By: Jelmer Wit and Sabien van der Sluis
How can I get the most out of my marketing budget? This is the question many marketers often ask themselves. In this blog series Validators helps you on your way. In the previous previous edition we used a PostNL case to show that Distinctive Brand Assets play a major role in brand linking. In this edition, we go deeper into the Distinctive Brand Asset colour.
Colour psychology is a term that will sound familiar to many marketers. Colours stimulate emotion and marketers make grateful use of colours to unconsciously attract attention, elicit behavioural responses or activate a certain feeling. It should therefore come as no surprise that colour is an enormously powerful and frequently used DBA.
And when we speak of enormous power, we are not exaggerating, as the example below shows. Can you link all nine customised 'Lidl' logos to the right brand?
Credits illustration: Sammie Ruijgrok, Studio MES
Best done? Yet the successful deployment and claiming of colour-based assets turns out to be difficult. Common problems include the colour blending into the background, resulting in little or no contrast, or the need for marketers to introduce a new, 'fresh' colour once in a while.
Source: Exterion Media
It is also very important to be aware of how consumers consume. Scientific research has shown that the average passer-by only watches an outdoor advertisement for 1.5 seconds. The chance is therefore considerable that the passer-by only catches a fleeting glimpse of the outdoor advertising. Without looking specifically at the object, colour is in that case the only thing our eyes can register (see image above). Shapes, words and other visual features are processed the moment we direct our attention specifically to the object (see image above).
Source: Exterion Media
Great expression, that phone on a magenta background. But would Flink really rather advertise for T-Mobile than for itself? Both expressions have the same colour scheme (magenta with a blue detail) and also a visual of a phone.
How to avoid this? Colour can be an extremely effective DBA, but colour alone is often not enough. It is therefore desirable to combine different DBAs to avoid confusion. It is also extremely important to be consistent in your use of colour (and others) as DBA. Resist the urge to change colour every few years and be very aware of the potential confusion that can arise the moment you do. Combining colours or combining colours and shapes can also help. Colour psychology teaches you what feelings certain colours evoke and consumer research shows you whether the chosen colour scheme causes confusion. The last thing you want is to advertise for your competitors. In short, certainly not easy, but oh so valuable if done properly.
Do you have any questions after reading this article? Then please mail to Jelmer.Wit@Validators.nl
Also read part 1 of our blog series: Consistency is free, inconsistency can cost you up to 23% in sales
This article also appeared on MartketingTribune.
[1] https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev-psych-010213-115035
[2] https://www.emerce.nl/achtergrond/succesvolle-brand-awareness-impact-kleurgebruik
By: Jelmer Wit and Sabien van der Sluis
How can I get the most out of my marketing budget? This is the question many marketers often ask themselves. In this blog series Validators helps you on your way. In the previous previous edition we used a PostNL case to show that Distinctive Brand Assets play a major role in brand linking. In this edition, we go deeper into the Distinctive Brand Asset colour.
Colour psychology is a term that will sound familiar to many marketers. Colours stimulate emotion and marketers make grateful use of colours to unconsciously attract attention, elicit behavioural responses or activate a certain feeling. It should therefore come as no surprise that colour is an enormously powerful and frequently used DBA.
And when we speak of enormous power, we are not exaggerating, as the example below shows. Can you link all nine customised 'Lidl' logos to the right brand?
Credits illustration: Sammie Ruijgrok, Studio MES
Best done? Yet the successful deployment and claiming of colour-based assets turns out to be difficult. Common problems include the colour blending into the background, resulting in little or no contrast, or the need for marketers to introduce a new, 'fresh' colour once in a while.
Source: Exterion Media
It is also very important to be aware of how consumers consume. Scientific research has shown that the average passer-by only watches an outdoor advertisement for 1.5 seconds. The chance is therefore considerable that the passer-by only catches a fleeting glimpse of the outdoor advertising. Without looking specifically at the object, colour is in that case the only thing our eyes can register (see image above). Shapes, words and other visual features are processed the moment we direct our attention specifically to the object (see image above).
Source: Exterion Media
Great expression, that phone on a magenta background. But would Flink really rather advertise for T-Mobile than for itself? Both expressions have the same colour scheme (magenta with a blue detail) and also a visual of a phone.
How to avoid this? Colour can be an extremely effective DBA, but colour alone is often not enough. It is therefore desirable to combine different DBAs to avoid confusion. It is also extremely important to be consistent in your use of colour (and others) as DBA. Resist the urge to change colour every few years and be very aware of the potential confusion that can arise the moment you do. Combining colours or combining colours and shapes can also help. Colour psychology teaches you what feelings certain colours evoke and consumer research shows you whether the chosen colour scheme causes confusion. The last thing you want is to advertise for your competitors. In short, certainly not easy, but oh so valuable if done properly.
Do you have any questions after reading this article? Then please mail to Jelmer.Wit@Validators.nl
This article also appeared on MartketingTribune.
[1] https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev-psych-010213-115035
[2] https://www.emerce.nl/achtergrond/succesvolle-brand-awareness-impact-kleurgebruik