Guest Post: What Color Can Do for Your Website as an Indie Author

Color is an important but often underrated facet of web design and marketing. Be it a massive international corporation, or a small independent venture, businesses can profit from using color choices in strategic ways. What’s more, the wrong color choice can damage your chance at success, affecting anything from brand image to CTA button efficiency, they can make or break a company. In fact according to DesignAdvisor, for more than 80% of consumers, color is the main reason for buying a product. In terms of branding and brand recognition, color accounts for up to 80% of a brand’s ability to be recognized.

It’s not just big business that should care about color choices. Those in creative industries, indie writers included, should keep color in mind when setting up online spaces to promote their art, be it a complex website or a simple blog. Making use of color to develop themes, associations and emotional responses can help creatives establish a sense of authority and coherence that their art and business will benefit from. To get you started, here are two key facts about color choices and color psychology to keep in mind:

Colors Carry Meaning

Color psychology helps us understand the most common associations between certain colors and meaning, messages and emotion. While we can put this research to great use, it is important to think of context and to keep testing for good results; different cultures and groups of people may associate colors differently. Color associations are also personal, depending on a person’s current mood, memories, and preferences. Color psychology is a great starting point, providing much-needed guidance when it comes to branding and message.

Many well-known companies have deployed enormously effective color-based campaigns. Think of Coca-Cola and their extremely well-known shade of red, instantly recognizable and associated with the brand. Also, their historic choice of red has helped the beverage mammoth establish their brand identity as a fun and exciting brand, as red is a very emotional color, frequently used to create a sense of urgency.

Web Design and Color Choices

Apart from color associations and coherent messaging, color choices can profoundly impact conversions and revenue used right. Many websites researched and tested color strategies for elements such as call to action buttons and saw great success as a result. Here, the key is contrast. The best performing colors for conversion purposes are red, orange and green, very highly contrasting colors.

Using highly contrasting colors when designing certain elements naturally draws attention to them. That is, users are more likely to notice and click on elements that stand out. For example, Beamax increased the number of clicks on links by changing their color from blue to red. Quite staggeringly, VegasSlotsOnline managed to increase conversions by 175% by changing their CTA buttons to a higher contrasting yellow.

So, there you have it. These two key facts should get you started. As always, remember that testing and continuous innovation will always keep you ahead. For more stats, facts, and information about color in web design, check out the infographic below.

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