Shorter sales cycles come from listening for three things

Most long sales cycles are not long because the buyer is slow. They are long because the seller started talking before they finished listening, and so the deal is running on guesses.

There are three things worth sitting in the discovery conversation until you genuinely have them. The first is the problem, in the buyer's own words, not the version that happens to match what you sell. The second is who actually cares about it, because the person in the meeting is often not the person whose week the problem ruins, and a deal without a person who cares behind it is a proposal waiting to expire. The third is what is standing in the way: the budget cycle, the incumbent contract, the committee that has to nod, the last vendor who burnt them.

When you hold all three early, something useful happens. You can shape the purchase around how this buyer is actually able to buy, which often means the deal never needs to become an RFQ at all. That puts you in the driving seat, and more importantly it makes the whole thing easier for the buyer, because an infrequent buyer does not need convincing, they need help buying.

The counterintuitive part is that this looks slower. You are asking more questions, booking the extra conversation, resisting the urge to send the proposal while the meeting is still warm. In my experience it is the fastest thing you can do, because every week you did not spend listening gets repaid later as a stalled deal, a surprise stakeholder, or a tender you were always going to lose.