If you were asked to order pizza for the entire office, what kind would you choose? You would have to consider food allergies and other dietary restrictions, individual preferences, and how many pizzas you need to feed the whole team … it’s a lot. Let’s not even get started on whether pineapple is a valid topping (file that one next to ketchup on hot dogs).
Now, imagine you haven’t been asked to order pizza, but instead are tasked with finding a solution that will help your team meet their end-of-quarter goals, bring operating expenses down, and expedite critical work processes … you see where I’m going with this.
Whether through anxiety about making a poor choice or apathy in the face of change (both of which complicate decision-making in different ways), we don’t like making decisions. They’re risky, they bring change (another non-favorite), and in many business settings, they’re relatively final—or at least hard to amend.
The Psychology of Consistency, or Why Your Brain Hates Big Leaps
Asking a client to sign a sprawling, intricate enterprise contract on day one is a lot like walking up to a random stranger at a coffee shop and asking them to elope. While it may, under very specific circumstances, result in a spontaneous marriage (terrible idea), the restraining order is likely to show up before the wedding planner.
Major decisions, especially in B2B sales, rarely happen in a single moment. They evolve over time through a series of micro conversions, through a process defined and punctuated with small agreements. If you structure your discovery and demo stages to optimize small, low-risk commitments, you can (ethically) leverage the consistency bias we all have and make the “final” decision more comfortable for your buyer.
Behavioral economics teaches us that we are fundamentally lazy. Nobel laureate Daniel Kahneman, whose name is something of a “greatest hit” here in our blogs, famously detailed how heavily we rely on various cognitive shortcuts. When we’re faced with making an important, complex choice—like overhauling an entire tech stack or signing a six-figure software contract—we do, by definition, the most natural human thing: look for a way out of it.
And this is precisely where awareness of the consistency bias can make the difference between closed won and closed nope. Social psychologists have long used the phrase to describe our innate (some might even say compulsive) desire to act in ways that align with what we’ve already said, done, or felt.
Boulders, Marbles, and B2B Pipelines
Once we agree to something, even once, we’re more likely to stick with that position, often without even being aware of it. If someone convinces you that pineapple doesn’t belong on pizza and that ketchup on hot dogs is for kids (the official position of the National Hot Dog and Sausage Council, by the way), you’re likely to maintain that viewpoint.
In B2B sales and relationship-building (which are nearly the same thing), this insight is an invaluable tool. It transforms the Sisyphean task of rolling a boulder up a steep incline to something like sending a marble down a carefully prepared incline. Every small agreement with a prospect aligns their psychological momentum with the mutual goal you’re both working toward—a signed contract.
Start Small: Quantum Momentum During Discovery
Discovery calls can be a lot like a trip to the dentist. Painful, probing, and punctuated by awkward silences while one party stares at something just out of the other’s line of sight. Consider a question that can spark existential dread in even the heartiest corporate veteran. Something like, “What are your core strategic bottlenecks for Q4?” will do nicely.
Is it any wonder prospects put in this position typically respond with vague, guarded answers? To build quantum momentum—velocity based on micro conversions—we need to start small. You do this through low-friction, high-agreement questions that establish baseline alignment.
Acknowledge obvious challenges. “Managing remote compliance across three time zones sounds a lot like trying to nail Jell-O to a tree.” If that’s too experimental, you can stick with “herding cats.” By explicitly addressing the scope of an obstacle, you show you understand it—and in a way that helps your prospect connect on a personal level.
Follow that by securing minor permissions. Ask for something small that promises to deliver value. “If we could shave just two hours off your weekly reconciliation process, what would you be able to accomplish?”
Active listening should be a part of your process, as should mirroring back what you’ve heard. Validate your prospect’s pain points before prescribing a cure. “Before we take a look at features, let me make sure I’ve got your workflow right. Currently, you’re passing data from Excel to Salesforce manually every Friday afternoon. Is that right?”
Astute readers (I’m looking at you) will notice something important about these exchanges. You didn’t ask your prospect to buy anything. You asked them to agree that the sky is, in fact, blue, water is wet, and their current process sounds maddeningly annoying.
Every time you meet them where they are, every time you agree on something as fundamental as alignment, your prospect becomes more invested in the premise that a solution is needed.
The Typical Software Demo: A Tragedy in Three Acts
Everyone has been part of a “standard” software demonstration, for ill or good. They’re so predictable that they tend to follow the three-act dramatic structure first identified by Aristotle.
Act One, in which the presenter speaks, uninterrupted by insight, for 45 minutes.
Act Two is usually a variation on a prospect staring wistfully into nothing while wondering how many emails are piling up in their inbox, as the presenter continues as a dim voice from somewhere offstage.
Finally, Act Three brings the drama to a crescendo when someone—usually from procurement—asks a hyper-specific question about pricing that brings the curtain down.
All it takes to build momentum is to ditch the monologue. A well-structured demo shouldn’t look like a pre-recorded broadcast, but more like a panel discussion between informed, invested participants working together to solve the same problem.
Instead of showing every ringing bell and melodious whistle your engineering team spent six months building, curate the prospect’s experience around the exact pain points you uncovered during discovery. Introduce a capability by showing how it addresses their chief worry.
“This is how our automated alert system flags compliance risks.” Then pause and ask for reflection. “How does this compare to how your team is handling audit flags right now?” You should, of course, already know the answer to this question.
By pivoting to a meaningful dialog, you’re building consensus. “So, if this feature could prevent that quarterly audit headache, what would that mean for compliance?”
By the time you reach the end of the presentation, you haven’t delivered a sales pitch. You’ve built a customized framework with your prospect. The final decision isn’t a terrifying leap of faith; it’s just the last step of a staircase you’ve built together that leads from problem to solution.
Little Yeses and Big Wins
Every small, low-risk commitment you ask a prospect for compounds your credibility, lowers psychological stress, and helps to align their internal narrative with the solution you’re bringing to them. Through quantum momentum, selling shifts from an aggressive act of persuasion to what it should be: a collaborative journey toward a mutually beneficial outcome.
Dragging clients across the finish line isn’t easy, fun, or rewarding for anyone involved. If you first ask them to walk with you, then guide them toward a win, you can make the rest of the trip a side-by-side jog.
Need help thinking small and winning big? Reach out to mastery@maestrogroup.co for a collaborative look at how to build quantum momentum into your process.