What does your branding colour say about you?
How does colour fit in to the immutable laws of branding? The laws tell us to strive to own a word or an emotion in the mind of the consumer.
To “tell your story” is the core of brand management. Stories create an emotional connection with the consumer, and they’re often told in words. Brands spend hours, if not days, fine-tuning their tagline to stimulate the right feelings: trust, loyalty, friendship, personality, character and individuality in just a handful of words.
What if you could capture all of these feelings, without words? That’s the role of colour in branding. Different colours tell a different story.
What stories do colours tell?
The master storytellers at Disney have been using colours for years to tell stories. Yellow characters like Belle from Beauty and the Beast and Woody from Toy Story create a sense of energy and intellect. Blue Elsa in Frozen learned how to let go and embrace the icy powers that make her special – she is seen as confident and stable.
Corporate business and B2B marketing often use blue to convey productivity without being too invasive. Take Dell, Forbes and Salesforce as examples.
Is your brand more of a Woody, or an Elsa, or perhaps a Jafar from Aladdin? Red Jafar exhibits passion and determination. Red also stimulates appetite: think KFC, McDonalds,Coca-Cola, Pizza Hut…
HubSpot also tap into colour psychology, creating feelings of warmth, sociability and creativity with shades of orange.
What about no colour?
There are also brands who seem to be saying that the most powerful colour may be no colour at all. Nike’s “black swoosh” is understood to be a symbol of speed and athleticism, which is a characteristic of many of Disney’s well-known baddies. WeWork, Uber, Vice, Chanel and Prada also opt for black logos.
Do you use colour in your story-telling? What does your branding colour say about you?
Take a look at the chart below to see what kinds of feelings your branding colour creates:
