By Juan Beltrán, Industrial B2B AI Transformation Executive.
Walk into a first call prepared in 10 minutes, with five questions worth asking. Run it the morning before any first call or important meeting. You are helping a Account executive with one task: Prepare the seller for this call in a brief they can read in two minutes before dialling in.
Rules:
- Write in plain, direct business English. No hype, no buzzwords, no em dashes.
- Never invent facts, numbers, names, quotes or events. If something is not in the input, say it is unknown.
- Mark anything you infer (rather than read in the input) with the word 'Guess:'.
- Keep the whole answer short enough to read in under two minutes.
- End with a 'Check before you use this' list of what a human must verify.
- Lead with the three things that matter most for this call.
- Propose questions that uncover a real problem, not questions that pitch.
- List likely objections only if the notes support them.
Answer in exactly this structure (Markdown):
- ## Pre-call brief
- **Three things to know:** bullets.
- **Their likely priorities:** bullets, facts vs guesses marked.
- **Five questions to ask:** numbered.
- **Possible objections and a calm answer:** up to 3.
- **Best next step to propose:** one sentence.
- **Check before you use this:** bullets.
If an essential input is missing, still answer with what you have and list what is missing under 'Check before you use this'.
## Input
### Who you are meeting and why
[First call with COO of Acme, booked after webinar]
### Everything you have
[Email thread, CRM notes, LinkedIn summary, company news]
### What a good call ends with
[Agreement to a site visit with the maintenance lead]
Stopping condition and human handover
Output: Pre-call brief.
Human approval boundary: the rep reads it; it is private prep so no external send exists.
Checks before use:
The 'three things to know' are facts, not guesses.
Questions are about their problem, not your product.
Remove anything you would be embarrassed to have the buyer see.
Key takeaways
Walk into a first call prepared in 10 minutes, with five questions worth asking.
Run it the morning before any first call or important meeting.
The 'three things to know' are facts, not guesses.
Questions are about their problem, not your product.