The Psychology of Color Combinations

Color can be very persuasive, albeit on a subconscious level. For the best chance at converting a prospect into a customer, a website’s color scheme should appeal to the sensitivities of the intended audience, not the website designer. Some aspects to consider when choosing an effective color scheme for a website include:

• Color and Gender Communication: Though societal stereotypes of what is considered feminine and what is considered masculine are rapidly diminishing in the modern world, color choice can still play an important role when a website’s target audience is predominantly female or predominantly male. Niche Marketing PR has extensive experience in marketing to audiences excusive or nearly exclusive to one gender.
• Color and Mood: Did you know that certain colors and color combinations have documented scientific effects on people’s moods? For example, some studies have shown a reddish hue of the color orange can stimulate the appetite, making it a prime choice for restaurant interiors.
• Multicultural Perceptions of Color: If your target audience comprises more than one ethnic group, it is important to consider the cultural perceptions your color scheme may have upon each ethnicity. For example, the color white, which is often considered to inspire feelings of cleanliness in western countries, represents sickness and death in Japanese culture because of its association with hospitals.
• Adding Emphasis with Opposite Colors: If you have ever taken an art class, you may recall being told that every color has an opposite, this being the color against which one color will appear to contrast the most. For example, the color orange will stand out most when placed on top of a blue background, and vise-versa. Use of opposite colors can be a particularly effective solution when designing calls to action in banner ads and other marketing outlets in which you must work with limited space, or in any instance where you would like one aspect of your website to appear dominant. Learn more about opposite color schemes here.

Color Theory and Customer Conversions

Improving your customer conversion rates doesn’t always have to be accomplished by making a logical or emotional appeal to your target audience’s conscious mind. Sometimes subtle, subconscious attempts at persuasion can be just as effective. Color theory is a psychology discipline involving identifying the words and concepts the human subconscious mind associates with various colors. Learning color theory, or having someone well versed in it on your marketing team, can go a long way towards improving your customer conversion rates through simple design changes.

Here are a few of the words and concepts people often associate with the colors red, orange, yellow, blue, purple, black, white, gray, brown, beige, and ivory according to psychology studies:

Niche Marketing PR is well versed in color theory and will help you look at your site’s current color scheme with a fresh perspective, and if necessary, choose a new or modified color scheme that will be more appealing to your target audience. (There’s a science to color scheme selection too – learn more about choosing the correct website color scheme here.)

We can also help you with other design considerations such as creating a visual hierarchy for each page and designing for the four tiers of website design.

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