How Strategic Use of Color in Web Design Can Increase Conversions

Websites are created for any number of reasons. Some people may put up a website for their business, while some do it just for fun.

A majority of webmasters, however, have websites because they have set goals they need to achieve. These sites could be for furthering a certain agenda—political or otherwise—or for selling certain products or services. For these websites, the single biggest indicator of success is conversion rates.

Simply put, a conversion is when a visitor of your website responds to your call-to-action. You get a conversion whenever someone registers for a webinar you’re about to host. A reader signing up for your newsletter is also a conversion.

The same goes for anyone filling out a contact form. Of course, the ultimate conversion would be if someone actually pays for a product or service you are offering.

There are many factors that help increase conversions, and the colors that you use in your web design are one of them.

The Essential Role Colors Play in Conversions

Colors are a powerful design tool. After all, they can influence our attitudes and emotions the moment we lay our eyes on them.

Now, this may sound like hokey mumbo-jumbo, but there is actually a legitimate sub-field of behavioral psychology that focuses on how color affects human behavior. It’s called color psychology, and marketers and web designers are wisely trying to get a good grasp of it for use in their respective works.

There have been studies that show the connection between colors and people’s attitudes and emotions. One study demonstrates how the relationship between brands and color depends on whether the color being used by a brand fits what is being sold. According to another study, our brains also prefer recognizable brands, and that makes color crucial to the creation of a brand identity.

As color psychology stands today, marketers are using whatever understanding they have of it to get people to respond to their material. The same goes for good web designers, who often incorporate color psychology into their designs to grab the attention of people and trigger desired emotions within them to complete conversions.

As mentioned earlier, color psychology studies how colors affect human behavior. Much of the science revolves around the values, emotions, and reactions that are commonly associated with colors. So, when a web designer creates a website, he or she must know which colors draw certain typical reactions from people and incorporate the one that serves his or her purposes best.

So, which colors are commonly associated with what values and emotions? Which colors trigger a physiological reaction in people? Here’s an overview of some colors and the attitudes and feelings that they elicit from viewers.

How Colors Can Impact Web Design & Conversion Rates

Blue

The color blue is a favorite in the business world, particularly in finance. It also bears mentioning that Facebook, the biggest website in the world, has been using blue since they first launched.

Perhaps the popularity of blue in the business sector hinges on the fact that it’s typically associated with security, reliability, intelligence, safety, and trust. All businesses want to project those qualities, after all.

Blue is also associated with calmness, coolness, and serenity, which is probably why blue is believed to lower blood pressure and heart rate.

Then again, blue is also the color of sadness, at least when it’s used as an idiom in the English language.

Black

OK, so black will forever be associated with death and darkness. You can even throw in oppression and gloominess. However, let’s not forget that black also projects elegance and glamour, which is why many advertisements for luxury products use a lot of black.

Aside from elegance and sophistication, black is also good for projecting power.

White

As far as the Western world is concerned, white is all about innocence, purity, and virtue. Hospitals, meanwhile, use a lot of white because it represents hygiene and cleanliness. White is popular in the world of healthcare as well as in other industries.

Green

Of course, the most obvious association with the color green is the environment. In fact, green has become interchangeable with anything related to the environment and conservation.

It’s also associated with decisiveness, which also makes it perfect for business. Green is also easy on the eyes, and the brain processes the color quite easily.

Red

It may sound a bit cliché by now, but no one denies that red is dubbed as the color of passion, and rightly so. Rage, jealousy, danger, and violence are also linked with red.

The way red evokes such feelings from people makes it perfect for creating a sense of urgency in marketing materials. If your business is having a clearance sale, for example, a red graphic with all details in white can make anyone who reads them feel like rushing to your store—online or otherwise—or miss out on the great deals that you’re offering.

Red is incredibly stimulating, and it’s probably why most materials that announce sales with huge discounts are almost always in red.

Yellow

If there’s one color that immediately induces feelings of warmth, cheer, and joy, that would have to be the color yellow. Some even believe that the sight of yellow fills them with feelings of optimism. Others claim that yellow makes them feel a bit younger.

Yellow, however, can be overwhelming, especially when used to excess. If you’re a web designer, you might want to go easy on using it if you don’t want visitors to be turned off by the sheer sunshiny-ness of your design.

Orange

Orange is a combination of red and yellow, and the associations with both colors come out in orange as well. Like yellow, it gives off warmth and a sense of cheer. The red part of orange is also suitable for creating a sense of urgency, as many strong CTAs are orange.

Picking the Right Colors to Drive Conversions

While it’s true that our personal experiences ultimately make us see colors differently, the associations as put forward by color psychology are mostly spot-on, and knowing how to use them in web design can boost your chances of getting those conversions.

So how do you pick the right colors for your web design?

It’s always best to study your target market first before settling on any one color. Take gender, age, culture, and other factors into consideration, all of which can help you determine the color to which they will respond the best.

If your site, for example, is selling toys and other kids’ stuff, you’re more likely to attract leads and conversions by using vibrant colors like yellow, green, or even a hint of red. If you’re selling to women, do some research on their color preferences. The same thing goes for men.

Don’t be afraid to do some A/B testing as well, as it would help you figure out the color combinations and placements that will help generate leads and conversions.

Play around with different colors on your website on buttons, forms, and more to draw the eyes of your visitors and increase conversions.

Guest Author

Anthony Tisara is the Outreach Manager at My Biz Niche, the go-to Phoenix-based digital marketing agency specializing in effective SEO and stunning web design solutions built to capture your target audience and generate more leads. He enjoys traveling with his family and organizing weekly trivia events with his friends.