"Nice Business!" Podcast

Two Silent Questions That Determine Every Call — Before Anyone Talks About Price

• Richard Train • Season 1 • Episode 20

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In this episode of the “Nice Business!” Podcast™, hosts Richard Train and Jim Bob Howard unpack the psychology behind every customer call and why most businesses are missing the point. While companies often focus on answering questions quickly and efficiently, callers are silently asking something deeper: Do I matter? and Will this be easy?

Through practical examples and a simple role-play, this conversation highlights how listening, not scripting, is the real driver of trust. You’ll hear why even polite, accurate answers can still fall short, and how a small shift toward curiosity and discovery can transform the entire customer experience.

The episode also explores a growing challenge in today’s business landscape. Fewer trained people are handling more important calls. With customer service roles being stretched thin, the solution is not better personalities. It is better structure. When teams are equipped with a clear, repeatable way to listen, guide, and respond, they can create meaningful interactions without relying on rigid scripts.

At its core, this conversation is a reminder that people make decisions emotionally and justify them logically. When customers feel heard, valued, and guided on what to do next, everything else becomes easier.

If businesses want to stand out, it starts with one simple shift: stop just answering questions and start understanding the person asking them.

Topics Covered:

00:00 – Episode Snippet

00:34 – Welcome to the Nice Business Podcast

01:54 – The invisible sign: “Make me feel important”

02:25 – The second silent question: “Will this be easy?”

07:02 – Listening as the foundation of trust

08:08 – The reality of shrinking customer service roles

09:19 – The gap in training for real conversations

10:06 – Why personality is not enough

11:25 – Answering without discovery

12:32 – What a successful call actually feels like

13:10 – Guiding the caller instead of just informing

14:15 – Why common fixes fail 

About Your Hosts: 

Richard Train is a Leadership Coach, Culture Consultant, and the Creator of the “Nice Business!” PodcastTM. He has spent more than 30 years helping leaders uncover the real issues behind performance, often the hidden “drama problems” that do not always show up in the numbers.

Connect with Richard Train:

Jim Bob Howard is a speaker, author, connector, and collaboration expert specializing in SharePoint, Teams, OneDrive, and Microsoft 365. He helps teams and organizations communicate clearly, collaborate effectively, and connect ideas to solve real business challenges. From teaching basic tech skills to leading global events, speaking to large audiences, and coaching teams, Jim Bob is passionate about using technology to bring people and ideas together.

Connect with Jim Bob Howard:

SPEAKER_00

It's very important to understand this. Most customer service positions are being hollowed out right now. The most important thing is to provide them a structure that they know what to say and how to say it without necessarily having to use a script. And it all has to do with listening. And it doesn't have to be a long haul. It doesn't have to be like we scream things out. There are words that I have to say, like on some script. As long as you get what you need and you feel like I took care of it and I was thinking about what your needs were. Welcome to the Night's Business Podcast. I'm your host, Richard Train, executive coach, leadership and culture consultant, and I'm joined by my good friend Jim Bob Howard, veteran technical consultant. Together we have more than 60 years combined of business and organizational experience. The purpose of this podcast is to have short but meaningful discussions about the people and culture side of business and how owners and executives can be both kind and successful.

SPEAKER_01

So last episode we talked about who's fielding these calls and why the stakes have changed. But today you want to get inside the caller's head, right?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, I mean, it really it's the psychology of the caller. And I think that it's more than just being prepared to answer their questions. I think that's what most companies mistakenly do.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

It's not just the preparation because they're missing something very important, and that's they're missing what the caller is actually trying to decide, not just the questions that they're asking.

SPEAKER_01

So what is it that the caller is trying to decide?

SPEAKER_00

You know, one of my favorite old teachers basically, when I got into sales for the first time, right out of college, I was working with a sales trainer who used to say that everybody walks around with this invisible sign on their chest that says, make me feel important. And that's the first of the two silent questions that everybody who calls a business, whether it's an existing customer or a prospective customer or whatever, anybody doing anything. I don't care if you're walking into a sandwich shop. It's make me feel important. How are you going to make, will you make me feel important? That's question number one.

unknown

Okay.

SPEAKER_00

And question number two is will you be easy to do business with? Now, most people, Jim Bob, have no idea that they're even asking that those questions. But they feel it. It's an emotional thing.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. Yeah, and that's true. I mean, whether I'm calling to order something online or I'm, you know, making reservations, or I'm walking into a store or whatever, there's a reason why I'm calling. Sure. But the silent questions, like you said, underneath are, you know, are they gonna make me feel like I'm valuable, right? That I matter. And then how easy are they gonna be to do business with? And once I've answered those, like, you know, then whatever I was actually there for comes along. But I may decide not to do business with them. I may not may decide not to ask my question, right?

SPEAKER_00

Because And there are businesses all across well-known, very large corporations that people do business with because they're just so easy to do business with. How many packages do you get delivered to your house from one very large mega corporation like I do? You know, because they're just so darn easy to do business with. Doesn't necessarily mean that they make you feel important, but we as consumers or as business people make a choice and it is that fast. And ultimately, it's a no-brainer when you are working with somebody who makes you feel important and is easy to do business with at the same time. Right. If they answer all the rest of your questions and all those other kinds of things, that's a bonus. Yeah. But that's something that everybody has to answer for themselves. And here's the funny thing: it is the easiest thing in the world for any company to do.

SPEAKER_01

Really?

SPEAKER_00

It is they they just they just need a structure for training their people.

SPEAKER_01

Okay, gotcha. Gotcha. So, because these questions are not they're not information questions, right? You know your information, right? These aren't that's not they're they're emotional questions. They want to know they're absolutely emotional that you've got to answer regardless of what your informational answers are, right? You it's making them feel like they matter and then making it easy to do business with you, right?

SPEAKER_00

Well, look, as people we make decisions emotionally, but we justify it logically because you will make a decision to spend your money, whether it's for business or personal reasons, on the things that you want that make you feel good in some way, right? Whether you feel like you want it or need it, and you will justify it with whatever logic supports that.

SPEAKER_01

Gotcha. So give me some examples of of what that actually looks like for a company to handle that well.

SPEAKER_00

So ultimately, you want people to understand that they have called the right place.

SPEAKER_01

Right.

SPEAKER_00

That this is the right place. I mean, so just a little bit of role play here. Hi, this is Richard. Thanks for calling XYZ Company. I can help you.

SPEAKER_01

Thanks for taking my call, uh, Richard. Um, I've I've recently come across some widgets that I knew to try to find. I think your company has them. I just wanted to see if I can check and see what the price is.

SPEAKER_00

I'm absolutely happy to answer that for you and give you the price. But first, before I do, we've got four different kinds. I want to make sure I'm getting you the right one. So give me a little bit of an idea of how you're gonna use it. What is your goal here?

SPEAKER_01

Well, my wife wants me to build this wreath to go on the front door, right? And so there's a specific kind of widget that she wants to put on it.

SPEAKER_00

Okay. All right, so uh about how heavy is this gonna be?

SPEAKER_01

Oh, gosh. Good question. Um, it can't be too heavy. It's going on a glass door, right? So it's gonna on one of those little those little hooks from the land strip hooks.

SPEAKER_00

So I don't know, maybe all right, that makes sense. I want you to know you called the right place. We've got exactly what I think that will work for you. Okay, and it it's model X, and it's gonna cost this.

SPEAKER_01

Great, great. How quickly can you get it to me?

SPEAKER_00

Uh, I'll have to get your your contact information, make sure that we've got would you like us to ship it to you or have it ready for you to pick up? What would be the best?

SPEAKER_01

If I could pick it up, that'd be great. She wants it. She wants this done by the weekend.

SPEAKER_00

So excellent. So we're located at 123 14th Street, and we're open till X time. Super. So you get my point. Yeah. So the first thing I wanted to do was point out number one, I'm listening to you. Yeah. You're being heard. So you're important. So I want to know what you're using it for. And number two, I want you to know that we're the ones that can supply that to you. You know, you call the right place. Yeah. Not too bad for just making this stuff up on the fly. But it comes down to something very simple. We didn't practice any script, did we? No. Okay. This is just simply listening to you.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

And and hearing what it is that you're saying. That was why I wrote up Answer Me back in 2010 and I've continually updated it.

SPEAKER_01

So that's something that you could actually train for, right? So it's not, it's in addition to, or it's like, I don't know. I mean, I think some people are just really good listeners, but are you saying that you can train people that don't consider themselves to be good listeners how to be good listeners so that they can actually make someone feel like they're worthwhile, right? Or that they matter to the company.

SPEAKER_00

Before I answer that, let me explain one thing. It's very important to understand this. Most customer service positions are being hollowed out right now.

unknown

Okay.

SPEAKER_00

Or removed because the fact that most businesses are doing whatever they can to conserve costs. Right. So what happens is the people who are taking the inbound calls that still remain, like we talked about last time, there are fewer calls, right? Yeah. So the people who are taking these calls are doing other things too. They're usually in more entry-level positions. They're usually some of the newer people on staff. And they are some of the least trained in what to do once all that marketing takes hold and people are calling, and they finally get through your advanced phone system. And they want once they finally get through because they still have questions, the person who's taking the call is not necessarily trained on how to handle somebody who just needs to talk to a person and needs more specific information than your phone bot can handle. So that's the situation that's happening. Here's the problem: most of these people are not trained in how to handle this kind of call. And it is very easy to be able to train them. The most important thing is to provide them a structure that they know what to say and how to say it without necessarily having to use a script. And it all has to do with listening. So this is really a leadership-level situation that needs to happen because somebody needs to take control of that call. Think about our little role play that we just did. You were asking a specific question, and I was doing what I could to make sure that you were fitting into a certain model of the information that I needed in order to help you. So all of this stuff can be trained. And that's the important thing. If you depended as a business owner on me having this great phone personality, then that's great if I do. But it's hit and miss, especially when you're talking about the lowest trained, the lowest paid in the company. But if you have a structure, you can train the structure. You can't necessarily train personality because my personality may be great one day, and then I may be off the next day. So it's inconsistent.

SPEAKER_01

So we're not talking training being handing somebody a script and helping them learn how to deliver it or how to jump to the objections, you know, when they get it, right? It's not a that that's not what we're talking about here. So give me some examples of what this actually looks like.

SPEAKER_00

You know, it's very interesting. When people call, they could ask simple questions and a CSR can answer them, and they sound polite. So just simply answering the question, what's what's the price? Yeah. They answer the question, and somebody says, okay, thank you very much. Goodbye. But what they don't do is get any more discovery kinds of information. That's where it goes wrong. Because I could be asking for a lot of different reasons. So for instance, asking questions like what's the price, or anything logistical like deliveries and things like that, callers rarely ask exactly what they mean. They're trying to determine things like, are you worth my money? Is this the right experience for me? Can I trust you to deliver this well? It's not just what you're delivered like. It's can I trust you?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

So these are all trust-related questions. So they're basically trying to test the waters because remember what we talked about last time? They've already done their research. So they're now calling and they're trying to find out what matters. And if you just answer the questions directly and even politely, that's not necessarily the right thing. You need to know more.

SPEAKER_01

So paint me a picture of a call that actually works. And what's different about it?

SPEAKER_00

So when the person on the other end of the line uh feels like they were actually heard, kind of like what we were talking about in that little role play of ours, when they feel like they were actually heard, and that me as the CSR was not just simply processing your request, that's when it goes right. You know, at some point in the call, someone slowed down and asked some questions before answering.

SPEAKER_01

Right.

SPEAKER_00

That's how easy it is. Just find out a little bit more, do a little bit more discovery. And discovery is one of the five main parts of a successful call that I teach in Answer Me. And that the caller basically is guided somewhere, not just given information and sent on their way. And if they don't know what happens next, then it didn't go right. So at the end of a call, the caller needs to know what they originally called for, the the the initial information. They need to feel like they were taken care of and they need to know what happens next.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, and they don't want to be in the dark, they want to know what the next steps are, right?

SPEAKER_00

And it doesn't have to be a long call, it doesn't have to be like me string things out. There are words that I have to say, like on some script. Just as long as you get what you need and you feel like I took care of it, and I was thinking about what your needs were. Gotcha. This has been great. So, next episode, where does this go? So, next episode, we've been talking about what the caller is experiencing. We talked about the psychology of the caller, and we've talked a little bit about the CSR themselves. Next episode, we're gonna really talk about the why the usual fixes don't really work. You know, scripts, why scripts are bad, um, training events, how most companies train their people to just be better. You know, as if just saying be a little stronger in your language or something like that is actually going to work. Good intentions alone don't produce consistent outcomes. So there has to be something underneath them. Yeah, that's great. So, all right, we'll get to it next time. Sounds good. Thanks for joining us for this episode of the Nice Business Podcast. We hope you got some valuable information and inspiration. We're always looking for great stories that will help your business be more kind and successful. And if you know of one we should hear or someone that would be a great interview, please let us know. To contact me, click the link here to go to my website or use this QR code. I wish you a nice business.