I’ve been thinking a lot about color this past month. Partly because it’s fall, and partly because of a new client who produces safety and hazardous waste labels – a line of work where color is very important.
Anyhow, it made me realize that color is so deeply entrenched in our lives that we’re barely aware of it.
But color is powerful. It has the ability to make us feel happy, sad, calm, excited, or passionate. It conveys purity, evil, mystery, strength or magic. Color has the ability to engage us and persuade us. It shapes our emotions, our actions and our lives.
So, guess what this month’s article is about. :)
Enjoy!
Setting the Tone: How Color Shapes Success
Imagine you’re wandering down the aisles of your local grocery store doing your weekly shop. It’s thirsty work so you decide to treat yourself to a can of Coca Cola™.
You head for the soft drinks aisle, quickly grab a can off the shelf, and place it in your basket.
But when you get to your car, you look closely at the can, and discover something odd. You didn’t buy Coca Cola at all. You bought Coco Coola, a chocolate-flavored soda pop.
How did you end up with this oddly flavored drink?
You picked it off the shelf because you recognized the color.
When you walked down the soft drink section of the store, you grabbed a can that looked like Coca Cola. But was actually Coco Coola.
Instead of reading the words on the can, you based your choice on what the can looked like. As far as you’re concerned, if it’s red, and it’s in a can, it must be Coca Cola.
Of course, it’s no accident that you think that way. It’s exactly what Coca Cola want. After all, they’ve worked long and hard to make sure the color of their brand is firmly established in your brain.
So how can color shape how people perceive your brand?
The way we react to color, especially in the West and Asia, is ingrained through a combination of psychological, biological, social and cultural factors. There are exceptions, but generally our response to color is the same.
Consider the following:
Red: action, power, excitement, urgency, aggression, passion, speed, danger, anger, heat, fire, blood
Yellow: happy, bright, playful, easy-going, optimistic, sunny, cowardice
Green: nature, life, money, renewal, hope, power, fresh, cool, abundance, envy, sickness
Blue: calm, tranquil, relaxed, wise, trustworthy, loyal, reliability, belonging, dignity, authority
Orange: mental clarity, warmth, happiness, fun, contentment, fruitful
Black: elegant, mystery, death, strength, evil, seductive
White: clean, pure, youthful, light
Purple: power, nobility, luxury, wealth, extravagance, wisdom, dignity, independence, creativity, mystery, magic
Brown: life, earth, wealth, unclean, home-grown, dirty
Colors encourage us to act in a certain way. They influence our mood and affect our purchasing decisions.
There’s a reason why popular brands use certain colors. Think about it…
McDonalds: red and yellow = excitement, happiness, playful
Starbucks: green and white = nature, fresh, pure, clean
US Postal Service: red and blue = urgency, speed, trust, reliability
IBM: blue and white = trustworthy, tranquility, authority, pure
Google: blue, red, yellow, green = hmm…they really do want to take over the world! :)
So what can we learn from this?
- Start looking at color around you. Why do banks favor green carpets? Why do you never see a green fast-food restaurant? When you start looking at color objectively, you’ll begin to see how you can use it to engage and persuade your customers.
- Choose colors wisely. Some colors just don’t work for certain products or services. Forget red for anything remotely medical. It signifies blood, emergencies and bad health. It also signifies stop. Something you may want to think about when using call-to-action buttons on your website.
- Once you’ve chosen your colors, stick with them. The more your customers see them, the more they’ll remember your brand. Even small, local companies can use color to make themselves stand out.
- Keep colors consistent unless the product name is different. You can use different colors for different products within your line, but only if the name is different.
- There’s no hard and fast rule. If you want your product to be black go for it. Just be sure to be aware of the connotations.
- Remember your customers. Understand that customers make choices based on color. Come on, who doesn’t know that green stands for go, yellow stands for caution, and red stands
for Coca Cola! :)
2 comments
Thank you. Concise, to the point and informative. I am investigating before I start to design my home office and have included Feng Shui principle. I wanted a straight to the point list of colour effect to compare with my research. You provides exactly the information I requires and I have been searching on Internet for the past 45minutes. Cheers
Posted: Thursday Jan 25, 2007what about the color pink
Posted: Saturday Dec 1, 2007