Nearly 85 percent of people cite color as the most important criterion for buying a product. Is it any wonder, then, that websites with exceptional aesthetics get more traffic? Although layout and user-friendliness are big parts of web aesthetics, color may deserve precedent over all other considerations. The importance of color in marketing has been studied extensively; the results can – and should – be applied to web design.
How Important Is it?
According to research from WebFX, 93 percent of people make purchasing decisions based on visual appearance. Texture (6 percent) and sound/smell (1 percent) were far behind. Another 80 percent of shoppers believe that color increases brand recognition, while 52 percent of those who were disappointed in a store’s aesthetics never returned.
As far as advertisements go, those that are in color are read up to 42 percent more often than those in black and white. It takes just 90 seconds to make an unconscious judgement about a product upon initial viewing, and 62 to 90 percent of that judgement is based on color. Of course, color is too broad a criterion; different colors evoke different feelings.
Colors Mean Different Things To Consumers
Have you noticed that most fast food companies incorporate red into their logo? What about the prevalence of blue in corporate offices? These patterns are not coincidental. The color red has been found to trigger hunger and strong emotions, while blue makes people comfortable and implies non-invasiveness. Green represents nature, and purple is the color of success.
The same color philosophy appears in web design. Amazon leans heavily upon orange, a color that evokes warmth and creativity. Netflix is red, a color that keeps you wanting more. Tampa web design companies utilize WordPress (blue), Shopify (green), WooCommerce (purple), and Magento (orange) to build their websites.
The Conformity Of Design
One side affect of color-first web design is that companies with the same goals will have sites that look similar. Website conformity peaked in 2016, with layout diversity decreasing 30 percent compared to 2010. Color diversity declined as well, but it rose considerably between 2016 and 2018. There’s nothing necessarily wrong with color conformity; the more that a certain color stands for a certain idea, the better it will work in web marketing.
Color is arguably the most important consideration when it comes to designing a website. If you are still not sure which color would suit your website the best, or how you can improve them, it’s always a good idea to reach out to custom New York web designers, get all the help you need and make sure your website looks as pleasant as possible. Much has already been studied about colors’ influence on consumers, the results of which are used in online marketing. In some cases, colors can promote a company’s ethic better than words.
