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2001: Choose the hues that draw consumers in and keep them coming back, by Eileen E. Flynn

(Publish) - The answer to the following question can make or break a company´s e-commerce strategy. What combination of colours does it to take to effectively market and sell a product online? The rules about colour are few, and experts don´t declare any one hue to be off limits. But too often, they say, Web site designers navigate this aspect of marketing with blinders on. And choosing a color scheme that will attract customers isn´t as simple as it sounds

"There are a lot of amateur-designed Web sites out there," says Barry Ridge, creative director of Barry Ridge Graphic Design (www.ridgedesign.com) in Westlake Village, Calif. A poorly designed site is very often the result of a company hurrying to launch a functional site, rather than taking time to effectively design one by hiring Web designers and other experts. "For a lot of companies, it´s the first time they´ve ever played with colour," Ridge says. "It´s like giving a box of 64 crayons to a kid-they use everything because they can, rather than choosing colours that have certain psychological meaning"

First impressions, lasting impressions. Choosing colours may at first seem a frivolous concern. Certainly aesthetics and site design are key to attracting customers, but isn´t the product itself the most important element in getting people to come to your site and stay there? Not necessarily. Companies that sell products or services online must understand that their audiences will respond first to the overall visual effect of a Web site. Research has shown that reaction to color is immediate and emotional, and it can have a direct effect on a customer´s choices.

"If you design your site well and you use the right colours, you will stand out and gain a considerable amount of credibility," says Nada Napoletan Rutka, a colour design consultant at Nada Associates in Canonsburg, Penn. "You really need to understand what colour does because the impact that colour has is many times very subtle yet very strong in its message." It´s essential that people creating Web sites understand and make use of the potential power of colour. Designers learn these skills from their training. For those with little or no design background, a variety of books are available online and in print that address how to use colour as a marketing tool

While some colour choices require little more than common sense (a black background with white lettering is generally a bad idea) and good taste (avoid garish tones and combinations), industry experts maintain that creating the perfect visual for a product is a science that involves extensive research and experiments. Both the Colour Marketing Group (www.colormarketing.org) in Alexandria, Va., and Hawaii-based Colorcom (www.colorcom.com), companies that forecast colour trends, have conducted online surveys to determine which colour combinations work in the Web marketplace.

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Since trends and consumer preferences are constantly evolving, even the savviest Web site designers may need help in keeping in line with colour trends. For example, The Tech´s online Museum of Innovation has a colour exhibit (www.thetech.org/hyper/color/intro) that demonstrates how designers can experiment with the saturation of hues to create a desired shade. The site also provides research that shows how people respond to different shades

The cross-platform palette. Currently, designers have 216 standard Web colours from which to choose. These colours are considered Web safe because they can be read across all platforms. But as more and more computers gain the ability to display millions of colours, these Web-safe standards may change

Designers must be selective when their colour choices have to effectively communicate their company´s (and their product´s) message. They must also keep in mind how consumers respond to color. According to Ridge and Rutka, there are a few basic rules of thumb when making colour decisions

Ridge recommends marketers consider the difference between an online store and a brick-and-mortar store, and try brighter colours online to convey the urgency of the Internet. He recommends pairing bright colours with conservative shades, such as dark blues or greens. "On the Internet you need [the customer to feel] the urgency to buy the product now. You want that immediate response," says Ridge

Conservative colours-while they imply reliability and trust-may not spark the same excitement over a product as bright colours can. Companies rely on consumer interest in a product to generate sales. If a customer cannot physically handle the merchandise, explains Ridge, there must be something else that grabs his interest and compels him to make a purchase.

"Use a complementary but shockingly bright color-maybe it´s a lime green or bright electric blue-to highlight features that you can use on the Internet," says Ridge. He suggests enhancing features such as pulldown menus, borders or buttons with bright colours, but he warns against using bright colors for backgrounds

Rutka, however, urges Web designers to use bright tones sparingly on a site-not as the dominant colour. "If you´re trying to shock or surprise the audience, then yellow [as a background] is fine," she says. But Rutka advises against using a bright yellow as the dominant colour

Avoid colour disasters. Another concern is how global audiences will respond to certain colours. Designers must choose colors that effectively represent the product in the global market. For instance, black is associated with death and mourning in the United States, but in Japan white is worn to funerals. Because the Web is a global marketing tool, companies that intend to sell their products abroad must be aware of the cultural context in which sites will be viewed

In a 1992 article in ID Magazine, University of Hawaii Colour Professor J.L. Morton explains why Euro Disney´s use of purple--which she calls a "polarizing" colour--on the theme park signs met a culture clash abroad. According to Morton, director of design consulting group Colorcom and author of several books on the impact of colour, the use of the color backfired because in predominantly Catholic Europe, purple symbolizes death and crucifixion

"It´s not surprising that visitors thought the signs were morbid," she writes. "How did this happen? The CEO liked purple." The lesson there, Morton adds, is "personal preference and avant-garde tactics frequently cause colour disasters. When the wrong colour is used on a Web site, the damage extends to a global audience"

According to Morton, avoiding such color disasters can be even trickier on the Web than in print. "Since colours may wind up much darker on different computers, a dignified navy blue background used for an airline´s Web site may turn out black [on the user´s computer monitor]," she notes. "Not only is this hue associated with death, it is a heavy colour, one which is not associated with the lightness required to keep the aircraft in the air"

Ridge also saw the color navy backfire on the Web when he attempted to recreate an investment broker´s print package online. The dark shade came across as "sleepy and boring." To liven up the site without compromising the message of security and trust, he added a lime green border

The winners. A universally popular colour, according to experts, is blue, particularly the "Bondi Blue" shade created by Apple, which conveys trust and calm. Another favorite is metallic silver, which was the overwhelming winner in the colour of the millennium online survey conducted by Colorcom

Experts at Colorcom and the Color Marketing Group stress that determining which tones will have the desired impact on a target audience hinges on factors such as age, culture and economic status. Bright colours, for example, tend to have more appeal with a younger audience, while an older generation might view conservative shades as reliable and trustworthy

Designers may never rest easy, though, as personal and individual preference cannot always be precisely measured. "On one hand, there´s a lot of technical knowledge [involved in making] colour choices. On the other hand, it´s just emotional, and that´s what makes colour so personal to every individual," Ridge says. "There is some kind of emotional attachment to certain colours that is strictly personal"

Eileen E. Flynn is a freelance writer in Austin, Texas