Why Does Everything Have To Be About Color?

This isn’t the discussion that you think this will be, so take a deep breath and relax. This won’t be the uncomfortable race conversation. There’ll be no need to assert any type of “All Lives Matter” rhetoric in this discussion. The only thing in regards to race that will come up will be the race to make sure that people see and hear about your business.

When it comes to politics, there is politics in many other things outside of who’s passing laws and doing things behind the scenes (or not so behind the scenes) to have a say in the ebbs and flows of society.

All forms of politics denote their system by the use of color. Whether they are business politics, management policies, policy and decision-making politics, product promotions, and more, they’re represented by one or more colors.

Branding is one of the hottest topics in today’s business world. Your brand is your business identity, but there is much more to it, as we shall see shortly.

What is the definition of a brand, and why is it so important?

You can picture a brand as a series of expectations, outcomes, memories, stories, and positive relationships that, when put together, are responsible for the decision made by a consumer to select and patronize one service or product over another. For a brand to be held in high esteem, it must be able to convey value.

If the consumer (who could be an individual buyer, a business, a donor, or a voter,) doesn’t make a selection, pays the premium, or spread the word around, then the consumer has not been provided with any brand value.

That is, the total extra amount people are willing to pay at any given time, or how many times, they chose the expectations, outcomes, stories and positive memories of one particular brand over the competitors. All of these are highly valuable and important to branding management.

Branding: More Than Just A Logo Or Design

Gone are the days when a brand is mainly described by its logo or a carefully wrapped design. While the design is still essential for identifying a brand in today’s business world, it’s not the ultimate benchmark for defining a brand.

The value and respect your brand conveys and the level of response its command from consumers to choose your services or products over alternatives is what makes it a “name brand.”

A study on Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) conducted by German scientists in 2006 to understand how the mind perceives and also process brands, shows that the human brain responds far better to name brands. In other words, strong brands provoke vigorous activity in consumers’ brains. This further indicates that the value that a brand conveys and the appreciation of such value is what make a brand real in a sense.

Furthermore, the MRI test entails that name brands easily command recognition from consumers because they have a “distinct” nature and thus easily recalled and accorded recognition and patronage by consumers’ brains. This is also called the “isolation effect,” an experiment conducted in 1933 by a young German scientist named Von Restorff. The test is still very much relevant today, and it closely corroborates the MRI findings on neuroeconomics.

Color and the effect it has on a targeted audience is the ultimate factor that determines the distinctiveness of a brand.

Color Psychology In Branding – The Definition of Color When It Comes To Branding

All marketers, irrespective of industries, share one ultimate goal; to persuade consumers to make buying decisions. But, for marketers who have gained experience knows that beautiful images and powerful words of man’s wisdom alone cannot deliver the expected goals. Against this backdrop, many branding managers employ psychological tools such as color combinations to drive a brand’s message, achieve better connections with customers, and drive conversions. This is what is called color psychology in branding.

Color theory and combination of colors are some of the most crucial aspects of brand building. What color to chose is always a tough decision for a brand manager or a business owner to make.

Color can enhance a brand’s message, distinguish a brand’s image, and motivate consumers to make actionable decisions.

Colors are part of our primary senses as individuals, and it’s the reason why many of us can remember a woman in a sexy red gown and a man in a blue coat. Still, we find it difficult remembering someone after a long period that was dressed in light brown or grey (someone who looked just casual/normal).

There is no doubt that color influences the decisions of consumers. For instance, when a consumer is faced with the ‘eh’ choice of affordability, the product with the best visual appeal will influence the consumers’ decision to buy. To make sure that your products or services stand out, you need to know what color to use and what meaning it conveys. Below is a brief review of some of the most important colors and what they represent for brands and consumers.

8 Branding Colors And Their Meaning For Brand Marketing And Customer Satisfaction

Red

Red is one of the most daring and glaring branding colors. It elicits powerful emotions and symbolizes intense passion and love. If you want to tag or describe impulsive shoppers, red is the color.

Red drives appetite and is a massive favorite among restaurants. It also symbolizes an increased heart rate while conveying a sense of physical self and safety.

The three most dominant attributes of red are: bold, powerful, and exciting.

Orange

If you are looking for a color that reflects enthusiasm, confidence, and warmth, go for orange. Brands that want to create a solid call-to-action marketing drive used orange color to achieve that. The color also symbolizes good value and affordability. It targets impulsive buyers as well.

By nature, orange is friendly, cheerful, and exudes confidence.

Yellow

No other color fosters communication and increases the level of cheerfulness better than yellow.

Yellow symbolizes clarity, youthfulness, and optimism in brand marketing. Thanks to its long wavelengths, yellow can be highly compelling psychologically. It has a visible charm that draws positive attention to it. That explains why high profile companies such as IKEA, NIKON, DHL, and CAT use it as one of their primary brand color of choice.

By nature, yellow stands for optimism, warmth, and clarity.

Green

Green is the color of growth, peaceful experiences, and health. Green is one of the colors whose shade can easily appeal to the average human eye. Brands use the color to create a sense of wealth and atmosphere of relaxation. Check out Spotify, and you will understand why they chose green.

Blue

Blue is the other most popular color that is giving red a run for its money in the color psychological effect table. Both colors are the most popular brand colors in use. Famous brands like Facebook, PayPal, AOL, and WordPress use a blue color, which symbolizes productivity, efficiency, and security. In other words, blue conveys trust, strength, and dependability.

Purple/Pink

Purple and Pink are the colors that rule in the fashion and cosmetic industries. The two colors denote a sense of creativity, passion, and imagination. While pink represents softness and is a color that a lot of people believe to be for girls, purple takes the steps necessary to mean premium quality service and nobility. A brand that wants to differentiate itself as a premium brand can use the color purple.

Taco Bell, Yahoo, FedEx, and Cadbury are examples of companies using the purple/pink color.

Black/Grey

Black/grey is the color that conveys power, control, and sophistication. It creates an air of mystery and gives brands a neutral, calm, and balanced symbolism. Black is most used in the cosmetic packaging sector, especially blushes and upscale lipsticks.

Black gives a notion of regularity while also lending itself to “luxury brand” and is the hallmark of highly famed brands like Gucci and Adidas.

Rainbow/Mixed Colors

For brands that are multidisciplinary or operating in the tech industry, choosing a rainbow/mixed color palette is the best option.

Rainbow/mixed colors also symbolize endless opportunities, exploration, and growth. Nevertheless, rainbow/combined colors are also associated with mixed feelings.

In A Capitalistic Society, You Can Either Stand Out Or Fall In

We’ve all heard the phrase “same shit, different toilet.” Well, life is like a toilet sometimes, especially when you fall in. If you fall in, you feel nothing but shit, literally. Figuratively speaking, falling in just means you feel like shit when your brand doesn’t stand out in comparison to the rest. As an entrepreneur (or wantrepreneur,) you have to stand out in order to be seen and heard. We’re swimming in a pool of sharks, and those sharks are hungry and smell nothing but blood. This is a race, and it’s a race to see who can come out on top. We all know in any race, there are winners, and there are losers.

That is what capitalism is all about. Capitalism only responds to those who are passionate about their business entirely; take giant strides towards realizing their passionate goals and objectives and make sacrifices to ensure overall success. They are the entrepreneurs that win in the capitalist race, against the wantrepreneurs who just have ideas but are lazy as fuck and are never willing to take action and make a disciplinary sacrifice for success.

By the way, what is capitalism?

Defining Capitalism

Capitalism is an economic theory, which recognizes the private ownership of goods and service production. It is an economic system where private companies own and control the four means of production; land, natural resources, capital, and workforce.

Modern capitalist practices in advanced economies of the world, particularly in Eastern Europe, have demonstrated that it takes more than just competition to be dynamic and ensure survival.

Features of Capitalism

You can tell that you are operating a capitalist system if your brands own and control the four elements of production. It’s receiving profits, interest, and rents from its ownership.

Apart from the political freedom to control and produce their products, the significant economic advantages of capitalism for brands are:

• Competition – Competition allows brands to foster efficiency by producing the best and quality products at the most affordable prices. Companies are always set to maximize their profits since consumers are always willing to buy and pay for the best and most reliable products. This is the reason there is so much competition among brands, which further pushes innovation and efficiency to its highest point of achievement. As this becomes the case, companies look for the best possible means to cut back on costs and minimize or avoid waste.

As a brand, your ability to compete will determine whether you will stay or fall out of the capitalist race to success.

• Innovation – Innovation is another equally important advantage for companies operating in a capitalist economy. While competition increases efficiency, innovation drives better productivity, which, in turn, leads to an increase in rewards for companies and individuals. Innovation is primarily responsible for the growth of any economy, as it fosters healthy efficiency and encourages productive competition.

A brand that’s not innovative cannot be competitive. Innovation gives your brand competitive advantage and allows you to stay ahead of the competition. Innovation allows a company to create branded merchandise relating to current trends and relevant events, while allowing you to connect meaningfully with your customers. Innovation enables companies to achieve growth and timely expansion into new categories and to meet new consumers’ needs.

No doubt, innovation is one of the most important central themes of capitalism and is highly critical for brand success. One way brands can achieve successful innovation includes rebranding, repackaging, product promotion, etc., all of which may involve choosing the right and most relevant branding colors.

Notwithstanding, capitalism has its flaws because people such as the elderly, children, and anyone that is disabled are deemed to be unskilled and are usually marginalized by the private companies, especially if they have no money to offer. Capitalism also encourages negative external factors such as pollution, environmental damages and health damages, which they ignore mostly. Lastly, capitalism creates monopolistic power, which allows less sensitive companies to exploit the populace by charging higher prices.

The U.S., Canada, Hong Kong, and Switzerland are examples of countries that practice capitalism.

Winning The Race With Color Means Having The Right Creative Force Behind Your Business

The race for brands to stay competitive and become successful in the capitalist-driven business world includes knowing how your company is fulfilling its brand promises, which is called “Brand Alignment.”

You can measure the strength of your brand’s alignment by knowing how clear your employees understand your company’s key message, communicate and act on the same message when dealing with your customers and representing your brand.

Unfortunately, too many entrepreneurs nowadays are lacking in brand alignment. One of the reasons for the lack of brand alignment is the fact that these entrepreneurs are going to different individuals and different firms to work on their branding.

So, if your consumers tell you they’re confused, that’s a sure-fire sign that your brand lacks precise alignment. Or if the services you offer is different from what your brand’s employees are describing, it’s clear you’re out of brand alignment.

In addition, if you are finding it difficult to recruit and maintain top talents, or your brand struggles to differentiate itself, then know you have a brand alignment problem.

Once you can understand brand positioning and how they relate to alignment, then you can start to work on your brand alignment failures by getting clues from your internal staff, current clients, and former clients.

Get Help From Creatives

Creativity brings you the best in intelligence and is capable of optimizing growth, expansion, and productivity to the highest points possible. The rapid growth in technology and artificial intelligence has reshaped how creatives deliver resulted-oriented goals, even under challenging sectors of branding.

The future of the creative industry is looking bright, so working with a cutting-edge, creative business—one that is a one-stop-shop–is the way to go. Surely, you can resolve your branding problems and take your business beyond 2020, to the uppermost point of competitive advantage by securing the branding services of creatives.

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Race, Color And Politics In Branding That Isn’t Race, Color And Politics