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Affects of Color on Marketing

Research on the affects of color on product preference and marketing shows that product color could affect consumer preference and hence purchasing culture. Most results show that its not a specific color that attracts all audiences, but that certain colors are deemed appropriate for certain products (Fernandez-Vazquez, 2011). Different colors can convey different meanings, attitudes, and characteristics.

Brand Meaning

People often see the logo of a brand or company as a representation of that company. Without prior experience to a logo, people being to associate a band with certain characteristics based on the primary logo color (Bottemley et al., 2006). In one study participants were asked to rate how appropriate the logo color was for fictional companies based on the products each company produced. This study showed a pattern of logo color appropriateness based on product function. If the product was considered functional, that is a product that fulfills a need or solves a problem, then a functional color was seen as most appropriate. If the product was seen as sensory-functional, that is a product that conveys attitudes, status, or social approval, then a sensory-social colors were seen as more appropriate for the company logo. This finding implies that companies should decide what types of products to produce and then should choose a logo color that is connotative with their products’ functions.

Company Logos can portray meaning just through the use of color (Labrecque, 2012). Color affects peoples’ perceptions of a new or unknown company. Some companies such as Victoria’s Secret and H&R block use color to change their corporate image and create a new brand personality for a specific target audience. A study done on the relationship between different logo colors and five different personality traits had participants rate a computer made logo in different colors for a fictional company on scales relating to five personality traits. Relationships were found between different colors and sincerity, excitement, competence, sophistication, and ruggedness. This implies that a company’s logo color alone could create a personality for that company. A follow up study tested the effects of perceived brand personality and purchasing intentions (Labrecque, 2012). Purchasing intent was greater if the perceived personality matched the marketed product or service. In turn color affects perceived brand personality and brand personality affects purchasing intent.

Specific Color Meaning

Different colors are perceived to mean different things. The chart below gives perceived meanings of different colors in the United States.

Red	Yellow	Green	Blue	Pink	Violet/Purple	Brown	Black	White
Sensory - Social	Sensory - Social	Functional	Functional	Sensory - Social	Sensory - Social	Ruggedness	Functional	Happiness
Negative Issues	Competence	Envy	Competence	Sincerity	Sophistication		Sophistication	Sincerity
Excitement	Happiness	Good Taste	High quality	Sophistication	Power		Expensive	Purity
Love	Jealousy		Corporate		Authority		Fear
Lust			Masculine				Grief

Combining Colors

Target Logo

Although some companies use a single color to represent their brand such as Target Corporation (include logo pic), many other companies use a combination of colors in their logo, such as McDonalds (include pic). A combination of colors or color pairs could be perceived in different ways than those colors independently. A study conducted on preference on color pairs asked subjects to rate how much their liked various sets of color pairs on varying background colors (Schloss et al, 2011). Results indicated that people generally prefer color pairs with similar hues when the two colors are both in the foreground. However, greater contract between figure and background is preferred.

In contrast to a strong preference for people to combine colors that are similar, some people like to make an accent with a highly contrasting color (Deng, 2010). In one study done on people’s preferences for the colors in Nike sneakers, people generally combined colors that from the same spectrum on the color wheel, however, some people preferred to have the Nike swoosh accentuated in a different, contrasting color. Most of the participants in the study also used a relatively small number of colors when designing their idea athletic shoe. This finding has relevance for companies that produce multicolored products such as shoes. To appeal to consumer preferences, companies should minimize the number of colors visible and use similar hues in a single product.

Color Name

Although different colors can be perceived in different ways, the name of those colors matters as well. Many products and companies focus on producing a wide range of product colors to attract the largest population of consumers. For example cosmetics brands produce a rainbow for eye shadow and nail polish colors for every types of person. Even companies such as Apple and Dell make ipods and laptops with color personalization to attract buyers. But, the actual color is not the only aspect of the product that attracts buyers. The color name can actually attract or repel buyers as well (Skorinko et al., 2006). In one study participants were given either color swatches or products with generic color names, such as brown, or fancy color names, such as mocha. The results showed that participants who were given items with fancy names rated the items as significantly more likable than participants who received items with generic names (Skorinko et al., 2006). This shows a greater favorability for fancy names compared to generic names for the exact same colors.

Fancy names are not only liked more, but cause the product to be liked more, hence increasing purchasing intent (Miller et al., 2005). A study that looked at jellybean preference for common color names and atypical color names, such as razzmatazz, were more likely to be chosen than jelly beans with typical names such as lemon yellow. This could be due to greater interest in the atypical names and willingness to figure out why that name was given. A following study was done on the purchasing intent of custom sweatshirts from an online provider. Participants were asked to imagine buying sweatshirts and were provided with a variety of color options, some typical, some atypical. Colors that were atypical were selected more than colors that were typical, showing a preference to purchase items with atypical color names.

Attracting Attention

Color is used as a means to attract consumer attention to a product that then influences buying behavior (Kauppinen-Raisanen et al. 2010). Consumers use color to identify for known brands or search for new alternatives. Variety seekers look for non-typical colors when selecting new brands. And attractive color packaging receives more consumer attention than unattractive color packaging, which can then influence buying behavior. One study done looked at how visual color cues affected predicted purchasing behavior for known and unknown brands in a variety of colors. The results showed that people picked certain packages based colors that attracted their voluntary and involuntary attention and associations made with that colors such as ‘green fits menthol.’ Based on these findings implications can be made on the best color choices for packages. New companies or new products should use dissimilar colors to attract attention to the brand, however, off brand companies should use similar colors to the leading brand to emphasize product similarity. If company is changing the look of a product, but keeping the product the same, they should not change the color scheme too radically since people use color to identify and search for brands (Kauppinen-Raisanen et al. 2010).

Individual Differences

Pink girls section of toy store

Gender

Childrens toys are often categorized as either boys or girls toys solely based on color (Hull et al., 2011). In a study on how color affects perception adult participants were shown burred images of children’s toys where the only decipherable feature visible was the toy's color. In general participants categorized the toys into girl and boy toys based on the visible color of the image. This implies that companies interested in marketing masculine toys such as tools to girls should make them stereotypical girl colors, such as pink and feminine toys, such as cooking sets, to boys in stereotypical boy colors, such as green and black.

Gender differences in color associations and color preferences can also be seem amongst adults (Chen et al., 2004). One study investigated any differences in color pair preference in men and women. Differences were noted for male and female participants, where the two genders did not agree on which color pairs they enjoyed the most. Men and women also did not agree on which colors are masculine and feminine. This could imply that men and women generally prefer different colors when purchasing items. Men and women also misperceive what colors the opposite gender views as fitting for them.

Age

Children’s toys for younger age groups are often marketed based on color, however, as the age group increases color becomes less gender-stereotypical (Hull et al, 2011). In general may toys become gender neutral and hence adopt gender-neutral colors. In the United States it is common to associate baby girls with pink and baby boys with blue. This difference in young children is a learned difference rather than in inborn one (LoBue, 2007). One study looked at young children’s, ages 7 months to 5 years, preference for small objects in different colors. The study found that by the age of 2 – 2.5 years socially constructed gendered colors affects children’s color preference, where girls prefer pink and boys avoid pink.

Slightly older children who have developed a sense of favorite color often tend to pick items that are in that color (Gollety et al., 2011. However, when their favorite color is not avalible for a desirded item children choose colors that they think matches the product best. A study done on childrens prefernces for chocolate bar wrappers found that although one thrid of the children picked a wrapper of their favorite color, the remaining two thirds picked a wrapper they percieved as fitting the product best. For example most children thought that a white wrapper was most fitting for white chocolate and a a black wrapper for most fitting for a dark chocolate bar and therefor chose those options for those two bars. This appliaction can be seen in The Hershey Company chcolate bars where the company stragtegically has light wrappers for white chocolate and brown wrappers for milk chcolate, making the product easily identifiable and understandable.

Culture

Many cultural differences exist on perceived color personality, meaning, and preference. When decided brand and produce logos, companies should take into account their target consumer, since cultural differences exist. On study looked at color preference in British and Chinese participants (Chen et al., 2004). Each participant was presented with a total of 20 color swatches one at a time and had to rate the color on 10 different emotions. Results showed that British participants and Chinese participants differed on the like-dislike scale the most. Chinese participants tended to like colors that were clean, fresh, and modern, whereas British participants showed no such pattern. When evaluating purchasing intent, color preference affects buying behavior, where liked colors are more likely to be bought than disliked colors (citation needed). This implies that companies should choose their target consumer first and then make product colors based on the targets color preferences.