Some Colors And Their Psychology

Color is a trigger that is associated with traditions and used in marketing over the years so well that they must be honored or potential sales can be lost here. It's a given that color will trigger reactions. This is why you must know how to choose the right color for the right reaction at the right time. You don't want people to exit your special offer here on the forum or your website before they saw the actual deal right? I've made a small list of the four main colors used the most in internet marketing. I will tell you what they depict. As stated before this report is based on western psychology, this means that when you sell stuff to Asian orientated (so raised in Asia) people you will need to use other colors.

Red
Red creates excitement, displays strength, is used to express passion, speed and danger. Red is often used to draw attention, use appropriately and it works extremely well. So don't go spamming your sales letter with all red text. Then it has not effect and will only drive your visitors away. Put some captivating one liners in red in between paragraphs and you are golden!

Blue
This is the most popular color and maybe the most important one. This because it builds trust, reminds people of sky gazing and day dreaming. Thus, builds trust, conveys reliability, a sense of belonging, refreshing and clean. Blue will work with every sales letter or website to build more trust with your buyers. They are more eligible to buy from you the next time when you've put up a new sales letter or website that is if they thought your other product was something of value.

Yellow
We think of the sun and sunshine, its warmth, being cheerful and happy. Place it together with some phrases you find important for your potential buyers. Results or profits for example highlight them yellow! As a substitute you can always choose to enable the bold text to let the important phrases jump out.

Orange
Orange isn't used much in marketing. On a computer screen it loses its hue. When it is clearly visible that it is orange, it conveys playfulness, triggers child-like behavior.

Some other views on color a highly appreciated!

Thanks, I guess green is also a trustworthy color and it's usually associated with money.

azureus3 said:

Thanks, I guess green is also a trustworthy color and it's usually associated with money.

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Green
The color of growth, nature, and money. A calming color also that's very pleasing to the senses. Dark forest green is associated with terms like conservative, masculine and wealth. Hospitals use light green rooms because they too are found to be calming to patients. It is also the color associated with envy, good luck, generosity and fertility. It is the traditional color of peace, harmony, comfortable nurturing, support and well paced energy.

So if you want no conversions on your squeeze page.. Then use green

this is interesting, guess green isn't good. what about purple? i know its associated with royalty but that's about it

bust-in said:

this is interesting, guess green isn't good. what about purple? i know its associated with royalty but that's about it

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Purple
What color were the robes of kings and queens? Yes, they were purple, our most royal color that is associated with wealth, prosperity, rich sophistication. This color stimulates the brain activity used in problem solving. However, when overused in a common setting it is associated with putting on airs and being artificial/ Use purple most carefully to lend an air of mystery, wisdom, and respect. Young adolescent girls are most likely to select nearly all shades of purple as their favorite color.

Used this color when revamping a dating site for high educated people. Improved conversion with 9%.

Give me a simple black and white theme any day and maybe some light colors to differentiate things.

StevenJones - I was wondering about color awhile back regarding the colors that do better with certain demographic groups or in certain countries. Any research info in these areas?

I'm sure demographics play somewhat into the color variants and conversions, I would guess it would also depend on your product and target market. Some of the things I sell are littered with red and blue text, however I do have a product that does extremely well with a purple-ish colored headline - far better conversions than the standard red headline for an info-product.

I heard that the color green was helpful in associated the brain with money.

Green and its color shades - that's my choice. Blue is also very good. When creating a site, they are the most suitable colors - calm and worm, they do not repel people. Also is good to combine them with gray color - looks pretty nice.

Colors in the text itself are universal. I think Steven summed it all up.

When it comes to background colors, a lot also depends on your niche.

I have one page. It has a video and a purple background. Which does get the mystery effect but it also has a different meaning which is perfect for that specific market.

On another video I used a yellow background. Tested it against green and blue and it outperformed blue and green. Converting 200% better as blue and 150% as green.

Same goes for the button. For some weird reason the "add to cart" button became popular. The button also needs to be orange.

However, I tried many different things. Different text and different colors. Doing this smartly, you can see big differences.

Putting this in perspective (and bear with me here. This is not a market I know nor understand):

Let's say I'm in the golf niche. I would try the following background colors:

- Green. It's a color most golf players are familair with. So it may invoke trust and even professionality in this case. And may even boost some credibility.
- Blue. When they hit the ball, they look into the sky hoping for that hole in one. In this case they may associate it with that.
- Combination of both. may work even better.

Besides that we got other elements. Like the button. I would probably test the above colors and besides that orange or even red. it's a contrast and, in case of red, it envokes excitement. Seems to be a color that works really well for me at those places. Where you want the CTA.

So yeah, there are certain "set rules" of how certain colors activate specific emotions. But I would always take it with a grain of salt and experiment. As making green work in 1 market, may not work in another. There are simply too many variables at place to determine why a certain color will and will not work. I keep everything in account, start testing with the most obvious colors for my market and go from there.

StevenJones said:

Purple
What color were the robes of kings and queens? Yes, they were purple, our most royal color that is associated with wealth, prosperity, rich sophistication. This color stimulates the brain activity used in problem solving. However, when overused in a common setting it is associated with putting on airs and being artificial/ Use purple most carefully to lend an air of mystery, wisdom, and respect. Young adolescent girls are most likely to select nearly all shades of purple as their favorite color.

Used this color when revamping a dating site for high educated people. Improved conversion with 9%.

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Perhaps using a far background of solid or pattern purple (shades) on a lead capture or sales page would improve conversion rates. Though that could depend on the niche involved.

Interesting how random colors could change someone's mind...

When it comes to your colors it is NOT your preference that attracts eyeballs and likes...

Why?

Because some nationalities like the Chinese - and you bet they count as they have the largest ethnic population in the world - They go for almost exclusively RED YELLOW/GOLD BLACK...

So folks get your website colors to match the color likes of the geo location country you are targeting as your core market...

Don't depend on the designer as he is only interested in eye candy looks === true business professionals get inside the head of the buyer. Why is That? Coz they bring in the green $$$$$....

This si really useful! thanks!

This could be well complemented with an analysis on shapes

Circle = connectivity, community, never ending, movement, often associated with women.

Square = stability, balance, scientific nature of the universe.

Check the use of these shapes in daily communication, its very interesting. Banks often use square logos because of the stability and security that it conveys. There was also triangle, but i forgot what it meant.

I read years ago (pre-internet) that a combination of brown and orange was a good way to get people to react to your message.

Orange gets people excited and brown is associated with fundamental needs.

But I am sure the big companies have looked into this in depth and it is interesting to see the major companies all use red in their logos - i.e. Coca Cola, Mcdonalds, BK, Wendys, KFC. It must also be noted that basically these companies sell products that are bad for health.

If you were asked to design a logo for a company that sold healthy food or products I think just about all of us would make sure we used green as the main colour as opposed to red which is associated with (albeit subconciously) danger and perhaps blood.

I just looked at the McDonalds logo and imagined the red changed to green - Not effective. (And I hate McDonalds - I am vegetarian, but even I can see the red is more appealing).

Interesting how red and associated danger sells more for these companies than green and associated health.

Interesting read. subbed

StevenJones said:

Orange
Orange isn't used much in marketing. On a computer screen it loses its hue. When it is clearly visible that it is orange, it conveys playfulness, triggers child-like behavior.

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Great post. A lot of people neglect the aesthetic side of marketing. The only color I have to disagree with you on is Orange. I think orange is a very important color for marketing.

Orange is a "buy" color. Just look at half of the "Buy Now" or "Add to Cart" buttons on the web. PayPal would be the biggest example.

Thanks for the info Steven. I find that if I pick a color for my important links that I want people to click (e.g., affiliate links) that really improves my CTR. For example, on one of my sites the main color is blue. On this site I use red links for my affiliate links. Seems to draw more clicks. Definitely takes some experimentation though.