---
title: "How Salespeople Can Overcome Call Reluctance"
description: "Most new salespeople suffer from call reluctance, characterized by fear and lack of confidence when approaching clients. The degree of this fear is inversely proportional to experience, and it can be overcome through training, preparation, and a positive mindset."
author: "New Distribution"
publisher: "New Distribution"
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published: "2014-12-28"
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# How Salespeople Can Overcome Call Reluctance

> Most new salespeople suffer from call reluctance, characterized by fear and lack of confidence when approaching clients. The degree of this fear is inversely proportional to experience, and it can be overcome through training, preparation, and a positive mindset.

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Most salespeople new to the field experience call reluctance. When I first started in sales, I often stopped at the client's door, hesitated for a long time, and ultimately dared not enter. Back at the office, I would even fill in my daily work report with "Visit not met." The defining characteristic of this phobia is that salespeople feel afraid of making calls, lack confidence, and fear rejection. The degree of call reluctance is inversely proportional to experience: the more sales experience one has, the less fear. I once conducted a survey showing that 90% of people within their first six months in sales suffer from this condition. So what causes call reluctance, and how can it be eliminated? Based on my sales experience, I analyze the causes and propose solutions below.

**I. Causes**
1. **Feeling inadequate** – Believing that product knowledge is insufficient, learning is lacking, planning and preparation are incomplete, conversational skills are inflexible, the setback from a previous failed visit has not been overcome, or knowledge of competitors is inadequate.
2. **Reduced vitality** – Lack of self-confidence, self-dislike, excessive pressure, unstable income, many worries, excessive pessimism, etc.
3. **Anticipating resistance** – Believing that product quality is inferior to competitors, prices are too high, there are too many competitors, or client conditions have not yet been resolved.
4. **Clients' higher status** – In terms of social standing, economic power, personality, knowledge, etc.
5. **Selling to acquaintances at a lower status** – This is common with classmates, friends, former colleagues, competitors, etc.
6. **Fear of disturbing clients** – Especially company executives, senior officials, or shareholders.
7. **Pressure from superiors**.

**II. Countermeasures**
1. Address deficiencies through education and training to enhance salespeople's abilities.
2. Never neglect continuous learning for salespeople.
3. Uphold a firm belief in selling.
4. Ensure thorough sales planning and preparation.
5. Make clients deeply understand that you are helping them, not troubling them. If they have problems, they can always come to you for satisfactory solutions.
6. Maintain good work and rest habits, seek family harmony, and eliminate external pressures.
7. Always ask supervisors for timely assistance and support.
8. Engage in comprehensive communication and coordination, especially with relevant departments, to secure support from back-office units.
9. Salespeople must adopt the mindset: "Better not to create good karma than to create bad karma."
10. Be ambitious, continuously hone and enrich yourself, use various learning opportunities to fill gaps, and boost self-confidence.
11. Understand the company's philosophy, have detailed sales plans and visit preparations to smoothly execute visit plans.
12. Improve physical health; a healthy body is essential for a successful salesperson.
13. Live a regular life daily and cultivate the habit of implementing plans once made.

**How Sales Managers Can Help Subordinates Overcome Call Reluctance**
As a sales manager, you have likely faced the same confusion as Beth. Those seemingly energetic and capable salespeople often fail to meet your expectations, and even training doesn't help. Typically, poor sales performance stems from lack of sales skills, product knowledge, or motivation. But if these don't explain the poor performance, the real cause may be timidity.

Salespeople must sell themselves. They must be willing to self-promote, let others understand their work, and seek recognition for it. Hesitation to showcase oneself to outsiders can be termed self-promotion phobia. This timidity may limit the number of interactions with potential buyers. In such cases, self-promotion phobia evolves into sales call aversion.

Sales call aversion has twelve types, each corresponding to a category of stress. If a salesperson contracts this condition without timely detection and management, each symptom can affect and limit the quality and quantity of sales visits.

A survey of a real estate company showed that salespeople with call aversion lose an average of $4,475 to $19,162 annually. Those with referral aversion (unwillingness to ask customers for referrals) suffer the greatest income loss.

Research indicates that 80% of new salespeople dismissed in their first year had call aversion. Among veteran salespeople, regardless of income or experience, 40% reported having experienced this condition at some career stage, even severely enough to threaten their careers.

Effective methods to control and eliminate call aversion include several steps: recognition, acceptance, assessment, and application.

The first step is to determine whether a performance problem exists. Companies typically monitor and review salespeople's activities and performance. Indicators like income and commissions that are too low may reflect performance issues.

If performance issues are linked to call aversion, provide evidence to the salesperson and openly discuss possible causes with them. During discussions, watch for signs related to the condition.

Next, identify the type and cause of call aversion. Ask salespeople to specify which tasks, people, or situations they find aversive. Determine whether these feelings lead to avoidance behaviors that hinder sales activities.

Finally, take appropriate measures to manage or eliminate call aversion. Strategies should focus on behavior, not personality. It is not a personality flaw but a set of behaviors that can jeopardize sales success. While recognizing underlying timidity is important, solutions should not center on timidity itself.

Measures to overcome call aversion should help salespeople identify specific, visible reasons for their fear. Through training, salespeople can learn to counteract timidity and replace it with more positive responses.

Examples can illustrate the four steps of recognition, acceptance, assessment, and application. Phone call phobia is the most common type of call aversion, where salespeople fear making business calls.

Observing work activities can help determine if a salesperson has phone phobia.

If the company requires a certain number of sales calls per day and a salesperson makes too few, that indicates a problem. First, rule out causes such as environmental distractions, lack of motivation, unclear objectives, or insufficient training in phone calls.

Then, observe for signs of psychological stress related to calling, such as sweaty palms, dry lips, trembling hands, blushing, or stammering.

If they make too few calls, show stress about calling, and do other things when they should be calling, they likely have phone phobia.

You can help salespeople with phone phobia replace negative thoughts with positive ones. For example, replace "This client probably doesn't want to talk to me" or "I really don't want to make this call" with "I can do this" or "This call will be great."

Research also shows that emphasizing the four steps of recognition, acceptance, assessment, and application in formal training effectively helps salespeople overcome self-promotion phobia and call aversion. Trained salespeople typically make significant progress in sales meetings, business opportunities, closed deals, and personal commissions.

The four-step method applies not only to salespeople but also to anyone whose work involves interacting with and relying on others. In almost every field, success is closely tied to self-promotion and gaining recognition for one's work. Whether asking for a raise or securing a budget, self-promotion is crucial to success.

Billionaire Ross Perot and singer Madonna may not have achieved their success solely because they are the most knowledgeable, capable, or talented in their fields. Most importantly, they know how to present themselves to the fullest and never hesitate to do so. They provide valuable lessons: don't let self-promotion phobia hinder success.

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