When you’re building a website, there’s so much to consider that color feels like the last thing to think about – but that’s where evidence suggests you could be wrong. In fact, color has such an impressive impact on consumer behavior that it could be the difference between your website converting that reader into a customer or not.

Why is Color Important in Websites?

Color is important everywhere, but understanding how color impacts your potential customer is vital to making your website successful.

Consider how quickly you form a first impression of something in front of you. Studies have shown that color is pivotal in conveying information in that first look. A first impression can last up to 90 seconds, of which about 90% of the impression made is from color.

So, it’s worth taking note of what’s important to your brand – are you bold, exciting, new? Calming, muted, peaceful? Adventurous, outdoorsy, vibrant? If you thought of the colors to match those descriptions, you’re already understanding how important color associations can be…

Which Color Should I Use for My Website?

Of course, picking a color isn’t as easy as choosing the closest one to the product you’re trying to sell. Nor is it straightforward when you’re using existing branding and don’t want to deviate too far from your established colors.

However, working proven colors into your site based on how you would like your customers to feel, could prime them to respond to your call to action, so we’ve collated some of the more popular colors and what they might be saying to your customers.

Blue is Calming

Blue is a color that builds trust and is supposedly one of the world’s favorite colors. It’s easy to see why, when a bright blue sky, or a gorgeous blue ocean are such shared experiences of peacefulness and tranquility.

It’s also a popular color for branding – look around at your local stores, you might see it appearing in decoration or logos more than you expect. From Walmart to Old Navy, and then digitally from PayPal to Meta, blue is trying to say, “you can trust us”, and that may be just what you want your customers to feel about you.

Red is Urgent

When you ask to assign an emotion to red, you’ll receive words like “passion” “love”, “urgency” and “attention”. These fiery, impossible to ignore emotions are why Red Is an attention-grabbing color to use, and exactly why brands from Target to Coca-Cola have used red to stand out in their branding for years.

Whilst it’s a balance to strike – too much red can give negative connotations too – red is a way for you to convey a buy-now, confident mentality to your consumers, which might be just right for converting that visitor into a first-time customer.

Green Suggests Health and Sustainability

Unsurprisingly, Green has become the color representing nature, a connotation that expands into sustainability, health, renewables… and surprisingly in that family of similar terms, money.

If these are the core of your business, having the colors speak for you before even the copy does buys you a little extra time within their first impression to convince them of your validity. Think of brands like Whole Foods, who use green extensively to communicate a closeness to nature.

Black Suggests Sophistication

An absence of color is, in itself, a bit of a statement, and a stark black and white rejection of color has become a way that many of us recognize luxury brands, where less is more. You’ll see this being utilized by brands like Sony, or Louis Vuitton, where elegant simplicity lets the products speak for themselves. If your priority is modernity and luxury, then opting for a monochrome look could tell that story.

My Website is the Wrong Color!

If you’ve read this and have panicked that your beautiful eco-friendly product isn’t perfectly in green, stop there. Color theory is important to understand within your designs, but if your first impression or your brand messaging is strong, it’s just another option for you to enjoy.

For example, Duolingo is hardly an eco-warrior in its core messaging, but it’s been recognizably green since its inception.

Furthermore, as the saying goes, you can break the rules if you know the rules. Sometimes standing out from the crowd is a conscious decision by a company. Just understand the risks and rewards of forging your own path.

If you’re building your website from the ground up, or are getting assistance in your website construction and have space to think about what message you want to present, colors can be one of the ways to do this.

Lastly, understanding colors doesn’t mean you have to overhaul your whole website. Try changing button color, menu options, or even just call to action, and see if you experience a difference in your customer’s behavior. You might be surprised the impact a single color can have.