When you ask a person what makes a brand memorable and recognizable, their first answer is most commonly related to the brand’s logo or maybe even their tagline. Those kinds of answers are very much correct. Colors in logos and other branding collateral can serve as psychological influences on one’s emotions – dictating the feelings and impressions that consumers will experience when they see a brand’s colors and aesthetic.
All the colors have many different connotations and meanings that help allow a brand to change its audience’s perception. Here are some tips on how to effectively use and understand colors on a psychological level for your branding.
What is Brand Color Psychology?
Color psychology is the study of how colors influence perception, behavior, and emotion. Therefore, colors can have a strong impact on almost everything, particularly marketing. From a brand’s standpoint, understanding the influences of color psychology can help you entice and attract your target audience, making color a powerful tool that could give your brand an attractive identity.
Picking Your Brand Colors
Colors have a huge impact on the overall aesthetic tone on your brand’s front. It’s a powerful and influential tool that commands attention and attracts the consumer base of one’s choosing. Let it be known; however, everyone has different perceptions and viewpoints of all the colors. The trick is choosing the colors that capture the exact audience that you’re looking to reach out to. However, it’s not just about choosing a basic color; hue, saturation, and brightness are very important factors that should not be chosen strategically. The slightest change in any of those factors could change the psychological tone and mood of your brand.
Think of your brand as an entity as your brand’s identity already acts as your own salesperson. It needs to have a “personality” that is attractive and appealing to your consumer base. Again, your brand’s identity has a psychological impact on potential consumers, so know exactly what kind of audience you’re hoping to bring in.
Depending on your brand personality, it can be a color that resonates and welcomes your audiences or intrigues them with mystery and intimidation. Aim for a color that makes your brand unique and different from most other brands. Don’t limit yourself to a single color, either. Many good color combinations can create a feeling that no other color can make on its own.
Understand all colors have both a positive and negative meaning behind them. It’s just a matter of how the color is set and expressed. Your brand has to be prepared to stick with the dual meaning of the colors you’ve chosen. A color you chose can be perceived as passionate, while also being perceived as angry or defiant.
Red, yellow, blue, green, purple, pink, and orange – there are 10 million different colors! What are your favorites? Do you know what kind of emotion and impression the different tones and hues can leave? Let’s talk more about color psychology and what colors you’re thinking about using for your brand.