Color and Emotional Response

Color can cause a visitor/customer to pass by your business, or leave your website altogether. For this reason, deciding on a color scheme for your business image is a very important first step.

BOLD

Warm colors such as red and orange are typically associated with boldness and strength. In web design, black can also trigger a feeling of strength.

PEACEFUL

Cool colors in the blue family conjure feelings of peace and calm. Purples are considered playful.

PROSPEROUS

Green and shades of it, cause most people to think of money, good health, nature, and/or prosperity.

PROFESSIONAL

Muted primary colors such as red, navy, or green along with black and dark gray convey a sense of professionalism.

You should avoid overuse of colors that cause a negative reaction such as bright (neon) purples, pinks, and yellows. Use of these colors in your website background can be particularly distressing to visitors. Unless you are looking for that specific type of reaction, you should avoid using them as the main colors on your website.

COLOR IN YOUR LOGO

The color of your logo should arouse the same feelings you wish your products to instill. As a general rule, a logo should not contain more than 4 colors. Many times even a black and white image is all that is necessary to achieve the desired response to your image.

It’s a good idea to study color and emotions when you are deciding on a color scheme for your branding. The knowledge you develop through a little extra studying, can make a huge difference in your brand’s future.

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How can you be sure your logo design will be memorable?

Start with simplicity. Many people think they need to get very detailed in their logo design; however it’s important to remember the short attention span of the typical client. You don’t want your customers to have to spend more than a few seconds “thinking” about your logo. You want quick recognition of purpose, and then you want them to move on to read more about your business with a sense of comprehension. Believe it or not, that can be achieved with a clean and classic design.

Using geometric shapes in your logo can be one of the easiest ways to start. Often starting with a simple shape, and “warping” it to be more abstract, can give you the notable design you’re looking for. By adding just one other color to that abstract, your result is a clean image that doesn’t require close study.

The more detail and color you have present, the more consideration it requires to decipher. Your goal in having a logo is to begin to “brand” your company. Branding is done through providing an image that is as easily recognizable as a name. A simple logo inspires a feeling of understanding and trust. Complex and overly colorful logos can inadvertently confuse your customers before they even get started. Confusion does not encourage confidence. While it may seem that having an elaborate hand drawn illustration better suits your business image, it is much more difficult to brand your products with such an illustration as your logo. An illustration works much better on a sales page or brochure that discusses a specific product or service you provide.

Color – Experts say that the best logos contain no more than 4 colors, and let’s face it…when you’re ready to visit the print shop for business cards, brochures, and color sales sheets, you’ll be very happy that you stuck to that rule. Printers charge you for each color they print (even different shades of a color are considered different colors). They will also charge you when colors “touch”. The fewer colors you have in your design, the more money you’ll have in your budget for nicer paper and raised ink! Unless you’re absolutely set in your color choices, it always helps to know how colors affect emotions. Using a color scheme that appeals to your target market, will increase the effectiveness of your logo.

Make sure that your logo is re-sizable! Business cards and product labels don’t present you with a very large amount of real estate, when it comes to your logo. The last thing you’ll want is for the person, looking at your business and your products, to squint and wonder what all that “stuff” is in your logo!

Slogans and Catch-Phrases – What if you have a detailed message to imply? The answer – save the details for your marketing and advertising materials. Imagine your business 5 years from now. Will your message still be the same? What about your slogan, or catch phrase? Chances are you’ll change these things as the market changes. The way you present your product and company is dependent upon the current fads and fashions of the marketplace. You should never limit yourself by including a slogan or catch-phrase in your logo design. The only words you should ever include are the words in the title of your business. Slogans can be changed easily in the text of your marketing materials. Including a slogan in your logo could cause you to have to redraw it often!

Your logo should also be unique, most importantly to avoid any trademark or copyright infringements, but also to help in the process of branding your company. The easier to recognize your logo, the easier to remember what it stands for (symbolism). Eventually, upon success, the symbolism matters less than the recognition. For example: McDonald’s “golden arches” began as a symbol of the arch shaped sides of the restaurants. Today, many of the restaurants no longer have the arch shapes…and yet everyone recognizes what company those golden arches symbolize.

Always remember that the purpose of your logo is to visually communicate with potential clients, before they read any messages, see any products, or meet any people. It’s the old adage of the “first impression” being the most important. When your logo design is simple, yet powerful – you’ve got a memorable base to work from!

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When you’re getting ready to hire a graphic designer, there are some basic things that every good designer will know and provide. You should be ready to ask the following questions and you should get the right answers…or you should move on to someone else. Price is not always the deciding factor when it comes to design.

1. What software do you use to create graphics?

This is important because you want clean crisp graphics, not only for print but also for the web. Did you know that you can go into programs like MS Powerpoint and MS Publisher, and create a document, then save it as a .jpg? This may seem like a really awesome and easy way to create a graphic, however there are issues with doing that…such as resolution. A true designer will have graphics software such as Adobe Illustrator (if hand drawn), Adobe Photoshop, Ulead PhotoImpact (great for photo editing), or CorelDraw. Keep in mind that while Quark, Publisher, and Powerpoint are all great Desktop Publishing programs, they are not intended to be used for logo design or website graphic design.

A good designer will provide you with final graphics that have smooth edges on the text as well as any other elements. Good graphics are very important to your business image. If your graphics appear to be designed by your brother-in-law’s friend with Powerpoint, your business will not be taken seriously. View an Example

2. Is there a difference between website graphics and print graphics?

The answer is always yes. If the person you are dealing with says “No”, you need to find someone else.

Print graphics are always high resolution (at least 300 dpi) and typically not provided to you as a .jpg or .gif. Most often your print graphics will be in one or all of these file types: .ai, .psd, .pdf, .eps, or .bmp. But be careful…some of these file types can be created using the software we mentioned in question 1…so they still may not be the clean, crisp graphics you should be getting.

Website graphics are typically a lower dpi, such as 150 or less, and are optimized for the web. Web graphics such as .gif, .jpg, and .png can all be optimized with the right software programs, so that they look exactly the same to the viewer, but the file size has been significantly lowered in order to load faster in a web browser. In today’s image rich website design, this can be extremely important. Visitors do not typically wait more than a few seconds for a website to “load” in their browser, and if your images and graphics are not optimized, you are probably losing a significant amount of traffic.

3. Can you provide a file for my print shop?

When you go to a print shop with any high resolution graphic (such as a logo or a print ad) you will typically be told that you need to provide them with camera ready artwork. Your graphic designer should have this artwork already on file if the artwork was created using the correct software. Many times a print shop will use the term “vector file”, and your designer will know exactly what is needed.

If you are having an ad designed, it’s important to let your designer know if it will be going to print, and what that print size will be. For instance, if you’re placing a magazine ad, your designer will need to know whether the ad will be in a portrait (short side up or vertical), or landscape (long side up or horizontal) layout.

4. Will you provide me with color codes, and if so what types?

At the very least your designer should be able to provide you with an R-G-B code for each color within your design. Your web designer will need something different, however: a hex code. Hex codes start with the ‘#’ symbol, and are six digits long. Print shops will typically need one of two common code types: CMYK or Pantone. A true graphic designer can easily provide you with with all four types.

Good graphic design can be hard to find in this age of computer driven business. If you know what you need before you get started you can avoid the pitfalls that come with a “person who does logos”, and find a graphic designer who’ll provide you with the image your business needs to succeed.

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