Colors Psychology: How You Can Leverage Colors in Your Business Marketing
Reading Time: 6 minutes Colors are all around us. In different parts of the world, the meaning of the color or what it represents could change dramatically.
The color of an advertisement may end up being the deciding factor for a viewer to make a purchase or not. Marketers need to consider the cultural implications of using a particular color in their marketing campaigns.
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What is Color Psychology?
Human behavior in relation to color is called color psychology. This study examines how color influences our decisions such as what we opt to buy on a day-to-day basis. Were we compelled to purchase a dress because of its color? Were you influenced by the colors of the package when choosing a brand? Is color a factor in our decision-making? Yes, in a nutshell. It is more difficult to explain why, though. The meanings of colors can affect our preferences for certain colors. Even the same color can mean different things to different people based on their upbringing, their gender, their location, their values, and many other factors.
Marketers can use this insight to drive more traffic, make more conversions, and ultimately get more sales. By using tools including a free live chat for websites, you’ll be able to provide instant customer support to your audience and retain them longer.
Here is a list of colors and how they could help you in your marketing efforts:
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Black.
Black signifies power, stability, strength, boldness, and authority.
Businesses that use black in their brand image include Chanel, Louis Vuitton, Nike, Adidas, Apple, etc.
If your business is catered towards a more professional and serious audience, using the color black would do just fine.
If you’re marketing to a younger audience, black might not be an ideal color.
Young children especially want to see different colors; it makes them happy and grabs their attention. The color black isn’t the best choice in this scenario.
White.
White signifies purity, safety, cleanliness, goodness, and light.
The color white is almost always used with other colors. Businesses that use white in their brand image include Tesla, Coca Cola, Crocs, Mini, etc.
Gray.
Gray signifies practicality, timeliness, intelligence, and reliability.
Businesses that use gray in their brand image include Forbes, Mercedes Benz, Nissan, Wikipedia, Lexus, etc.
Gray is a more relaxed color. You should use gray if you’re targeting an older audience.
Children and young people are generally not that into grays.
Red.
Red signifies urgency, passion, power, excitement, and encourages hunger.
Businesses that use red in their brand image include Coca Cola, CNN, Target, Virgin, Pinterest, etc.
Red is the color of passion. It excites people and is ideal to use if you’re launching a new product or are having a flash sale or something similar.
Marketing campaigns that use red get our attention much more easily. The color red catches our attention and prompts us to look. Many call to action (CTA) buttons are red because of the same reason that it catches our attention.
Blue.
Blue signifies peace, reliability, security, spirituality, and sincerity.
Businesses that use blue in their brand image include Facebook, Dell, Microsoft, JP Morgan, etc.
Several healthcare institutions use the color blue for their logos and marketing. The color blue promotes a sense of safety and security that these organizations want to portray if they’re going to get customers.
Software and IT companies also use blue as it tends to promote integrity and security.
Green.
Green signifies nature, tranquility, harmony, growth, and safety.
Businesses that use green in their brand image include Animal Planet, Spotify, Monster, Land Rover, etc.
Green is an ideal color for your business if your business has anything to do with nature or the outdoors. Having green in your marketing campaigns will appeal to an audience who wants to experience peace, life, and harmony.
Businesses and nonprofits that focus on climate change can use green in their marketing to have more of an impact.
Yellow.
Yellow signifies joy, passion, clarity, warmth, and optimism.
Businesses that use yellow in their brand image include McDonald’s, Best Buy, National Geographic, Denny’s, etc.
The beautiful golden arches that signify the end of any diet, yellow is a color known too well by many.
Yellow is a color that can be used for a variety of different businesses.
Restaurants like Subway, McDonald’s, Denny’s use yellow for their logo. Yellow is also used by businesses like IKEA, Shell, Nikon, etc.
Orange.
Orange signifies courage, vibrancy, cheerfulness, and enthusiasm.
Businesses that use orange in their brand image include Fanta, Mozilla, Harley Davidson, Amazon, Nickelodeon, etc.
You should use orange in your marketing campaigns if your business is catered towards a more young, dynamic audience. Using orange to market to an older generation might not give the best results.
Purple.
Purple signifies royalty, respect, wisdom, nobility, luxury, and wealth.
Businesses that use purple in their brand image include Yahoo!, Taco Bell, Syfy, Cadbury, etc.
Educational institutions tend to use a medium shade of purple as it promotes thought and wisdom.
If you’re marketing towards a more female audience, a light shade of purple can do surprisingly well for your business.
Pink.
Pink signifies femininity, care, comfort, and softness.
Businesses that use pink in their brand image include Barbie, Cosmopolitan, Baskin Robbins, Dunkin Donuts, etc.
Companies that are more focused on women related products and services should use pink for their marketing efforts. But pink can be used for much more.
Pink represents comfort and may prove to work well for small coffee joints or furniture businesses.
Brown.
Brown signifies dependability, resilience, reliability, and the outdoors.
Businesses that use brown in their brand image include UPS, Gloria Jean’s Coffees, Oakwood, Cotton, etc.
Most businesses do not use brown to represent their business. Your business might be able to differentiate itself from its competitors solely based on the color it chooses to use in its marketing campaigns.
Gold.
Gold signifies wealth, prosperity, traditions, and value.
Businesses that use gold in their brand image include Versace, MGM Grand, Rolex, Lamborghini, etc.
If your business is catered towards a more high end, luxury-loving clientele, then you should definitely consider using gold in your marketing campaigns.
Conclusion
Businesses have been using colors to market themselves and their offerings for ages.
Your color selection can have a considerable impact on the effectiveness of your marketing campaigns. When designing your campaign, you should ensure that your color selection doesn’t offend anyone.
If you want to make sure that two colors are contrasting, convert them to grayscale first to get a better look at the contrast levels. You’ll need to make decisions that will keep your customers engaged on your website. Having a live chat app on your website will do just that.
With this new-found knowledge about colors and hues, you can make better decisions for your business.
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Co-Authored With
Hamzah Adil is a young digital marketing executive who loves to consume all kinds of content on social media and other online sources. Keeping up with the most happening trends is one of his most favorite past times. He is, at the moment, working for a startup that has developed a live chat application called SwiftChat. Live chat software allows you to take a more proactive approach at marketing to your website’s visitors at a fraction of the usual cost.
