Colour Communications Inc conducted research concluding that it takes the average person roughly 90 seconds to form an opinion about a brand and in that time, between 60 and 90% of decisions are solely influenced by colour. So colour is pretty important…
Colour Connotations
So many brands make the mistake of choosing colours that may look great but make no sense to their business. Be sure to choose colours that don’t connote something that is the complete opposite of the vibe you’re trying to portray. For example, if you’re checking in at a beachside hotel, you wouldn’t expect their website to be saturated with a blood red and garish green scheme.
Examples of brands who use colour connotations according to the service they offer are EasyJet and IBM. EasyJet are a budget airline catering specifically for the needs of holiday go-ers and use a bold orange in their branding, conventionally symbolising happiness, sunshine and energy. This compliments their motivation as a business, to persuade people to travel and go on holiday.
IBM are an IT solutions company who use a combination of blue and black. Blue symbolises technology and is proven to be a colour that people trust, whilst black connotes power and influence. As they supply equipment and services such as security which are heavily replied upon by many, these colours are appropriate and are designed to make their customers feel safe in their hands.
Consistency and Versatility…
Although the title of this segment may seem contradictory, it does make a lot of sense. Make sure that your colour scheme is consistent on each page of your site, as this will help consolidate your branding. However, it’s useful to choose a scheme that you can make subtle changes to should you want to promote a certain campaign or tweak your branding down the line.
- Blue: calm, stable, trusted, smart, technology
- Red: intensity, immediacy, anger, hunger
- Green: soothing, natural, wellbeing, envy, balance
- Yellow: joy, energy, fresh, energy
- Orange: happiness, attraction, wealth, fun-loving
- Pink: caring, love, emotional, sensitive
- Purple: luxury, royal, sadness, arrogance, creativity
- Black: strength, authority, elegance, mystery, bold
Colour Coordination
A study named Aesthetic Response to Color Combinations found that an overwhelming majority of consumers favour colour schemes with contrasting accent colour. So, it’s important to create a foundation with simple base colours using definitive colours for the aspects you’d like to draw attention to. The psychological principal named The Isolation Effect proves that we as humans recognise certain items when they stick out from their backdrop – therefore this is important in marketing. However, you don’t want to lose you brand identity by alienating your customers with garish and bright colours. So find some bold colures that you can draw on regularly for marketing campaigns and that suit your brand’s regular colour scheme.