And the importance of using one.
When first starting out on your new business journey, branding can feel overwhelming. Often a little bit out of your comfort zone, reach, or better left for more established businesses. Despite this having some truth, as there is no harm with testing the waters before you dive in, once you have decided it is something you’d like to pursue then it is time to start investing in your beliefs.
When you begin to invest in yourself and your business, it helps potential clients and customers feel safe investing in you too.
So, once you do reach the stage in your business where you feel like branding is becoming necessary, you begin to look for someone to create a logo. A logo is arguably the most important part of your branding. A recognisable, memorable mark that people are able to trust immediately.
A logo is a great start, but it only tells part of your story. To extend your narrative further, and to create an atmosphere for your branding then the next step is colour.
Colour Psychology
Colour psychology is the idea that all colours have undercurrent meanings and emotions attached to them. Knowing these meanings can help you attach colours to your brand that are in line with the atmosphere you’d like to create. Most of them are fairly easy to guess as you’ll already, perhaps unknowingly, have been exposed to them and made internal links.
Here are a few examples:
Red
Romantic, Active, Sport/Speed, Bold, Courage, Confident, Physical, Ambitious
Orange
Warm, Inviting, Optimistic, Motivating, Social, Friendly
Yellow
Loud, Creative, Happy, Distracting, Intelligent, Clear
Green
Growth, Nature, Affluence, Luxury, Safe, Stable
Blue
Health, Spirit, Clinical, Professional, Trustworthy, Ambitious
Purple
Fantastical, Deep, Creative, Unique, Unconventional, Respectable
Do you catch my drift? I’m sure at this point you could add a few of your own. Using this psychology as an undercurrent can help you to pick your brand’s colours.
Another thing to take into consideration is the atmosphere you want to create for your customers. Is it bright and airy, interesting and moody, more masculine, or feminine? Who is your demographic? What do they like?
All good questions to ask yourself when choosing your colours.
A great resource for inspiration is Pinterest. Put a board together with a bunch of your favourite images and look for a pattern. Pick out any repeating colours, or just the ones that drew you to the image in the first place by using an online Colour Picker such as this one.
As a general rule of thumb, I would pick out 3-5 colours for a brand depending on the overall vibe. A primary, secondary, text, accent, and pop.
Primary – Your main brand colour
Secondary – A complimentary colour to be used alongside your Primary
Text – The colour you use for your body text
Accent – Often used for things like hyperlinks or something you’d like to draw the eye to
Pop – A contrasting colour to add interest and contrast to your branding
Once you’re happy with you selection of colours make sure to write down the hex codes of each one. A hex code is a series of 6 letters and numbers following a # sign. E.g. #FFFFFF is the hex code for White. Keep them somewhere safe so you can easily pull them out when creating new content for your brand!
Hopefully this should give you a good place to start on your colour journey, please feel free to leave any questions in the comments below 🙂
