What do your colours say about your brand?
An extravagant statement about colours
Colours impact the way we live. While this may sound like a lofty statement, it’s true. In our daily lives, we’re literally surrounded by colours. They affect our moods, help us to navigate our environments, influence the values of our societies, bring together communities, shift our judgements from black-and-white viewpoints, alter our perceptions… the grandiose list goes on. So, colours go beyond straightforward aesthetics.
Still thinking about colours on a slightly basic level for a moment, consider the many, diverse ways colours are used around you. The colours on traffic lights dictate our actions when travelling. As a marker of respect for the deceased at a funeral, black clothes are worn by mourners in the West and white clothes in the East. The wearing of white by a Western bride at her wedding symbolises purity. Red generally acts as a warning to stop and beware, from road signs to fire engines. At some Eastern weddings, however, red’s often worn by brides as icons of love and prosperity, with grooms and guests choosing other bright or pastel colours.
At the opposite end of the colour spectrum, green denotes all good things, from ‘go’ on the aforementioned traffic lights, to healthy food labelling, to environmental trademarks. In the Mediterranean, the blue amulet called nazar is deemed to protect individuals from the evil eye. Social conditioning assigns the colour pink to girls and blue to boys. Multicolour, typically those from the rainbow, are used to represent diversity and inclusivity in relation to equal rights.
This isn’t an encyclopaedic review of colours in the private and public sphere. You can probably recall a whole host of colour usage from your own real-life observations.
Rightly or wrongly, certain colours make us perceive, experience, act and judge in particular ways. Colours, then, have a vital role to play.
Obviously, the use and power of colours is much more complicated than this, but their in-depth analysis is better suited to academic studies rather than this format – a blog about colours in branding which handily brings us onto discussion of this central matter.
Let your brand colours speak volumes
You see, the colours in your brand will provoke thoughts, feelings and notions in the people interacting with you – that’s your clients, prospects, suppliers, employees, partners and other stakeholders. Whether you like these self-same thoughts, feelings and notions brought to mind – or not – there’s no getting away from them. Branding and rebranding exercises should revolve around colours.
It goes without saying (but we’ll say it anyway) these interactions with your brand should be positive – not negative. As such, your brand colour palette demands careful deliberation and selection.
Having already intimated some ‘good’ and ‘bad’ branding colour options, here we summarise the psychology of colour in a nutshell:
Yellow = positivity
Word associations = hopeful, creative, energetic, happy, youthful, curious.
Green = calm
Word associations = growth, serene, wealth, balance, stable, health, harmony, luck.
Orange = warmth
Word associations = cheerful, friendly, adventurous, extrovert, inviting, fun, courageous.
Black = powerful
Word associations = bold, timeless, classic, substance, power, sophistication, credible.
White = pure
Word associations = simple, trustworthy, clean, clarity, freshness.
Purple = luxury
Word associations = regal, sophisticated, magical, imaginative, decadent, spiritual, justice.
Red = energetic
Word associations = attention grabbing, passionate, loving, exciting, confident, hot.
Blue = dependable
Word associations = secure, confident, loyal, masculine, successful, authoritative, purposeful.
Pink = optimistic
Word associations = respectful, feminine, sensitive, romantic, gratitude, softness.
Brown = down to earth
Word associations = honest, organic, sustainable, wholesome, nurturing, reliable.
Grey = professional
Word associations = subdued, responsible, serious, mature, neutral.
Nail your brand colours
When selecting your corporate colour scheme, think about several interlinked factors including:
#1: What do you want your colours to represent? While the above list isn’t exhaustive, it’s a place to start. Pick colours that convey the right message about your values, messaging and positioning – and ensure these colours complement each other.
#2: Which colours are your competitors using? It’s often said that imitation is the best form of flattery but this mentality doesn’t apply to branding. Being a copycat should be avoided when it comes to your brand assets.
#3: How will the colours translate in your market? With different connotations to different societal groups, research the meaning of colours to your audience. The last thing you want is colours which damage your brand due to an ill-thought-out selection process.
Create brand colour guidelines
With your colour line-up complete, devise a single source of truth regarding which colours to use in specific contexts and on distinct platforms by building into your brand guidelines. To help you out with the perhaps-daunting task of developing and managing a brand rule book, cast your mind back to our earlier ‘Brand guidelines: A how-to guide’ blog.
Within your brand colour guidelines, detail colour references such as CMYK (cyan, magenta, yellow, key), PMS (Pantone matching system), RGB (red, green, blue) and HEX (hexadecimal numeral system) values, as appropriate.
While not mandatory, it’s also useful to dictate a primary and secondary palette to cover every eventuality and showcase examples of colours in actual designs – both good practice and bad practice illustrations. You’ll soon be singing from the same brand hymn sheet for all-important consistency and supporting brand awareness activity to turn your prospects into devoted advocates.
Remember our (surprising) branding credentials
As a company specialising in Microsoft 365 customisation and training, we have lots to say about branding because it’s all part-and-parcel of introducing uniformity throughout your client-facing touchpoints. Read about our customisation and training services to discover a flavour of our branding-related work with law firms.
You might also wish to access previous blogs on branding-themed subjects, not least ‘How important is your brand?’, ‘Three benefits of brand consistent documents’ and ‘What does your font say about your brand?’
Take away our closing recommendations
As is customary with our handy hints, we’ve helpfully compiled some take-away advice to get your colour projects running swimmingly:
Do the legwork before you launch. Take the opportunity to perform R&D in your sector around colour usage rather than blindly opting for colours which you believe represent your brand. If there’s no substance or knowledge behind your colour decisions, it’ll show.
Be inspired by the big brands you know and love. Divert your lens further than the legal industry alone by analysing the colour usage of popular brands. These corporations take their colours very seriously and have invested huge sums of money in choosing them.
Get Adobe’s help to play around with colour schemes. The colour wheel at https://color.adobe.com/create/color-wheel allows you to experiment with possible branding schemes during the early stages of your colour undertaking – before you commit.
Collaborate with others. Whether it’s working with your marketing and wider teams, liaising with your marketing agency or instructing Integrated Office Solutions’ expertise, embrace these partnerships for optimal results.
Use brand colours in digital and physical assets. From your logo and business cards, to social accounts and website, make brand colours a pivotal element of your company’s visual identity by utilising anywhere your brand shows up – online or offline.
Adopt the well-known 60-30-10 rule. 60% of your visuals use your dominant colour, 30% its complementary friend and 10% an accent colour. Of course, your colour palette will maybe feature more than three main colours but it’s a useful beginning point.