[E240] Book Review: Five Love Languages

Jason: Time for another book review episode, and I get asked a lot about ideas and recommendations for sales books. And so on this episode, I'm going to dive into another book that may or may not make sense as a sales related book. But you'll find out by the time the episode is done, why I think it is. And if you're looking for personalized recommendations for books, for courses, for things to help you and your own sales career, or in leading your sales team, go to Jason cutter. com. Get on my calendar. Let's talk about sales, information, training courses, books, all of that based on what you are looking for, where you're at in career. And where you're wanting to head to, again, go to jasoncutter. com. Get on the calendar and let's talk. For now, enjoy this episode of my book review of something you're probably not even thinking is a sales book. Now, this next book that I am going to review and recommend, the question I usually get from people is, what the hell does love have to do with sales and business? Now, the book that I want to discuss right now is called The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman. And this is an amazing book in many different ways. Now, first off, obviously I would recommend it for anybody and everybody who has a relationship with anybody. So that could be with parents, that could be with children, it could be with significant others. So pretty much it applies to everybody because we're all in relationship with somebody else. It's so important because a lot of times people are speaking different languages, and I'll get into what this has to do with sales and business in a minute, but the basically the premise of this is that there are five main love languages, which is how somebody feels that the other person loves them or cares about them, and it's how they receive it. So there's acts of service, there's gifts, there's words of affirmation, there's physical touch, and then there's quality time. And so there's these five different love languages. And the challenge comes in is that most people operate from their own self centered love language. It's just who we are. We don't think about it if we're not conscious of it. And for example, if you like receiving gifts, if that's how you feel that somebody cares about you is when they give you a gift. then most likely your default mode is to then give gifts. The problem is that if you give gifts to somebody who wants acts of service, which means they like it when people do things for them or take care of things for them, and that's how they feel loved, if you give that person a gift, it's going to fall on deaf ears. Their response is not going to be great. And then what happens as the gift giver who loves giving and receiving gifts, they're going to be hurt. Their feelings are going to get hurt. Leave a sour taste in their mouth, and it's not going to be good for the relationship. And so really the key is that the gift giver has to understand the other person is an act of service person. That's their love language. And so does acts of service for them. And then help that other person realize that what they want in return are gifts or words of affirmation or quality time. The more you can understand this with the people in your life. It will help you speak their love language and give things to them that help them feel loved. Instead of just always being self centered as far as giving what you want, that golden rule, which isn't applicable in this case. And so it's very important. Now let's talk about why this has to do anything with sales. and business. One of the biggest things that I see a lot is that sales managers of all types, owners of companies, they fall under the same trap as well. They're just as human as everybody else. And so the problem is that they are giving to their staff to their team in the same way that they like to be received, that they receive love. So the problem is they giving gifts, or they're giving words of affirmation to people who each have their own love language. If there's, if you have a 20 person team and there's five love languages, then there's a percentage chance that some will be right if you're giving one type and then some will not. work well. It won't be effective. If you're telling somebody words of affirmation and they like gifts, then it's not going to be motivating. It's not going to be effective and they're not going to feel like you care because you're literally speaking the wrong language to their heart and to their soul. This might sound very woo. Might sound very fluffy, but when you're dealing with people, when you're dealing with team members and you want to have a culture that's positive and supportive, if that's what you're trying to build, then you want to make sure that you're conscious as a leader to speak the language of each person, what they're motivated by, what they have on their vision board. What drives them, how they like to be spoken to, and then what their love language is. So you can make sure and give them that. You could have an employee on your team where their love language is quality time. And I'll bet you, you know who that is. If you've ever led any teams or run any groups, you'll know whose love language is quality time because they will constantly try to be in your office. Or at your desk and want to sit down and want to talk to you or they trap you out in the hall and they just want to talk because they want that quality time. That's how they feel like you care. Then you have other people on your team that never stopped by your office. They just want to hear positive things. If you don't say positive things about them, then they're unmotivated and they're potentially on their way out the door. As a leader, it's important to understand and assess everybody's love language and then use that in your conversations to support them and show them that you care by speaking their language. Now, there's an advanced level with this, depending on what you're selling and what your sales cycle is as a salesperson. You can also come to understand what the love language is for your prospects. And then you can speak those love languages, right? Especially if you're doing long sales, especially if it's vendor relationship, partner relationship, business to business. Some people might be gifts. Some people might be quality time. Once you figure that out, then you can serve that to them. So they feel like you actually care and then you can grow that relationship. So I know that was a long discussion about this, but it's so important for relationships. Everything in life is sales and everything in life is relationships. So when you combine those two, Things like the Five Love Languages book and that whole principle is so important. So check out the book. You can also find a lot of stuff online. You can find a quiz. Just Google it. There's lots of quizzes to help assess what your love language might be. And then I always recommend having the people in your life take that as well. And then for your team, it's something that is very important to understand that. So hopefully that helps. Hopefully you've enjoyed this book review. Send me a comment or an email if you have any questions on this. You're not sure how to use it. You want some help using it. In your business with your teams, let me know. Definitely focus on culture when it comes to sales success. And so that's it for this book review, and I will see you in the next one.