Pre-planned questions are a bad idea. First when you go into a meeting with pre-planned questions you tend to focus on yourself rather than on the prospect. You will tend to just look for an opening slip the question into rather than let the conversation flow naturally. When your questions are planned in advance (especially if they are written down … or worse in questionnaire format), the language used is usually more stilted than you would say it when talking to the prospect. All of those and more are good reasons not to pre-plan the questions you will ask. However, that does not mean that there should be no pre-planning. I strongly urge you to plan the answers you need to get from the meeting. If you go into a meeting with 3 or 4 answers you need to get, you can lead the conversation to those topics and you might not even have to actually ask the questions. The answers may just flow naturally from the conversation. When you are at the appropriate time the form of the question will come to you and you will ask it. Planning what answers you need is much more effective than planning the questions you will ask.
