Recently I’ve become intrigued by the premise of Dr. Gary Chapman’s book, The Five Love Languages. Simply stated, each of us has a primary and secondary language that makes us feel loved, valued and acknowledged. Although the concepts come from a marital/family counseling perspective, it struck me that each of these 5 languages has value to us as marketing writers and communicators.

Let’s take a look at them step-by-step:

• Affirmation
  For customers for whom personal affirmation is paramount, our copy needs to acknowledge their intelligence, commonsense, their pain/problem/challenge and express our sincere desire to respect, support and provide for their well-being.

• Quality Time
  In the non-marketing sense, this is about spending time giving undivided attention to our spouse and other family members. While we can’t replicate this experience exactly in copy, for customers who needs to feel our undivided attention, we can 1/use their name, remembering to address them as individuals (not as a group) … 2/keep our copy laser-focused on not wasting their time, getting right to the point and staying there … 3/keep our copy on point and directed to our customer’s needs/wants/desires — and ensure we deliver fully on all the promises our copy makes.

• Gifts
  Who doesn’t like to get a gift? So what can we give our customers that will make them feel special? We can certainly offer one, two or more bonus gifts upfront. Sometimes we include the bonus in the promotion itself. Sometimes we send it after the order is submitted. But we can do more on the back-end. (Remember the old adage – it costs dollars to get a new customer, but only pennies to keep them.)We can send relevant gifts/discount coupons on a customer’s birthday or holiday or at certain intervals after a sale is made. These things don’t have to cost a lot, but they will delight the customer who feels love through gift-type acknowledgment.

• Acts of Service
  For customers who feel your love in what you do for them – your copy can focus on the active benefits to be enjoyed with our product/service. Also, too, we can offer them free shipping, no-hassle returns and meaningful guarantees. Here’s what we DO for you as our customer. Here’s what we DO for you if you’re dissatisfied for any reason.

• Physical Touch
  While we’re not in the position to physically touch our customers (I’ll leave that to other folks in other kinds of businesses ), our copy can provide a sense of emotional touch through stories told, testimonials shared. In addition, for those customers who need a tactile experience we can provide physical samples of our products, or at least use physicality in how we describe the characteristics of our products/services and the benefits to be derived when used.

Like the concept of marketing “personas”, these love languages represent the broad strokes of your prospect/customers varying communication styles. They represent the channels that connect best, reaching our customers deep within and make them want to respond to us – emotionally and physically -in a positive and definitive manner. We may enjoy acknowledgement using all 5 of these languages, but there are one or two that will mean more.

There’s no reason why your copy and mine can’t incorporate these 5 languages as part and parcel of the way we write. Most of us do already, I’m sure. It’s just a fresh perspective on the how and why of the techniques and tactics we use in our marcomm efforts. As I tell my copywriting students and “coachees” – our customers will receive our messages through the lens of their personality and life experience. Let’s make sure our language and marketing message get through .

If you’re interesting in reading more about the five love languages as it relates to more personal endeavors, click here.

• Enjoyed this post? Get free updates by email or RSS
• Need a copy critique or a consult? Contact the Maven
• The ultimate guide to writing and designing effective landing pages – Marketing Sherpa’s Landing Page Handbook, 2008 (aff)