Colors and Your Website

Here is an interesting article about colors and using them on a website.
Colors are very important as this article demonstrates.

Web Page Design Instruction - The Vital Role of Colors

By Brian McGregor

I wonder if you knew that visitors to your website form an instant opinion? And they form it about you and your offer. This instant opinion is created subconsciously. It happens automatically within the visitors mind. This happens automatically, and you might wonder why. It matters not a jot how clever the text is on your page. You can have paid an expensive professional to produce your copy for you. In fact, their instant opinion is formed before the visitor will have read a single word of your copy.

It doesn't matter either, whether the quality of the images on your website are of the highest. It also doesn't matter how great your offer is. You might be providing a superb bargain or proposition, but again this isn't going to influence the instant opinion. This is because the initial reaction to your website is instant, and occurs the moment the page appears in the browser of your visitor. You may have guessed there is something subliminal at work here. In a way, that is right. Immediate opinions are formed by visitors to every single website. This may surprise you, but the answer is colors. When your web page appears to your visitor, the colors you've used go to work on the subconscious of your visitors.

The spooky thing about this is that as a web page viewer we can do nothing about this. Colors evoke an intuitive reaction which we have no control over.' The feelings evoked by colors are automatic, and there's no way we can avoid them. This is one of the reasons why companies can invest millions in getting the colors exactly right for their products and marketing promotions. Big companies realize that colors are a psychological feature, and they can influence our reception of their marketing. Companies fully appreciate that the use of the correct colors can be critical in the success of their products. What webmasters have to realize, and this can be very important, is that the same color psychology applies to our web pages.

The fact is, the color scheme you use on your web pages can have the effect of causing your visitors to very quickly click away from your website. This can happen even if the copy on your website is compelling. The chances are that visitors who are put off by your colors are unlikely to read your copy anyway. But don't despair. By using a different color scheme it is quite possible to influence your web page visitor to react positively to you and your offering. This isn't a new discovery. The psychological power of colors is well known in the offline marketing world. It's been around with us for decades. No matter who we are, emotions are conveyed to our subconscious through the use of colors.

What we need to do in our website design is to ensure the color combination on our web pages convey a positive feelings. If you do this, then you will be conveying a trust, sense of belonging and warmth. If you get your colors wrong, you could be conveying negative feelings like distrust, rejection and coolness. The following list gives an idea of the emotions associated with their respective colors:

RED
Danger, love, leadership, sense of power, excitement, energy, strength etc

ORANGE
Courage, playfulness, confidence, cheerfulness, friendliness, comfort, steadfastness etc

YELLOW
Amusement, intelligence, caution, organization, joy, curiosity, brightness etc

GREEN
Health, healing, money, nature, food, harmony, life etc

BLUE
Peace, love, stability, acceptance, trustworthiness, patience, tranquility etc

PURPLE
Wisdom, dignity, royalty, nobility, luxury, independence, ambition etc

BROWN
Tribal, earthiness, comfort, durability, reliability, nature, primitive etc

BLACK
Sophistication, formality, power, elegance, wealth, dramatic, style etc

WHITE
Simplicity, goodness, innocence, cleanliness, fresh, easy, purity etc

Finally, be aware that your website color scheme should reflect the product or offering you make. The subconscious mind of your visitors will automatically relate the color of your page with the message that's on it. If you give out a mixed message in terms of color and offer, the subconscious mind will not even attempt to reconcile the two. Which means, your visitor will be lost. You should spend time in determining what are the right colors for your web pages. Try and make sure your colors and message are in harmony. If you do this, your website will produce the results you're looking for. In summary, the difference between the right and wrong color scheme on your website can be the difference between profit and loss.


About the author

Brian McGregor is an internet entrepreneur and business consultant, and author of the ebook CASH COLORS. If you're interested in web page design instruction, CASH COLORS shows how to make your web page colors work for you, as opposed to against you. http://www.cash-colors.com
This article was found at WellWisher.org.