Many small and medium sized businesses put a lot of thought into their name and logo. Often times, color choice becomes an afterthought. In reality, color plays a vital role in design and says so much more about your business than you might realize. It’s your foundation and a strong reflection of your identity.
Blue is the most often utilized color, particularly in the industries of health, travel, and household goods. Purple and orange are least used, however are appropriate for certain industries like luxury items (purple) or toys for children (orange). Choosing the wrong color can limit your reach to your target consumer.
Let’s take a look at psychological suggestions associated with color:
- Blue – dependable, trust, confidence
- Green – health, wealth, safety, calm
- Yellow – cheerful, motivation, happy
- Red – energy, passion, excitement, contemporary
- Orange – playful, engaging
- Purple – luxury, spiritual, mystery
- White – cleanliness, purity
- Pink – nurturing, youthful, softness
- Brown – earthy, nature, durable
- Black – power, value, prestige
There are other considerations as well when choosing color. Combinations may be perfect for your logo however most designers will recommend no more than three colors (or shades). Aside from being more expensive to reproduce multiple colors, the psychological suggestion becomes lost. Here are some well known corporate logos as examples of one, two, or three colors:
- One color – Starbucks (green), Target (red), Apple (black)
- Two colors – Harley Davidson (black/orange), Expedia (navy/mustard), Dunkin Donuts (pink/orange); many sports teams use two colors for their logos
- Three colors – Superman (red/yellow/blue), Burger King (red/gold/blue), Tide (red/orange/blue)
- There are also some successful exceptions of more than three – NBC, Google
- www.DesignWizard.com will give you some ideas for eye-catchy color combos.
When making your choice, consider:
- Who is your customer? If it’s an executive, try black and red. If it’s a mom with small children, try pink and white. For a DIYer try brown and green. A health facility could try blue and green. You get the idea.
- Play with lighter or darker alternate shades of a color: teal (from blue), salmon (from orange), mint (from green).
- Ask unbiased people their opinion; give them 2 or 3 options. If you’re able to assemble a focus group of 10 people, you’ll hear interesting feedback.
- A good design tool to play with shapes and colors is www.Canva.com
- Consider your font color (if adding that) as well to ensure you get the sharpest look. White on black is easiest to read while red on black can be difficult, particularly for seniors.
Finally, while color won’t guarantee success for your business, it can be a substantial boost in creating your identity. Need help? Give me a holler at 941.321.5069 or message me here or on my Facebook page at www.Facebook.com/FirewallBranding
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