not a rigid phone survey. Before conducting interviews, develop an interview guide that outlines the key topics and questions you want to incorporate into each conversation. Consider questions like these: 

Overview & Origination 

What was your final decision? Why? 

What prompted your evaluation? 

How did you structure and run the evaluation? 

Product or Solution 

What specific requirements did the product/solution need to meet? 

Which capabilities were most important to you? 

What were your impressions of the overall product offering? 

What were its strengths? Weaknesses? 

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Sales Experience 

What was the overall buying experience like? 

What did the sales team do well? What could they improve? 

How did the sales experience influence your final decision? 

Pricing & Packaging 

How did you react to the initial pricing proposal? 

How did you view the price relative to the overall value? 

How did the price compare to that of other vendors? 

Did the pricing model align with your needs and expectations? 

Competitors 

What other vendors did you include in your evaluation? 

Win: Which vendor was the strongest alternative? 

Loss: Which vendor did you choose? 

In what ways did <vendor> excel? Fall short? 

Conclusion 

If you were the CEO of <company>, what would you change? 

Win: How satisfied are you with the experience so far? 

Loss: What could <company> change to win your business in the future? 

As you listen to the interviewee’s answers, adapt your questions and probe for more details when appropriate. 

After the interview, review the transcript and tag the Decision Drivers that influenced their final decision. Diligently tagging and tracking drivers will help you spot trends across interviews and integrate the findings with driver data from the other channels.