Using Color and Color Theory in Marketing

Color choices and contrast can greatly affect the effectiveness of your online and offline marketing

BY WELTON HONG

Window fashion professionals know that color is important. The colors and patterns you choose for window coverings or other elements in a room’s décor set a mood for that space. But did you know the same thing holds true for marketing?

Color really does impact marketing performance because color plays a critical role in the visual experience people have with your advertising and marketing. Studies indicate that 90 percent of people make purchase decisions based at least in part on visuals, making the visual aesthetic of your webpages, social media posts and advertisements important.

Do specific colors make people feel certain ways?

You’ve probably heard that various colors elicit certain responses from people. Red, for example, is known as the color of passion or boldness. Blue, on the other hand, is known as a calm color.

This is true to some extent, so it’s important to be aware of what emotions various colors tend to evoke in people. Some of the most common thoughts on this topic are summarized in the list below.

Red: passion, boldness, youth, excitement Orange: confidence, boldness, professionalism, friendly Yellow: cheerful, warm, optimistic Green: growth, money, healing, peace Blue: calm, trust, dependable, strong, peaceful Purple: imagination, wisdom, creativity, powerful Gray: neutral, calm, professional

However, it’s not quite this simple. Colors come in an unlimited number of shades and tones, changing how they impact people. And every person is unique and has a different internal response to colors and other visuals. You can’t simply put curtains of a certain color in your ads or make the background of all your social media posts blue and call it a day.

To put the power of color theory to work in marketing, it’s important to have some understanding of the technical design ideas behind color, as well as the preferences and needs of your target audience.

Some basics of color theory for marketing

First, you must decide if you’re going to include color at all. While black-and-white or grayscale visuals do offer potential elegance, they’re not usually the most powerful option for marketing. Marketing and advertisements that include color are more likely to capture someone’s attention. In fact, ads that include color are read 42 percent more often than black-and-white ads.

After deciding to include color in a piece of marketing content, you need to decide which colors and in what combinations. It’s often a good idea to start with your brand colors, especially when you’re creating images for social or infographics. Having your brand colors show up in those images can help people begin to identify your content with your window fashion business—and be more likely to remember your business later.

You don’t have to include brand colors in overt ways in every image, though. Imagine if your brand colors were yellow and blue and your entire curtain image gallery was filled with drapes in those colors. You’d obviously limit your audience and sales unnecessarily. Instead, use brand colors when it’s appropriate or as accents, such as in the border around social images.

Next, consider the contrast of colors in your marketing. This can actually be more important or as important as which colors you use. High-contrast designs draw the eye to the most important information, such as your call to action or offer.

Here’s where it can get tricky, because you can’t always rely on an untrained eye to determine if colors are contrasting. Certain shades of blue and green, for example, may appear to contrast when they’re actually very close and might be hard to view or read when stacked on top of each other.

The best way to know if you’ve chosen truly contrasting colors is to put them next to each other and convert them to grayscale. Grayscale lets you see how light or dark each color actually is and whether they’re actually contrasting or very close in tone.

If you’re not sure where to start picking contrasting colors, begin with color opposites: blue and orange, red and green, yellow and purple. You can have more than two contrasting main colors in your marketing, but it’s usually a good idea to keep things simple. An entire rainbow of color confuses the eye and makes your message more different to read, understand and remember.

A study from the University of Toronto indicates that most people prefer simple color schemes with two to three dominant colors. That doesn’t mean you only have three colors in every image. That would get boring fast. It means that the colors that dominate your images—the ones that are most prevalent or noticeable—are limited to a few.

You might try choosing one main color, one or two contrasting colors and a neutral color, for example. When using contrasting colors, do ensure one wins out. If you have half blue and half orange, one color doesn’t win out and the eye doesn’t have any cues on what to rest on or what’s meant to be different (and thus important). This can cause your curtains, calls to action or other important content to fade into the background.

Remember that some people are red/green color-blind. If you use red/green to contrast in your designs, individuals with red/ green color blindness won’t be able to discern your entire message or image. Also, some people struggle with color or other visuals. Always pair your marketing images with captions that can be read or processed through screen readers to ensure a wider audience for your message.

Getting the best use of colors and visuals

You can get a lot done on your own when it comes to basic visuals for your social media pages or blog posts. Even if you aren’t sure how to manage colors for the best marketing impact, templates in tools such as Canva have done a lot of work for you and make it easy to create professional, beautiful color designs.

However, if you’re creating a complex design or starting from scratch with your window fashion website, you might want to bring in a professional. Graphic designers are educated about color theory and many other design tools, and they can help you craft images and pages that connect with your audience. V

Welton Hong is the founder of Ring Ring Marketing and the author of “Making Your Phone Ring with Internet Marketing for Window Covering Companies.”

RingRingMarketing.com Facebook: RingRingMarketing

Using Color and Color Theory in Marketing

Color choices and contrast can greatly affect the effectiveness of your online and offline marketing

BY WELTON HONG

Window fashion professionals know that

color is important. The colors and patterns you choose for window coverings or other elements in a room’s décor set a mood for that space. But did you know the same thing holds true for marketing?

Color really does impact marketing performance because color plays a critical role in the visual experience people have with your advertising and marketing. Studies indicate that 90 percent of people make purchase decisions based at least in part on visuals, making the visual aesthetic of your webpages, social media posts and advertisements important.

Do specific colors make people feel certain ways?

You’ve probably heard that various colors elicit certain responses from people. Red, for example, is known as the color of passion or boldness. Blue, on the other hand, is known as a calm color.

This is true to some extent, so it’s important to be aware of whatemotions various colors tend to evoke in people. Some of the mostcommon thoughts on this topic are summarized in the list below.

Red: passion, boldness, youth, excitementOrange: confidence, boldness, professionalism, friendlyYellow: cheerful, warm, optimisticGreen: growth, money, healing, peaceBlue: calm, trust, dependable, strong, peaceful

Purple: imagination, wisdom, creativity, powerfulGray: neutral, calm, professional

However, it’s not quite this simple. Colors come in an unlimited number of shades and tones, changing how they impact people. And every person is unique and has a different internal response to colors and other visuals. You can’t simply put curtains of a certain color in your ads or make the background of all your social media posts blue and call it a day.

To put the power of color theory to work in marketing, it’s important to have some understanding of the technical design ideas behind color, as well as the preferences and needs of your target audience.

Some basics of color theory for marketing

First, you must decide if you’re going to include color at all. While black-and-white or grayscale visuals do offer potential elegance, they’re not usually the most powerful option for marketing. Marketing and advertisements that include color are more likely to capture someone’s attention. In fact, ads that include color are read 42 percent more often than black-and-white ads.

After deciding to include color in a piece of marketing content, you need to decide which colors and in what combinations. It’s often a good idea to start with your brand colors, especially when you’re creating images for social or infographics. Having your brand colors show up in those images can help people begin to identify your content with your window fashion business—and be more likely to remember your business later.

You don’t have to include brand colors in overt ways in every image, though. Imagine if your brand colors were yellow and blue and your entire curtain image gallery was filled with drapes in those colors. You’d obviously limit your audience and sales unnecessarily. Instead, use brand colors when it’s appropriate or as accents, such as in the border around social images.

Next, consider the contrast of colors in your marketing. This can actually be more important or as important as which colors you use. High-contrast designs draw the eye to the most important information, such as your call to action or offer.

Here’s where it can get tricky, because you can’t always rely on an untrained eye to determine if colors are contrasting. Certain shades of blue and green, for example, may appear to contrast when they’re actually very close and might be hard to view or read when stacked on top of each other.

The best way to know if you’ve chosen truly contrasting colors is to put them next to each other and convert them to grayscale. Grayscale lets you see how light or dark each color actually is and whether they’re actually contrasting or very close in tone.

If you’re not sure where to start picking contrasting colors, begin with color opposites: blue and orange, red and green, yellow and purple. You can have more than two contrasting main colors in your marketing, but it’s usually a good idea to keep things simple. An entire rainbow of color confuses the eye and makes your message more different to read, understand and remember.

A study from the University of Toronto indicates that most people prefer simple color schemes with two to three dominant colors. That doesn’t mean you only have three colors in every image. That would get boring fast. It means that the colors that dominate your images—the ones that are most prevalent or noticeable—are limited to a few.

You might try choosing one main color, one or two contrasting colors and a neutral color, for example. When using contrasting colors, do ensure one wins out. If you have half blue and half orange, one color doesn’t win out and the eye doesn’t have any cues on what to rest on or what’s meant to be different (and thus important). This can cause your curtains, calls to action or other important content to fade into the background.

Remember that some people are red/green color-blind. If you use red/green to contrast in your designs, individuals with red/ green color blindness won’t be able to discern your entire message or image. Also, some people struggle with color or other visuals. Always pair your marketing images with captions that can be read or processed through screen readers to ensure a wider audience for your message.

Getting the best use of colors and visuals

You can get a lot done on your own when it comes to basic visuals for your social media pages or blog posts. Even if you aren’t sure how to manage colors for the best marketing impact, templates in tools such as Canva have done a lot of work for you and make it easy to create professional, beautiful color designs.

However, if you’re creating a complex design or starting from scratch with your window fashion website, you might want to bring in a professional. Graphic designers are educated about color theory and many other design tools, and they can help you craft images and pages that connect with your audience. V