Marcus Sheridan was literally losing sleep because his pool company, River Pools and Spas, was bleeding cash during the 2008 housing crash. He was staring down the barrel of bankruptcy. It’s a terrifying spot to be in. Most people would have just bought more radio ads or mailed out more glossy flyers, but Sheridan did something that felt totally counterintuitive at the time. He decided to stop being a "salesman" and start being a teacher. He sat down at his kitchen table and wrote out every single question a customer had ever asked him. Even the awkward ones. Especially the ones about price and why his fiberglass pools might actually suck compared to concrete. That’s the origin story of the They Ask You Answer book, and honestly, it’s probably the most practical business framework ever written.
Most marketing is fluff. You know it, I know it. We see a billboard or a pop-up ad and our brains instantly filter it out because we know we’re being sold to. Sheridan’s whole vibe is about killing that friction. If a customer has a question, you answer it. It sounds stupidly simple. But if you look at most corporate websites, they hide their pricing, they ignore their competitors, and they gloss over their flaws. They’re terrified of being "too honest." Sheridan argues that this fear is exactly what’s killing your sales.
The Big Five: What Your Customers Actually Care About
There are five topics that drive almost all buying decisions. Sheridan calls them "The Big Five." If you aren't writing about these on your blog or filming videos about them, you’re basically leaving money on the sidewalk.
First off, Cost and Pricing. This is the big one. Everyone wants to know what something costs, yet businesses treat their pricing like a state secret. You’ve been there—searching a website for a price, not finding it, and then leaving to find a competitor who is more transparent. You don't have to give a flat number if your service is custom, but you have to explain the factors that move the price up or down.
Then there are Problems. People search for "problems with [your product]" all the time. If you don't address those problems yourself, someone else will. Probably a reviewer who hates you. By owning the conversation around your product's flaws, you build an insane amount of trust. It shows you aren't just trying to snatch a paycheck; you're trying to find the right fit.
Comparisons are next. "This vs. That." It’s how we shop. We want to know if we should buy the Honda or the Toyota, the HubSpot or the Salesforce. If you sell one of those, you should be the one comparing them fairly.
The last two are Reviews and Best-in-Class. People want to know who the best players in the industry are. Surprisingly, Sheridan suggests you should actually list your competitors. It sounds like business suicide, right? It's not. It proves you know the landscape and that you're confident enough in your own value to mention the guy down the street.
Why Transparency is Your Only Real Edge
In 2026, the internet is flooded. AI can generate a thousand blog posts in a minute. But AI struggles with genuine, lived-experience transparency. That’s why the They Ask You Answer book is actually more relevant now than when it was first published.
You can’t fake being helpful.
Think about the last time you bought something expensive. Maybe a car or a high-end laptop. You probably did ten hours of research before you even talked to a human. By the time a lead reaches out to your sales team, they are already 70% of the way through the buying journey. If your content was the stuff that guided them through those ten hours, you’ve already won. You aren't just a vendor anymore. You’re the expert they trust.
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Sheridan talks a lot about "disarming" the customer. When you answer the "scary" questions—like why your product is more expensive than the cheap alternative—the customer’s guard drops. They realize you aren't hiding anything. That trust is the shortest path to a closed deal.
The Sales Team is Your Best Content Department
Most companies have a huge wall between marketing and sales. Marketing sits in a room and tries to think of "cool" ideas, while sales is out in the trenches getting yelled at by prospects.
This is a total waste.
The They Ask You Answer philosophy demands that your sales team tells the marketing team exactly what questions they are getting every day. Every email a salesperson sends answering a client's question is a blog post waiting to happen. If one person asked it, a thousand more are typing it into Google.
Assignment Selling: The Secret Productivity Hack
This is a specific tactic from the book that literally changes how sales calls work. It’s called Assignment Selling.
Imagine you have a meeting with a prospect on Tuesday. On Monday, you send them a video or an article you wrote that answers the most common questions for people at their stage of the process. You say, "Hey, looking forward to our chat. To make sure we make the most of our time, please check this out."
If they read it, they come to the meeting educated. The "fluff" questions are gone. You can get straight to the meat of the deal. If they don't read it, you know they might not be a serious buyer. It’s a vetting tool and a teaching tool wrapped in one. It saves everyone time. Lots of it.
It’s a Culture, Not a Checklist
You can’t just hire a freelance writer to "do" They Ask You Answer for you. It won't work. The expertise has to come from the people inside the building—the engineers, the installers, the CEOs.
This is where most companies fail. They try to outsource their honesty.
The book emphasizes that you need a "Content Manager" whose entire job is to interview the internal experts and turn their brain-dumps into readable, searchable content. This person is the bridge. Without this role, the initiative usually dies after three weeks because everyone gets "too busy" to write.
Real talk: being this transparent is uncomfortable. Your sales team might freak out. Your legal team definitely will. They’ll say, "We can't tell people our prices!" or "We can't talk about our competitors!"
But ask yourself: is keeping those secrets helping you grow, or is it just making it easier for your customers to ignore you?
Actionable Steps to Start Today
Don't go out and try to overhaul your entire website overnight. It's a recipe for burnout. Start small and get some quick wins to prove the concept to your team.
- Audit your Sent folder. Look at the last 20 emails your sales team sent to prospects. Identify the three most common questions they answered. Turn those three answers into three separate pages on your website immediately.
- The "Price" Page. Create a page titled "How much does [Product/Service] cost?" Break down the variables. Explain why someone might pay $5,000 and why someone else might pay $50,000. Do not put a "Contact for Quote" button as the only piece of information.
- Record a "Who We Aren't For" video. Be brutally honest about who shouldn't buy your product. Maybe you’re too expensive for startups, or maybe your software doesn't integrate with Mac. Say it out loud. It filters out bad leads and makes the good leads want you even more.
- Kill the stock photos. Replace those generic "smiling people in headsets" photos with real pictures of your team, your office, and your process. People buy from people, not from 123RF.com assets.
- The 80% Rule. If your sales team spends 80% of their time answering the same five questions, create a "Buyer's Guide" that answers them all. Send this guide to every single lead before the first discovery call.
The goal isn't to have the prettiest website in your industry. The goal is to be the most helpful. In a world of noise, the loudest voice rarely wins—the clearest one does. By embracing the They Ask You Answer book principles, you stop chasing the algorithm and start obsessing over the human being on the other side of the screen.