They Ask, You Answer

They Ask, You Answer systematizes what saved Sheridan's pool company in 2009: become the most trusted teacher in your market by answering, publicly and honestly, every question buyers ask. The Big 5 name the questions companies dodge — cost, problems, comparisons, reviews, and best-of — precisely because buyers search them most. Assignment selling closes the loop: prospects read or watch the honest answers BEFORE the sales call, which then starts at question forty instead of question one.

The pricing article that wouldn't state a price is the book's defining sin; addressing your own product's drawbacks builds more trust than any claim; the buyer completes most of the decision before talking to sales, so content IS the first sales rep; insourcing — your team writes, because the expertise lives in-house; and video's escalation of all of it ('the selling 7' videos).

It is the most operational of the content classics — less philosophy, more 'publish these exact pages.' In the AI-answer era its bet improves: engines reward the site that actually answers the question asked. The discipline still filters its readers, though — most companies that 'do TAYA' publish four of the Big 5 and quietly skip cost, which is the one that works.

Grew from the 2009 River Pools turnaround — the fiberglass-pool cost article Sheridan wrote when no competitor would state a price — and the speaking circuit that followed. Wiley published it January 2017, with a revised edition (adding video) in 2019.

Etymology: source.

Search interest for this term over the last five years:

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Areas of marketing where they ask, you answer is a core concern: