How star performers manage the sales call anxiety | Professional Capital

Willem Verbeke & Richard P. Bagozzi

Sales Call Anxiety: Exploring What ItMeans When Fear Rules a Sales

EncounterThe goal of this study is to develop and test a conceptualization of sales call anxiety (SCA) on the basis of currentinsights from the cognitive approach to social anxiety. Sales call anxiety is an irrepressible fear of being negativelyevaluated and rejected by a customer, and it is coupled with a desire to avoid undertaking specific functional actionsin selling situations. The authors present and test a model of SCA in two selling situations known to have threat-ening consequences for salespeople: canvasing and closing. The authors find that SCA consists of four compo-nents: negative self-evaluations, negative evaluations from customers, awareness of physiological symptoms (e.g.,a queasy stomach, shaky voice, blushing), and protective actions (e.g., avoiding eye contact, fiddling with thehands, shunning self-disclosures). The authors show that these dimensions are functions of negative affectivity andanxiety-provoking contextual cues and that they negatively influenced the performance of 189 mortgage sales-people.

We have more fears than we need and it seems that ourutterly efficient fear conditioning system, combined withan extremely powerful ability to think about our fears andinability to control them, is probably at fault.

—Ttie Emotionat Brain, Joseph LeDoux

1 reluctance" or the fear of making contactwith the customer has long been recognized bysalespeople as a problem. However, no

researchers have investigated the nature of this frequentlydebilitating symptom (Ingram, LaForge, and Schwepker1997; Weitz, Castleberry, and Tanner 1992). Part of the prob-lem is that call reluctance and fear of making a contact havelargely been left undefined. To provide a basis for theresearch described in this article, we define sates catt anxiety(SCA) as the fear of being negatively evaluated and rejectedby customers, which is accompanied by urges to avoid con-tact with customers or, when contact is made, to refrain frominteracting effectively and asking for a commitment.

It is estimated that SCA is prevalent in selling situationsand will reach intense levels for up to 40% of salespeople atsome points in their careers (Ray 1995). A need exists tounderstand better what SCA is, when it occurs, and how tomanage it.

The goal of this article is to develop a conceptualizationof SCA that is grounded in current insights from the cogni-tive approach to social anxiety. Specifically, we focus onhow SCA unfolds in two selling situations (canvasing and

Willem Verbeke is SMA Chair Professor in Sales and Account Manage-ment, Erasmus University. Richard P Bagozzi is J. Hugh Liedtke Professorof Management and Professor of Psychology, Rice University, and DwightF. Benton Professor of Behavioral Science in Management, BusinessSchool, University of Michigan. The authors express their gratitude to theanonymous JM reviewers for the many constructive recommendationsthey made during the review process and to Miriam Houben for herInsightful suggestions.

closing) and how it affects the salesperson's ability to inter-act with customers. In addition, we propose an operational-ization of SCA and investigate how SCA relates to person-ality traits, anxiety-provoking contextual cues, andperformance. Our conceptualization and empirical investi-gation is designed to provide managers with a way to rec-ognize and understand why salespeople seek to avoid under-taking appropriate actions before and during a sales call. Wealso discuss how SCA can be controlled to the benefit of thesalesperson and firm.

The article proceeds as follows. First, we explore the con-cept of SCA on the basis of recent conceptualizations of socialanxiety developed by Clark and Wells (1995) and others (e.g..Barlow 1988; Wells and Matthews 1994). We discuss the sit-uation specificity of SCA, as well as its antecedents and con-sequences. Then, using a sample of 189 salespeople, weinvestigate how SCA manifests itself during cold canvasingand closing a sale, two prototypical selling situations knownto cause fear in many salespeople. We then propose manage-rial implications and future research questions.

Memory Processes and SellingIn the field of sales management, there is agreement thatsalespeople's use of declarative and procedural memory sys-tems during customer interaction depends on the amount ofattention resources that a salesperson has available in agiven situation (e.g., Szymansky 1988). In addition, someresearchers have pointed out that metaknowledge (e.g.,working smarter or the willingness to learn) affects the waysalespeople use selling situation categories and the waysthey apply scripts during the sales interaction (Sujan, Weitz,and Kumar 1994). However, only a few studies have inves-tigated the role of memory processes with regard to emo-tional behavior in making a sale (e.g., Badovick, Hadaway,and Kaminski 1992; Brown, Cron, and Slocum 1997). Forexample, on the basis of research by Bagozzi, Baumgartner,

88 / Journal of Marketing, July 2000Journat of tVtarketingVol. 64 (July 2000), 88-101

and Pieters (1998), Brown, Cron, and Slocum (1997) showthat selling can be regarded as a goal-directed activity andthat, in the pursuit of the sales goal, anticipated emotionalreactions to success or failure influence the actions that thesalesperson takes. In other words, goal pursuit and subse-quent performance can be regarded as under self-control,but cognitive and emotional processes also initiate andguide goal pursuit (Bagozzi 1992).

Implicit in the process of goal pursuit, but not studied todate, is how instrumental acts—such as selling tactics dur-ing customer interactions—are maintained or abandoned atleast temporarily, after they are initiated, and then possiblyreactivated. Simon (1967) was one of the first theorists tosuggest that the cognitive control of purposive action isfacilitated by what he termed "interrupt mechanisms" orwhat psychologists now call "cognitive interference" or"attentional disruption" (Sarason and Sarason 1986). Bythis, Simon meant that ongoing goal-directed behaviors areoften evaluated, modified, and even forsaken before a goalis reached, but purely cognitive mechanisms cannot accountfor such occurrences. Simon (1967) speculated that humanemotions interrupt the cognitive control of action, so thatnew assessments of progress and goal commitment can bemade and changes instituted as required. However, he neveridentified the emotional processes or the way they operate.

Social Anxiety and CognitiveInterference

Social anxiety is a strong emotion that functions as an impor-tant interrupt mechanism in goal-directed sales behaviors.How might social anxiety manifest itself in a sales situation?A salesperson may experience anxiety in anticipation of crit-icism from a supervisor, rejection by coworkers, ridicule bypeers, conflicts between work and family pressures, or con-Ilicts between company policies and moral standards. Butprobably the most salient causes of SCA for salespeople arethe fear of failure and the disapproval and repudiation bycustomers. Indeed, research in sales management suggeststhat when salespeople fail, it negatively affects their feelingsof self-esteem (Goodwin, Mayo, and Hill 1997) and attribu-tions used to explain failure, which in turn affect motivation(Johnston and Kim 1994) and emotions negatively(Badovick, Hadaway, and Kaminski 1992). Thus, comparedwith many other occupations, personal selling seems to con-tain inordinate opportunities for social anxiety because of itsvery nature, which includes the possibility of multiple rejec-tions and failures on a daily basis and the effects of thispotential on feelings and thoughts about the self.

To understand how SCA might occur in different situa-tions, we focus especially on cognitive theories of socialanxiety, as they have attracted considerable attentionrecently in psychology and lead to practical remedies forpeople suffering from social anxiety (Wells 1998).

Early research by Ellis (1962) and Beck (1976) suggeststhat anxious people possess hypervalent cognitive schemas(called "memory biases") that continuously present a viewof reality as dangerous and the self as vulnerable. To theextent that anxious people possess these schemata, they willmore likely appraise or perceive a myriad of situations as

threatening, which in turn reduces their belief that they canhandle the situations or cope with them properly. Bothappraisals, which interfere with memory processes duringconversations, are thought to occur automatically and repre-sent an ongoing integrated process. Although Beck hasupdated his theory (e.g.. Beck and Freeman 1990), otherresearchers have refined schema theory to describe and treatspecific types of anxiety disorders, such as social anxiety.The most well-known theories in this regard include Bar-low's (1988) anxious apprehensioh theory, Clark andWells's (1995) cognitive approach to social anxiety, andRachman's (1998) anxiety model. In contrast to previousapproaches that viewed social anxiety as a pathology, thenewer theories regard many anxiety-related problems ascommon errors of normal functioning rather than as signs ofdeep-rooted abnormalities (Rachman 1998, p. 64). We termthese theories "attention-based cognitive anxiety models"(see the next section). Attention-based cognitive anxietymodels differ from the pathological conceptions of anxietyin the following ways:

1. Early theories focused on how vigilant schemata contribute toanxiety responses, whereas researchers now focus on attentionbiases and cognitive processes that are produced in specificsituations that contain threat-related stimuli. As we discusssubsequently, the attention of people with anxiety is focusedon extemal signals as well as intemally produced signals, suchas physiological symptoms that typify anxiety. As Mineka andNugent (1995, p. 187) suggest, anxiety is associated with con-tinuous monitoring of a situation for signals of potential threatand requires a cognitive system that scans for such threats.

2. The persistency of social anxiety is reinforced by character-istics of the anxiety response itself That is, the behavioralresponses that emerge from dysfunctional appraisals areoften involved in the maintenance of danger appraisals andbeliefs about situations, as well as people's beliefs aboutthemselves in those situations. In other words, if anxiouspeople avoid or tlee from threatening situations, they neververify whether the situations were truly dangerous and thusmaintain anxiety and thwart learning. This perspective haspromoted contemporary remedies rooted in learning how tocontrol attentional processes and beliefs (e.g.. Barlow 1988;Rachman 1998; Wells et al. 1995).

3. Some research shows that people with certain personalitytraits develop situation-specific feelings of anxiety (e.g..Barlow 1988; Rachman 1998). Among these traits are neg-ative affectivity (NA) and anxiety sensitivity. Althoughsome people are prone to developing social anxieties in oneor more social situations, they do not do so necessarily in allsocial situations, which suggests the need to specifyanxiety-provoking cues in any particular context.

Attention-Based Cognitive AnxietyModels and the Components of SCAPeople suffering from social anxiety typically have a strongdesire to convey a particular favorable impression of them-selves to others, yet they have a marked insecurity abouttheir ability to do so (Clark and Wells 1995). In particular,when they enter threatening social situations, they believethey are in danger of behaving in an inept and unacceptablefashion, and they think that such behaviors will have nega-tive consequences such as of loss of self worth, status, andrejection (see Clark and Wells 1995, p. 69). Researchers

Sales Call Anxiety / 89

stress that these thoughts enter people's minds only in diffi-cult or amhiguous situations, in which the self-doubt eruptsmore or less automatically. Clark and Wells (1995) and Bar-low (1988) conceive of these anxious thoughts as "anxietyprograms," which are complex constellations of cognitive,somatic, affective, and behavioral changes that are designedto protect a person from harm in objectively dangerous envi-ronments. When they are activated by cues in the situation,these anxiety programs amplify the perceived danger inthose situations. Attention to threatening or ambiguousaspects of the situation takes priority over other cues. Thisnarrowed focus of attention heightens the arousal of anxietythat subsequently becomes the focus of attention, an effectthat causes people to find further evidence for perceiveddanger. As a consequence, attention overload sometimesoccurs, which negatively affects people's ability to handlesocial interactions and the quality of interpersonal commu-nication. In a selling situation, this may elicit negative reac-tions from customers, which anxious salespeople in turnperceive as proof of their inability to handle similar situa-tions. Finally, some of the self-generated symptoms mightproduce further symptoms (e.g., talking too fast is oftenaccompanied by hyperventilation and increased heart rate).These self-amplifying or paniclike behaviors have beenobserved by psychologists (Clark and Wells 1995) as well asby such applied scholars as Dudley and Goodson (1992, p.77), who have found that "doomsayers experience panicattacks" in personal selling contexts.'

Two more characteristics must be added to this self-rein-forcing anxiety process. First, people high in social anxietyare motivated to search for information that gives themclues about how others think about them. But when peoplesuspect that others negatively evaluate them, they avoidexamining the full extent of the negative evaluations,because they are afraid that people might reject them if theyask for feedback. Second, after experiencing negative socialevents, people suffering from social anxiety tend to rumi-nate excessively about what went wrong. This ruminationreinforces their fears of the situation and reduces their feel-ings of self-efficacy for handling similar situations in thefuture.

Dimensions of SCASales call anxiety can be considered a special case of socialanxiety (Rachman 1998). On the basis of the work of Clarkand Wells (1995), who investigate general social anxiety, wepropose the following:

H|: Sales call anxiety comprises four dimensions: negativeself-evaluations, perceived negative evaluations from cus-tomers, imagined physiological symptoms, and urges toperform protective actions.

The four dimensions of SCA are thought to occur during,and even before, encounters with customers.

The first dimension of SCA involves negative evalua-tions of the self that arise in anticipation of a specific

'Doomsayers, according to Dudley and Goodson (1992), aresalespeople who believe beforehand that they will fail. This pro-motes a type of call reluctance.

encounter with a customer (e.g., in cold canvasing or clos-ing a sale). These negative expectations entail rumina-tions about past failures, negative images of the self inprevious as well as anticipated sales encounters, andexaggerated considerations of what can go wrong andhow the salesperson might fail. Examples might include"I will not remember all the selling points and will havetrouble getting the words out" or "I will be nervous andwill lose control and look foolish." In summary, one char-acteristic of SCA is salespeople's insecurity about theirability to perform well and convey a positive impressionto customers.

The second dimension of SCA is imagined negativeevaluations from customers. People who have high socialanxiety have a strong desire to convey favorable impres-sions of themselves to others, which is coupled with a strongneed to know what others think about them (Clark and Wells1995; Pozo et al. 1991). Yet their insecurity about their abil-ity to perform and communicate a positive image, which isexacerbated by excessive rumination about past failures andimages of future failure, creates strong anticipatory socialanxiety. Research suggests further that people high in socialanxiety tend to set unrealistically high standards for socialperformance (Clark and Wells 1995). Examples mightinclude "I must get every customer to like me" or "I mustnot ever show signs that I do not know my product or do notbelieve in my product."

A third dimension of SCA is salespeople's physiologicalsymptoms, which they use to infer customers' reactions tothemselves and to appraise how well they are doing overall.Common reactions to SCA, which are largely uncontrol-lable at least at the outset, are a pounding heart, an unsteadyvoice, blushing, sweating, and shaky hands. Physiologicalsymptoms reflect the fact that social anxiety is mediatedprimarily by the sympathetic nervous system. However, theparasympathetic nervous system sometimes comes intoplay as well and is manifested by a drop in blood pressureand accompanying feelings of dizziness or weakness. More-over, it has been found that people who have high socialanxiety tend to overestimate how negatively others evaluatethem in interpersonal exchanges (Rapee and Lim 1992;Stopa and Clark 1993), which amplifies the communica-tors' perceptions of their own physiological symptoms andfurther increases social anxiety. A preoccupation with phys-iological symptoms causes salespeople to see themselvesfrom the point of view of the customer, and this adds totheir negative self-evaluation (e.g., "The customer sees thatI am nervous and sweating profusely and will think I amincompetent").

The final dimension of SCA involves urges to performprotective actions. These are similar to what clinical psy-chologists term "safety-seeking behaviors" (e.g., Clark andWells 1995; Wells et al. 1995), or what psychologists callemotion-regulatory processes or coping responses (Barret1995; Lazarus and Folkman 1984; Thoits 1990). Psycholo-gists have found that one of the symptoms or concomitantsof social anxiety is an automatic reaction that reduces orrelieves the negative effects of anxiety. Protective actionsencompass a wide range of coping responses, many ofwhich are involuntary but some of which can be learned or

90 / Journal of Marketing, July 2000

unlearned to a certain extent as personal policies. Examplesof the more involuntary protective actions are gazing awayand avoiding eye contact, speaking quickly, and fiddlingwith the hands. Protective actions more subject to self-con-trol entail avoiding self-disclosures, saying less, controllingthe breathing (e.g., taking deep breaths, breathing slowly),or standing still. It also entails salespeople focusing on theirown and the customer's voice and feet or holding ontoobjects. Withdrawal from contact and avoidance of futurecontact are extreme and usually dysfunctional protectiveactions.

In accordance with Clark and Wells (1995), we believeit is fruitful to conceive of SCA as functioning in two ways.First, SCA manifests itself along a continuum from no socialanxiety to severe, debilitating social anxiety; second, SCAmanifests itself in a broad range of situations known to pro-voke social anxiety. More concretely, one salesperson mightexperience intense SCA during cold canvasing but onlymoderate levels of SCA during the finalizing stages in salesconversation, or vice versa, whereas others might experi-ence high SCA in both situations (e.g., Dudley and Goodson1992). Similarly, Singh and Rhoads (1991) suggest that asalesperson might experience role ambiguity related to col-leagues but not to customers, and vice versa. When SCA isexamined as a situation-specific enigma, it appears lesspathological and therefore perhaps more manageable if wefocus on the self-attentive processes that cause anxiety inthose situations. This situation-specific perspective is at thecenter of discussion among specialists working on socialphobia (e.g., Heckelman and Schneier 1995; Rachman1998). Therefore,

H2: Salespeople undergo SCA as a matter of degree that rangesfrom low to high levels of intensity. Two common contextsin which salespeople face SCA are canvasing (cold call-ing) and closing the sale.

Antecedents and Consequences of SCAPersonatity as an antecedent of SCA. Although the focus

of our research is situational aspects of SCA, we also wish toinvestigate one antecedent to social anxiety identified in psy-chology and organizational behavior research. Negative affec-tivity is a disposition of mood and indicates the general vul-nerability of people to experiencing aversive emotional states:"High-NA individuals tend to be distressed and upset and havea negative view of self, whereas those low in the dimension arerelatively content and secure and satisfied with themselves"(Watson and Clark 1984, p. 465). We think of NA as a type oftrait social anxiety, a personality characteristic that endows orpredisposes people to react emotionally in a particular wayacross many situations. Watson and Clark (1984, p. 465) notethat NA is a unidimensional construct, and people scoring highin NA possess chronic subjective feelings of nervousness, ten-sion, and worry. Furthermore, Watson and Clark (1984, p. 466,emphasis in original) posit that NA manifests itself even in theabsence of any overt stress and people high in NA are, "in anygiven situation, more titcety to experience a significant level ofdistress." In summary, NA is a disposition that reflects indi-vidual differences in the general propensity to experience neg-ative emotions and have a negative view of the self.

Some research supports the effects of NA on job stressand job strain for professional and managerial personnel inan insurance company (Brief et al. 1988) and for employeesacross a wide range of companies (Chen and Spector 1991;see also Watson and Pennebaker 1989). Thus, we proposethe following:

H3: Negative affectivity will positively influence SCA.

That is, we expect NA to increase the salesperson's SCA inparticular situations. Support for this hypothesis can befound in Watson and Clark's (1984, p. 466) review of the lit-erature, in which they document that high-trait anxious peo-ple react more strongly to stressful situations but, in theabsence of stress, tend to be no more anxious than those lowin NA. Likewise, given the tendency of high-NA people tofixate on and magnify mistakes, frustrations, disappoint-ments, and threats (Watson and Clark 1984, p. 466), weexpect that NA should also accentuate SCA. In addition tomain effects for NA, we explore whether NA interacts withanxiety-provoking cues to infiuence SCA.

Dependence of SCA on situationat cues. Canvasing andclosing are distinct global settings in which selling occurs,but the real determinants of SCA are particular anxiety-provoking cues that function within these settings. Differentanxiety-provoking cues can be identified for canvasing andclosing. This interpretation is consistent with modern defin-itions of social anxiety that regard it as "a persistent fear ofone or more social or performance situations in which a per-son is exposed" (American Psychiatric Association 1994,pp. 416-17; see also Wells and Mathews 1994).

For canvasing, one source of anxiety arises when sales-people must initiate contacts with prospects who are of ahigher rank or social status. The salespeople are put in anawkward position because of differences in expectations andcustoms that might arise as well as the uncertainty whetherdeference must be shown, and if so, how, when, and howmuch. A second source of anxiety in canvasing settings is thenear-universal reaction people have to meeting new people.Without prior knowledge of the needs, style, and other char-acteristics of a prospect, the salesperson is asked to face a setof unknowns that could thwart the initial encounter. A thirdsource of anxiety stems from the need to create a favorablefirst impression and convey specific positive qualities of theselling organization and its offerings. In summary, canvasingpresents a vague and ambiguous situation in which things cango wrong and the salesperson is vulnerable to rejection andfailure. The anticipation of concerns about the unknown acti-vates SCA programs. In summary, we suggest the following:

H4: Sales call anxiety will be provoked to the extent that sales-people are sensitive to difficulties in dealing with new cus-tomers, higher status customers, and the conveyance ofpositive qualities of their firm and its products, three facetsof canvasing.

For closing, the strongest source of anxiety is the antic-ipation of asking for a commitment and being rejected. Somuch rides on obtaining a commitment that the dread offailure is a real and feared consequential outcome. Anticipa-tory anxiety here can lead to cycles of approach-avoidance,procrastination, and strong apprehension. Another source of


anxiety is the thought of admitting failure to a supervisorand explaining why a failure occurred. Therefore, we submitthe following:

H5: Sales call anxiety will be provoked to the extent thatsalespeople are sensitive to difficulties associated withasking for a commitment and discussing their performancein this regard with their supervisor, two aspects of closingsales.

Performance-related consequences of SCA. Sales callanxiety intrudes into goal-directed activities and potentiallyinfiuences performance negatively. How might this happen?One way that performance might be negatively affected isthrough the interference that social anxiety produces incustomer-seller exchanges. Parallel to psychologicalresearchers, we expect social anxiety to drain or limit sales-people's attentional resources and so interfere with theirability to process social cues (Clark and Wells 1995; Rach-man 1998). Related to this is the general tendency in peoplehigh in social anxiety not to "check out what is really hap-pening" in interpersonal encounters (Clark and Wells 1995,p. 72). People who have high social anxiety "are not datadriven but function rather like an automatic program whichis activated in a social situation," and this leads them "to runthrough a repertoire of negative thoughts without really pay-ing attention to what is happening in the situation" (Stopaand Clark 1993, p. 264). This behavior is dysfunctional forpersonal selling, in which complex communications ofneeds and offers and counteroffers are necessary for success.

But not only failures in attention occur as a consequenceof social anxiety in interpersonal communication. Excessiveself-focus, negative self-evaluations, and overestimation ofhow negatively others view the self can lead to protectiveactions that make the salesperson high in SCA come acrossas unfriendly and unresponsive. This, in turn, can elicit sim-ilar reactions from customers. The result can be a break-down in communication and lowered performance.

Likewise, when social anxiety induces or is accompa-nied by negative self-evaluations by salespeople, they maybecome discouraged and avoid certain interactions. Even ifthey do not give up completely, salespeople high in SCAmay become distracted by their feelings and physiologicalsymptoms, which makes them work nervously and displayless attention to the task at hand. Disruptive social anxietymay also interfere with working smart (Sujan, Weitz, andKumar 1994). All these reactions can depress performance.As a consequence, we propose the following:

Hg! The greater the perceived SCA, the poorer is the perfor-mance in terms of communication effectiveness and salesvolume.

MethodSalespeople and ProcedureA total of 500 questionnaires was sent to salespeople from asubdivision of a large Dutch bank. The salespeople sellmortgages to consumers. Of these salespeople, 196 returnedthe questionnaires. After eliminating incomplete question-naires, we ended up with a final sample of 189 salespeople.

for a 38% response rate. On the basis of comparisons ofsociodemographic characteristics and length of tenure, nosignificant differences were found between respondents andthe entire sales force.

Mortgage sellers are ideal subjects for a study of SCAbecause they engage in extensive cold canvasing, face manyrejections in the course of a day, work in a competitive envi-ronment, are compensated on the basis of commission, andundergo constant pressure to sell to customers across a widespectrum of status and other differences. The sample can bedescribed as follows: A majority of the salespeople weremen (approximately 60%), most were younger than 35 yearsof age (approximately 52%), and a few salespeople (approx-imately 9%) were more than 50 years of age. With respect toexperience, approximately 10% of the sample had been withthe organization less than 2 years, and almost 55% had beenwith the company between 6 and 20 years. Finally, mostsalespeople had finished basic and advanced vocationalstudies, but only 1 % had a university or college degree. Thisprofile is typical of mortgage salespeople across Europe.

Questionnaire DesignTo construct a pool of items for measuring each of the vari-ables under study, focus group interviews were organized,and several tests were administered in stages, as DeVellissuggests (1991). Managers were asked to identify situationsin which their salespeople encounter apprehension problemswhen selling. The managers identified canvasing and clos-ing as the most anxiety-provoking contexts for selling mort-gage-related products. The identification of canvasing andclosing as general anxiety-provoking contexts is consistentwith basic research in psychology on anxiety. Indeed, a keydefining element of social anxiety is that it occurs in situa-tions that imply initial encounters (e.g., new customers),consist of people who are regarded as having power or sta-tus, or place the person in a conspicuous position that is dif-ficult to escape physically (Beatty 1988, Buss 1980; Learyand Kowalski 1995). Thus, analogous to when a personstands before an audience to give a speech, canvasing andclosing demand that the salesperson make actual contactwith a customer and provide specific information andrequests. To avoid doing this or to flee from such encoun-ters, which is an urge salespeople with SCA frequently feel,would be dysfunctional for the salesperson and the firm.Canvasing and closing are also two activities that occupymuch of the time of mortgage salespeople in the setting athand and are among the most important tasks they perform.

Therefore, questions presented to subsequent focusgroups were tailored to address these two prototypical con-texts to generate items for the final questionnaire. First,items that refiect the four dimensions of SCA typical forcanvasing and closing were generated for presentation infocus groups (as proposed by Clark and Wells 1995; Leary1991; Patterson and Ritts 1997; Salkovskis 1991; Trowerand Gilbert 1989). Second, for each of the two situations, wegenerated specific anxiety-provoking cues by asking sales-people to specify particular events and experiences that cre-ated the most anxiety for them. Five anxiety-provoking cueswere identified: three for cold canvasing (i.e., dealing withhigher-status customers; preparing for and communicating


with new, unknown customers; and conveying positive char-acteristics of the bank and its offerings) and two for closing(i.e., asking for a commitment and discussing performancewith the sales manager). All items contributed to the initialitem pool were evaluated for relevance and understandabil-ity by salespeople and sales managers. It should be notedthat the salespeople who participated in focus group inter-views were not part of the final sampling.

Questions presented on the final questionnaire followedstandard practice in the literature. The actual questionnairewas administered in Dutch, but a rough English translationis presented here (for a list of all items discussed subse-quently, see the Appendix). To avoid carryover effects, thequestionnaires were printed in three different versionswherein different sections of the questionnaire were coun-terbalanced (Bickart 1993). The SCA items were introducedwith an instruction that attempted to put the salesperson inthe position of anticipating or engaging in a sales interac-tion. Specifically, the items were introduced with the fol-lowing question for cold canvasing: "You are having a firstconversation with a new and unknown customer. You willhave to ask many personal and significant questions aboutthe person's income, financial situation, and family situa-tion.... A successful conversation is important to you. Whatis going on in your mind?"

These instructions were followed by items designed tomeasure the four dimensions of SCA in canvasing situa-tions. For negative self-evaluations, six items were used(e.g., "I hope I will not shut down/clam up"). For negativeevaluations from customers, ten items were used (e.g., "Thecustomer will think that I do not come across convinc-ingly"). Physiological symptoms were measured by sevenitems (e.g., "I am nervous," "I cannot sit still during periodsof salience"). Finally, protective actions were measured withsix items (e.g., "I adopt a passive attitude"). Responses forthese SCA measures were recorded on seven-point, "com-pletely disagree" to "completely agree" scales.

For sales closing, the SCA items were introduced withthe following instructions:

After the orienting discussion with customers, you engagethe customer in conversation. You want to make tlnal tiiesale. During this phase, you need to communicate somedetails about the offer before the mortgage contract can besigned. You have communicated to your manager that youwill attempt to make final the sale, and now you realizethat obtaining the offer is important to you. What is goingon in your mind?

Similar to those for cold canvasing, the four dimensions ofSCA were measured separately for closing. Specifically, fornegative self-evaluations, six items were used (e.g., "I hopeI will not rattle off my words"). For negative evaluationsfrom customers, eight items were used (e.g., "He will laughat me afterward"). Physiological symptoms were measuredby seven items (e.g., "I become panicky"). Finally, protec-tive actions were measured with five items (e.g., "I offer thecustomer too many extras").

To measure cues within the four contexts that provokeSCA, we asked salespeople to respond to 24 items intro-duced by the following instructions: "In the following situ-ations, you might experience a certain amount of tension

and uneasy feelings. Please indicate the extent to which youexperience tension." Then the following items were pre-sented: 4 for meeting with customers of a higher status, 5 forpreparing for and communicating with new prospects, 4 forbeing assertive about themselves and the organization, 7 forapproaching and asking for a commitment from customers,and 4 for discussing performance with a manager. Re-sponses were recorded on seven-point, "never experiencetension" to "always experience tension" scales.

Performance was measured with a scale based onresearch by Behrman and Perreault (1984). One componentof performance referred to sales volume and was measuredwith five items (e.g., "exceeding all sales targets and objec-tives," "generating sales of new company products"). Thesecond component of performance addressed communica-tion quality in the sales interaction and was measured withfour items (e.g., "convincing customers that you understandtheir unique problems and concerns," "working out solu-tions to customers' questions or objections"). Finally, NAwas measured with a scale from Tellegen (1982). Twentyitems were used.

Scale DevelopmentExploratory factor analyses were performed on the items foreach scale. Maximum likelihood estimation with obliminrotation was done with SPSS (1993). The different dimen-sions of scales were analyzed, and items not satisfying thefollowing criteria were deleted: (1) dominant loadingsgreater than .40 and (2) cross-loadings less than .25. Crite-ria for accepting factors relied on inspection of the scree plot(Briggs and Cheek 1986; DeVellis 1991). The reliabilitiesfor items of dimensions of each scale were also assessed bymeans of Cronbach's alpha.

In Table 1, we summarize the results of factor analysesfor each scale: Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin of all the factor analy-ses are substantial. In addition, the factor loadings are gen-erally high, and the lowest loading is equal to .41. Noteespecially that two factors corresponding to cold canvasingand closing were found for negative self-evaluations and forperceived negative evaluations from others. The items mea-suring physiological responses and protective actions eachloaded on one factor. Not surprisingly, physiologicalresponses and protective actions reflect reactions that aregoverned by the autonomic nervous system and thus tend tobe invariant across different anxiety-provoking situations.We also present the reliabilities of each scale in Table 1. Thereliabilities are high and exceed the minimum of .70 recom-mended by Nunnally (1978). Finally, means and standarddeviations of measures are provided in Table 1.

Regression modelsTo take measurement error into account formally and avoidproblems of multicollinearity, we used LISREL (Joreskogand Sorbom 1996) to perform regressions. One set of regres-sions tested the effects of anxiety-provoking situations andNA on SCA: SCAj = f(anxiety provoking cuesj, NA); fourregressions were run, one for each dimension of SCA (i.e.,negative self-evaluation, negative evaluation from cus-tomers, physiological symptoms, and protective actions).Three anxiety-provoking cues (i.e., dealing with higher-


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status customers, meeting new customers, and conveyingqualities of the organization) plus NA were entered as inde-pendent variables for canvasing, and two anxiety-provokingcues (i.e., asking for commitment and anticipating discus-sion of performance with managers) plus NA were enteredas independent variables for closing sales. The second set ofregressions tested the effects of SCA on performance:performance^ - fCSCAj); two regressions were run, one foreach dimension of performance (i.e., communication perfor-mance and volume performance).

To test for interactions between NA and anxiety-provoking cues on SCA, we performed two analyses. First,we used classical regression analysis in which the maineffects of NA and anxiety-provoking cues, as well as theirinteraction, were entered. This approach uses full informa-tion but does not take into account measurement error. Sec-ond, to take into account measurement error, we split thesample at the median based on SCA and used structuralequation models to do the regressions. This approach doesnot use full information in the sense of classical regressionanalysis. Thus, there is a trade-off between the two proce-dures. Unfortunately, because of sample size restrictions andthe need to represent four interactions and five main effects,structural equation models with latent variables cannot beused both to take into account measurement error and to usefull information underlying the interactions.

ResultsIn Table 2, we summarize the findings for the regressionanalyses. In the top panel, low to moderately high amountsof variance in SCA are explained, and all anxiety-provokingcues influence the four dimensions of SCA during both can-vasing and closing. Nevertheless, several interesting pat-terns of results can be pointed out. During both canvasingand closing, the effects of anxiety-provoking stimuli aregreatest on physiological symptoms and protective actions.Yet strong effects are found on negative self-evaluations andnegative evaluations from customers for most anxiety-provoking stimuli. For each dimension of SCA, the effectsof the anxiety-provoking stimuli are roughly equal duringboth canvasing and closing. When closing and canvasing arecompared, the effects of anxiety-provoking stimuli on SCAare greater for the former. This occurs as well in the higherlevels of explained variance for the dimensions of SCA dur-ing closing compared with canvasing. Finally, NA influ-enced all fourdimensions of SCA during both canvasing andclosing. The effects of NA were generally higher on physio-logical symptoms and protective actions than on negativeself-evaluations and negative evaluations from customers,and higher coefficients occurred for closing than canvasing.

In the bottom panel of Table 2, relatively small but signif-icant proportions of variance are explained in performance bySCA. For both canvasing and closing, more variance isexplained in volume than communication performance. Phys-iological symptoms and protective actions have the largesteffects on performance, yet the effects of negative self-evalua-tions and negative evaluations from customers are substantial.

The tests for interaction revealed that NA does not mod-erate effects of anxiety-provoking cues on SCA. No signifi-

cant interactions were found under either canvasing or clos-ing. Therefore, the results for the direct effects of NA onanxiety-provoking cues can be interpreted as main effects.

DiscussionSales call anxiety can be conceived as an intrusive and per-sistent apprehension about dealing with customers in partic-ular selling situations and is triggered by specific cues inthose situations. Rather than being a simple global fearresponse, however, SCA was found to consist of four com-ponents: negative self-evaluations, imagined negative eval-uations from customers, physiological responses, and pro-tective actions. The experience of SCA, which is believed tohappen largely automatically and unconsciously, was foundto differ between cold canvasing and closing for negativeself-evaluations and imagined negative evaluations fromcustomers. Anxiety-provoking cues had larger effects onnegative self-evaluation and negative evaluation from cus-tomers for closing than canvasing. In contrast, SCA withregard to physiological responses and protective actions wasinvariant across the two types of selling situations (i.e., sim-ilar physiological responses and protective actions, as afunction of anxiety-provoking cues, occurred during can-vasing and closing).

Negative self-evaluations involve insecurities withrespect to situational appearances or characteristics, actionsin sales encounters, or outcomes thereof. These are espe-cially manifested in ruminations about past failures or short-comings and images of difficulties and failure in anticipatedsales encounters. The danger of a preoccupation with nega-tive self-evaluations is that it can discourage and immobilizethe salesperson, limit attentional resources needed to remainalert as well as be adaptive, and disrupt the processing ofsocial cues and other aspects of interpersonal communica-tion when customers are engaged. An important characteris-tic of SCA is that salespeople generate anxiety programsautomatically. The data in this study suggest that SCApotentially makes salespeople vulnerable to dysfunctionalsocial anxiety across a variety of selling situations, and thisin turn negatively correlates with the salesperson's perfor-mance. Many salespeople who do not suffer from strongSCA may be able to hide their anxiety, because they chooseto focus on less threatening selling activities or consciouslyor unconsciously avoid situations that provoke anxiety.Consequently, they may be relatively unaware that theyexperience anxiety in a detrimental way.

Sales managers should learn to detect signs of SCA intheir salespeople. In many cases, sales managers will noticesecond-order effects of anxiety when sales force strategieschange or when salespeople change accounts. For example,imagine a change from a defender strategy to a prospectorstrategy, in which salespeople are instructed to increase theirquota of new customer contacts (Miles and Snow 1978).Such a change may be difficult for salespeople who feelanxious and threatened by such environmental and task dis-ruptions. Innovations in automated selling and managementmight be able to incorporate ways to monitor SCA here.Current decision support systems enable managers to detectuseful ratios (e.g., sales from new customers versus existing


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customers) that might indicate salespeople's preferences fordealing with existing as opposed to new customers. Imbal-ances resulting in too many sales from existing customersmight signal a problem in SCA for management to address.Sales managers should be careful not to jump to the conclu-sion that a salesperson in this case necessarily suffers fromSCA. It is possible that the salesperson lacks certain sellingskills and this deficit causes avoidance of new accountprospecting.

When a sales manager detects symptoms of SCA in oneor more salespeople, the next task is to make the salespeo-ple aware that their performance suffers from SCA. Man-agers then should inquire why their salespeople, for exam-ple, find it difficult to achieve closure during interactionswith customers. By doing so, the salespeople and their man-agers make the SCA programs explicit (e.g., " I now realizethat I do not visit new customers because I fear negativeconsequences of canvasing"). When they are made explicit,such disclosures can help both salespeople and sales man-agers start joint problem solving to overcome SCA. Thus,the sales manager should take a coaching attitude whensalespeople are prone to develop anxiety. One coaching sug-gestion for sales managers is that they should avoid anystigmatization about SCA. This can be done by suggestingto salespeople that anxiety is contingent on situational cuesthat can be anticipated and coped with and that everybodywill experience SCA to a certain degree now and then. Inother words, SCA is not necessarily a pathological problem(Rachman 1998). When salespeople recognize that they arevulnerable to anxiety in certain circumstances, this sets thestage for various corrective efforts by management and self-regulation by salespeople.

We propose that one or more of six different programscan be used to address SCA:

Freeing up memory space ttirough disconnected niind-futness. One approach to counteracting negative self-evalu-ations is to help salespeople reengineer their anxiety pro-grams. This might involve helping the salespersondisconfirm counterproductive thoughts and negative self-appraisals during a sales visit. Constructive self-analysescan be promoted by training the salesperson to ask suchquestions as "What evidence do you use to infer that the cus-tomer might not like you?" and "What signals do you lookfor when visiting customers?" Such questions might helpsalespeople develop self- and task-related metaknowledge(knowledge about their self-knowledge of SCA) thatenables them to break through the cycle of escalating antic-ipatory fears consciously (e.g., Clark and Wells 1995). Byteaching salespeople to focus on cues that reflect positiveinformation and avoid cues that normally trigger over-whelming fears, which tend to occupy the salespeople'smemory and prevent the activation of adaptive resources,the salespeople can learn to free up attentional resources.Key adaptive resources to emphasize include the matchingof customer needs to the seller's offerings and matching theselling strategy and specific appeals to customer type. Thisentails the adaptive selling tactics of "knowing what" and"knowing how" (Weitz 1978, 1981). Only by managinganxiety will it be possible for salespeople to practice adap-

tive selling behavior and work smarter (e.g., Spiro and Weitz1989; Sujan, Weitz, and Kumar 1994).

Reduction of approval seetcing. Imagined negative eval-uations from customers will be intensified to the extent thatsalespeople have an excessive need for approval but areafraid of asking for it (Baumeister and Leary 1995; Strick-land 1977). Therefore, it is advisable to (1) help salespeoplebetter understand what their self-worth is based on, so as notto overemphasize the need for approval (or to not be disap-proved) for its own sake, and (2) recruit salespeople who arenot obsessive in the need for approval and help themdevelop impression management techniques that focus moreon customer and product knowledge than on approval seek-ing and the need to belong, per se. This is not to suggest,however, that though the sales job is inherently stressful,sales managers should not seek to reduce, for example, rolestress. Role stress has been known to evoke feelings of jobtension and dysphoric cognitions (Singh 1993; Kramer1994), and those levels of job tension and dysphoric cogni-tions might make salespeople vulnerable to rejection by thecustomer and so bring about the development of SCA.

Relaxation. Sales call anxiety is also exhibited throughphysiological symptoms. Excessive self-focus on shakyhands, sweating, a quiver in the voice, or an upset stomachcan aggravate social anxiety and interfere with interpersonalcommunication. One way to offset the effects of physiolog-ical symptoms is to concentrate on relaxing the muscles dur-ing a sales interaction. Indeed, through practice, relaxationtechniques can have generalized, long-term effects on reduc-ing anxiety. In more extreme cases of SCA, such as beforeclosing a big deal that has been worked on for months, phar-macological agents such as beta-blockers may be called for(Liebowitz et al. 1988). Encouragement to engage in sportsor recreation outside work might promote relaxation andrenewal (Zillman, Johnson, and Day 1974). Some firms havein-house athletic facilities and counseling services and spon-sor periodic educational and recreational programs designedto relieve tension and social anxiety. Finally, with practice inselling and the development of interpersonal skills and prod-uct and customer knowledge, the negative effects of physio-logical symptoms should become easier to control.

Regutatory tactics. Protective actions, the fourth compo-nent of SCA, are potentially the most damaging in twosenses. At the point of salesperson-customer interactions,such protective actions as averting eye contact, speakingquickly, avoiding self-disclosures, or prematurely withdraw-ing in an effort to escape embarrassment can break downtrust and lead customers to question the competence of thesalesperson. Even before salespeople engage with customers,such protective actions as putting off calling a customer orother forms of procrastination, refusing to answer a tele-phone call from a customer, or planning to avoid certain top-ics in an anticipated exchange can lead to lost sales. Proba-bly the most important remedy for overcoming dysfunctionalprotective actions is to develop self-regulatory tactics. To theextent that salespeople can develop scripts to activate whencustomers raise questions or objections or when the sales-people feel an urge to avoid encounters or discuss issues inan exchange, they will be better able to handle SCA and


function effectively. For example, when salespeople experi-ence setbacks after a customer asks a product-related ques-tion to which they have no answer, they can respond by say-ing something to the effect of "I cannot answer your questionfully now but will call you back this afternoon after I inves-tigate our policies more completely." Other self-managementtactics can be developed to select alternative ways to make asale, monitor goal striving, maintain commitment, and over-come impediments to goal achievement.

Professional treatment. On occasion, SCA may becomeoverwhelming, and professional help may be required. Insuch cases, it is likely that salespeople will display anxietyacross a broad range of selling situations, which makes theirsuccessful functioning in the sales force more doubtful. Forsome salespeople, several therapies are available for copingwith social anxiety (Heimberg et al. 1995), and various self-help programs may be useful (e.g.. Cheek 1989; Markawayetal. 1992).

Selection criteria. The data in this study show that thepersonality trait NA is correlated with the development ofSCA. The NA scale may thus be used as an additional crite-rion in the selection of salespeople and perhaps as a checklater in a salesperson's career to verify whether cynicism hasdeveloped over time. Research shows that other personalitytraits, such as fear of negative evaluation and anxiety sensi-tivity for which scales exist, may be associated with socialanxiety (Peterson and Reiss 1987; Rachman 1998).

Further ResearchA topic not considered in the present study but worthy offurther research is the possibility that, at least for somesalespeople, anxiety can spur them on to greater achieve-

ments. Some athletes and performers arouse themselves inpreparation for a performance through anxiety-provokingthoughts to energize their performances (e.g.. Martens1977). It is possible that SCA can be functional for somesalespeople under certain conditions. To uncover these pos-sibilities, it may be necessary to model the relationships ofSCA to its correlates in nonlinear patterns. For example,SCA might initially stimulate salespeople, but when athreshold is reached, it will not have an effect. Yet somepoint later, under intense SCA, performance may be nega-tively affected. This will be difficult to study in the field andmay require special laboratory testing with salespeopleunder controlled conditions.

It is most likely that SCA emerges during the salescareer. Johnston and Kim (1994, p. 78), for example, suggestthat "Many new salespeople quit their job within a fewmonths because they are not suited for it after a fewinstances of failure." As sales become more automated andselling patterns more easily detected, the sales environmentis a good opportunity to study causal relationships betweenfailure and the onset of SCA.

In our study, we focus on anxiety in salespeople thatstems from relationships with customers (only one dimen-sion—talking with a manager about performance—did notdirectly reflect relationships with customers). Anxiety mightalso be expected to result from interactions with other sales-people, sales managers, friends, and family members. Thesepossibilities deserve further study.

Finally, it would be informative to investigate otherforms of self-conscious emotions in personal selling.Shame, embarrassment, guilt, and pride are likely candi-dates for study, but they have not been studied systemati-cally in personal selling to date.

APPENDIXScales and Items Used in the Study

I. Negative self-evaluationA. Cold canvasing

1. I hope this conversation does not flop.2. I hope I will not shut down/clam up.3. I hope I will not come across as an unfriendly

person to the customer.4. I hope I will not get the idea again that I am not

able to have a constructive conversation.5. I hope it will not turn out that advisors from other

banks will be able to convince the customer bet-ter than I will.

6. I hope the customer will not turn away from mewhen I keep asking questions.

B. Closing1. I hope I can listen carefully to what the customer

says.2. I hope I will not start stuttering.3. I hope I will not fumble for words.4. I hope I will be alert.5. I hope I will not give in to the customer.6. I hope I will not waffle my words.

II. Perceived negative evaluation from customersA. Cold canvasing

1. The customer will think the following of me:a. there you have again another "salesperson."b. that I do not come across as a credible sales-

person.c. that I do not get across convincingly.d. that I have doubts.e. that I adopt a kind attitude to prevent refusal.f. that bad experiences lie ahead for him with

this salesperson.2. I will think of the customer:

a. that he only smiles to get rid of me.b. that he does not like me.c. that he will tell other people that I am not a

competent person.d. that he will tell other people that I am a very

accommodating person.B. Closing

1. The customer will think the following of mea. that I do not have authority.

98 / Journal of IVIarketing, July 2000

APPENDIXContinued

b. that I am not professional.c. that I am an insecure person.d. that I am not able to sell.e. that I am not reliable.f. that advisors from other banks are better

salespeople than I.2. I will think of the customer:

a. that he will laugh at me afterward.b. that he will not do any more business with me

at a later stage.

III. Physiological symptomsA. I am nervous.B. I talk less quickly.C. I repeat myself.D. My thoughts are wandering off.E. I suddenly start to stutter.F. I look away from the customer.G. I set out to talk louder now.H. I become panicky.I. I am already getting tired now.

J. I cannot observe a silence.K. I dare not look the customer in the eyes.L. My hands are trembling.

M. I am going to say too much.N. I am losing control over the conversation.

IV. Protective actionsA. I avoid direct questions like "Please will you sign the

offer?"B. I quickly change the subject.C. I adopt a passive attitude.D. I think "I should not ask this.... I find this topic

irrelevant."E. I offer the customer too many extras.F. I say, "You do not have to decide now; you may think

it over."G. I say to the customer, "You need not answer all

questions."H. I often apologize quickly to the customer.I. I talk less persuasively to the customer.

J. I dare not argue with the customer.

V. Cues in situations that provoke SCAA. Meeting customers with higher social status

1. I talk to a customer with a higher income.2. I talk to someone who has a higher professional

status than I have (e.g., the director of a firm).3. I talk to a well-known Dutchman.4. I talk to a customer with an impressive appear-

ance and self-assured manner.B. Preparing for and communicating with new

prospects1. I prepare for a sales conversation with a new and

unknown prospect in my sales office.2. I prepare for a conversation with an unknown

prospect.3. Unexpectedly, I have to meet an unknown

prospect because my colleague is excused.4. I prepare myself for a sales conversation with an

unknown prospect at his home.5. Unexpectedly, I have to meet a prospect who

walked into the sales office.

VI.

C. Being assertive about self and organization1. I have to tell the customers, "We are the best

bank."2. I have to explain to the customers what we have

to offer to them compared with other competingbanks.

3. I have to explain to the customers what theymight expect from me during and after the con-versation.

4. I have to explain to the customers what I nowexpect from them during the sales conversation.

D. Discussing performance with the sales manager1. I have to share my sales results with my man-

ager.2. I have to talk with my manager about my sales

results.3. I have to discuss my sales results with my man-

ager, and it appears I did not achieve my salesquotas.

4. I have to tell my sales manager how I go aboutselling mortgages to customers.

E. Approaching and asking for a commitment from thecustomer1. The customer tells me that my offer is too expen-

sive, and I have to refute this.2. The customer shows me the offer from a com-

petitor, and I have to reply to this.3. I ask customers whether they know someone

else who would be interested in buying mort-gages from my bank.

4. I ask customers if they are interested In buying amortgage from my bank.

5. Beyond my expectations, customers appear to bewell informed about mortgage offers from com-petitors.

6. I ask customers whether they will sign the mort-gage contract.

7. Customers speak to me about something that Ido not do well (e.g., I did not show up at anappointment).

PerformanceA. Sales volume

1. Producing a high market share for your companyin your territory.

2. Generating high levels of dollar sales.3. Quickly generating sales of new company prod-

ucts.4. Identifying and selling to major accounts in your

territory.5. Exceeding all sales targets and objectives for

your territory during the year.B. Sales interaction

1. Listening attentively to identify and understandthe real concerns of your customer.

2. Convincing customers that you understand theirunique problems and concerns.

3. Working out solutions to a customer's questionsor objections.

4. Undertaking actions when customers have prob-lems.

Notes: The items presented here are loose translations from the original Dutch versions used in the study.

Sales Call Anxiety/99

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