# General Business Category > Marketing Forum >  The power of color in branding

## Stelio

Colors do have a significant impact on peoples emotional state while colors  for sure - have an impact peoples ability to identify.

Research conducted by the secretariat of the Seoul International Color Expo 2004 documented the following relationships between color and marketing:

92.6% said that they put most importance on visual factors when purchasing products. Only 5.6% said that the physical feel via the sense of touch was most important. Hearing and smell each drew 0.9%.

When asked to approximate the importance of color when buying products, 84.7% of the total respondents think that color accounts for more than half among the various factors important for choosing products.

Research reveals people make a subconscious judgment about a person, environment, or product within 90 seconds of initial viewing and that between 62% and 90% of that assessment is based on color alone (source: CCICOLOR - Institute for Color Research).

Research by the Henley Centre suggests 73% of purchasing decisions are now made in-store. Consequently, catching the shopper's eye and conveying information effectively are critical to successful sales.

> Color increases brand recognition by up to 80% (university of Loyola, Maryland study).

> Color influences brand identity in a variety of ways. 
If a picture is worth a thousand words, a picture with natural colors may be worth a million, memory-wise. Psychologists have documented that "living color" does more than appeal to the senses. It also boosts memory for scenes in the natural world.

> Color helps us to process and store images more efficiently than colorless (black and white) scenes, and as a result to remember them better (source: The findings were reported in the May 2002 issue of the Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory and Cognition, published by the American Psychological Association).

Ads in color are read up to 42% more often than the same ads in black and white (as shown in study on phone directory ads - source: White, Jan V., Color for Impact, Strathmoor,, April, 1997). ..

Color can improve readership by 40 percent 1, learning from 55 to 78 percent 2, and comprehension by 73 percent.

Tests indicate that a black and white image may sustain interest for less than two-thirds a second, whereas a colored image may hold the attention for two seconds or more. (A product has one-twentieth of a second to halt the customer's attention on a shelf or display.)

People cannot process every object within view at one time. Therefore, color can be used as a tool to emphasize or de-emphasize areas.

A Midwestern insurance company used color to highlight key information on their invoices. As a result, they began receiving customer payments an average of 14 days earlier.

Other Research
92% Believe color presents an image of impressive quality
90% Feel color can assist in attracting new customers
90% Believe customers remember presentations and documents better when color is used
83% Believe color makes them appear more successful
81% Think color gives them a competitive edge
76% Believe that the use of color makes their business appear larger to clients........................ 90% Feel confused when dealing with products that carry multiple colors  they found products using one to two colors more appealing and easy to identify
(source: Conducted by Xerox Corporation and International Communications Research from February 19, 2003 to March 7, 2003, margin of error of +/- 3.1%).

"It is probably the expressive qualities (primarily of color but also of shape) that spontaneously affect the passively receiving mind, whereas the tectonic structure of pattern (characteristic of shape, but found also in color) engages the actively organizing mind."

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## IanF

Hi Stelio
When I see colour spelt without the "u" I immediately suspect a copy and paste from an American article.
Do you have research for South Africa I suspect that gold and silver are important to SA consumers, but I have no research for this.

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## adrianh

Ianf - very observant on the copy & paste

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## adrianh

Stelio - I looked at your website. The work that you do is really amazing.

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## Stelio

I am of the opinion that when it comes to advertising / marketing / branding, the Americans are the most reliable source of information. These functions / processes are part of their culture – the art of selling is part of the platform they have based the “American Dream” on (whether this is right or wrong that is a different discussion all together for a different forum).
I believe that the way colours affect our perception over products is a global phenomenon to a great extend. Most probably there are differences from country to county but they cannot be major.
Us - South Africans – can only benefit by noticing these business “basics” or “trends” in whatever we do – since we chose to operate on the most volatile platform one can choose to make his living from: self employment.

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## Blurock

The symbolism of colour is indeed interesting. When used in marketing and branding one has to be aware of cultural differences as well, because what is perceived as pure and clean in one culture resembles death in another (white).

The colour red for instance has 
Positives: passion, strength, energy, power, speed, love, fire, masculinity, sex, excitement
Negatives: Danger, fire, blood, aggression, stop.

So depending on the product, application and the target market, one should be very careful about the choice of colour for your brand.

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## adrianh

There is always another side to the coin. 

What colour are the following brands:

1. Mercedes Benz 
2. Apple
3. Nike
4. Hummer

hmmm...I think it largely depend on what you are selling and to whom.

If you were to sell light armoured vehicles then you would probably do so in white, black or cammo but not in red, pink and bright yellow. If you were to sell razor blades to ladies you would probably do so in pink, white, possibly light green but not black, dark blue or dark green.

What happens if you make a colourful fancyful brand and then one day produce a serious product aimed at a serious market.

Another question is why do so many people prefer black or white clothing, shoes, belts, cars, cellphones, laptops, tablets etc. Could it be that colour is too heavily liked to fashion? A lady or a gentleman will most always look good in a black suit and white shirt but not in colours.

I think that one has to be very careful of colour, especially when it comes to marketig to women.

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## Blurock

ORANGE
Positives: energy, balance, heat, fire, playfulness, autumn
Negatives: aggression, ignorance, warning, danger, gaudiness

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## Wiz

> There is always another side to the coin. 
> 
> What colour are the following brands:
> 
> 1. Mercedes Benz 
> 2. Apple
> 3. Nike
> 4. Hummer
> 
> ...


You said it all buddy. Depends on business to business. In UK people prefer a simple combination of color for instance White + blue is there favorite color i believe.
Have seen more conversions with simple colors in UK. 
In India people prefer Blue color, not sure about other countries.  :Big Grin:

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## Blurock

BLUE

Positives: ocean, sky, harmony, unity, confidence, water, ice, loyalty, conservatism, cleanliness, technology, tranquility
Negatives: depression, coldness, ice, tackiness

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## Blurock

BLACK

Positives: modernity, power, sofistication, formality, elegance, wealth, mystery, style
Negatives: evil, death, anger, sadness, remorse, mourning, unhappiness, mystery, anonymity, fear

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## eina26

Colors do matter. I just want to share this interesting Infographic that shows how powerful it can be.  :Smile:

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## wynn

> Colors do matter. I just want to share this interesting Infographic that shows how powerful it can be.


I see the blues are the predominant color, I always believed that the FNB color was the most trustworthy, not necessarily fact but definitely the perception.

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## roryf

Colours have a huge impact on certain consumers.We tried to change the colour of a label on some of our products a while back and the consumers didn't want to buy them anymore.We changed back and don't have any problems.The colour was associated with our brand.

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## Blurock

> Colours have a huge impact on certain consumers.We tried to change the colour of a label on some of our products a while back and the consumers didn't want to buy them anymore.We changed back and don't have any problems.The colour was associated with our brand.


Which colours were they?

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## pmbguy

We are just just above animal man, colour is a huge part of natural human nature and psychology. Ripe fruit anybody?

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## Dave A

In a split test on a website selling shoes, they split test a page selling a particular brown shoe - one test with a black background and the other with a white background for the image of the shoe. Sales for the black background image was 64% higher than the page with the white background image.

But don't for a moment assume this to be a golden rule for brown products. The particular presentation I got this from was about the importance of split testing, and it didn't take long for the presenter to make the key point - assume nothing. Just because something worked in one case doesn't mean this can be relied on in another.

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Chrisjan B (09-Aug-13), pmbguy (09-Aug-13)

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## adrianh

No matter what colour tin Castle Lager is sold in I will still drink it. You see, when it comes to beer I am colour blind.

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## roryf

> Which colours were they?


Green to Yellow.

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## Peter Johns781

Thanks for the heads up!

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## Blurock

> Green to Yellow.


Green
Positives: nature, spring, environment, wealth, good luck, vigor, generosity, fertility

Negatives: aggression, envy, misfortune, inexperience, greed, illness


Yellow:
Positives: Sunlight, joy, happiness optimism, summer, hope, wealth

Negatives: cowardice, illness, sissy, weakness, dishonesty


Colours play a huge role in people's perceptions and its choice depends on the message, the market and a product

Of all the colors in the spectrum, blue is an appetite suppressant. Weight loss plans suggest putting your food on a blue plate. 
Blue food is a rare occurrence in nature. There are no leafy blue vegetables, no blue meats, and aside from blueberries and a few blue-purple potatoes from remote spots on the globe, blue just doesn't exist in any significant quantity as a natural food color.
Consequently, we don't have an automatic appetite response to blue. Furthermore, our primal nature avoids food that are poisonous. A million years ago, when our earliest ancestors were foraging for food, blue, purple and black were "color warning signs" of potentially lethal food.

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## taftimes

I also agree with one of my friend who mentioned above i.e color is brand depends on the product we are selling. When the recall time is very low for your brand then color is one of the important way to increase your brand recognition.

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