Ideas for Using Spring and Summer Trend Colors Without Changing Your Brand Identity

Seeing Red – How Spring Color Trends Impact Branding and Marketing

We love color — that is, “we,” as in the collective. We all love color, we just don’t all love the same colors. When it comes to your brand identity and marketing, color matters. Find out just how much color can influence your buyers and what color trends they expect to see this spring.

Feeling Blue? Spring Color Trends Can Help Your Business Get More Green – So You’ll Feel Back in the Pink Again

“We” all love color; or, it might be more accurately stated that we all have colors we love – or at least prefer to others. Find out what your brand’s colors might subconsciously convey to customers and prospects, what colors will be on trend in spring 2014, and how you can use those colors to attract consumers by infusing a fresh, current feel to your marketing efforts in the coming months.

As always, we look to the color experts at Pantone when it comes to gaining a deeper understanding of the subconscious messages color can convey. For more, check out Pantone’s Guide to Communicating with Color.

Why Color Trends Matter to Branding and Marketing

Research about color and its relationship to and impact on marketing and branding at the Seoul International Color Expo found:

  • For 92.6%, visual factors were the most important purchasing influencer
  • 84.7% said color accounts for more than half among visual factors influencing their purchasing choices
  • Between 62 and 90% of visual assessment is based on color alone (CCIColor, Institute for Color Research)
How color strengthens brand identity

How Color Strengthens Brand Identity

Some brands use of color is blatant; for instance, when you hear, “What can brown do for you?”, doesn’t it instantly bring the brown trucks and logo of UPS® to mind?

Using the graphic above with the meanings ascribed to various colors as a guide as you compare the graphic with corporate brand logos below (courtesy: logomyway.com), can you see how some of the most popular US brands use color when it comes to reinforcing subconscious messages about their brand?

How popular US brands use color infographic

Color does more than influence buying decisions when consumers are comparing packaging and ads. Color actually help to create memory: A University of Loyola, MD study found that color influences brand recognition by up to 80%.

Furthermore, 2003 research at Xerox and International Communications Research found that use of color in presentations and documents:

  • Increased customer memory of the documents and presentations
  • Presented an image of quality and made them appear more successful
  • Gave them a competitive edge
  • Made their business appear larger to clients

Color Trends for Spring

You’ll be seeing the 2014 Spring Trend Colors as published by the color experts at Pantone® in everything from clothing to magazine ads and feature spreads to dresses, suits, ties, fonts and paper colors available for a wedding.

Refresh your Brand Identity and Marketing with Spring Color Trends

Given the power that color has to influence buying choices and increase brand recognition with your customers and prospects, if your brand identity already features one or two colors prominently, it’s not likely that you should change them out for trend colors.

One design change you can make – without losing the brand recognition you are building with color – is to reverse use of color. For instance, note how some brands – even iconic brands – refresh their look from time to time by placing their prominent brand color in the background, with the logo or title in a contrasting color.

Ideas for Using Spring and Summer Trend Colors Without Changing Your Brand Identity

Obviously, changing the way that you use your logo with color in the foreground or background may not allow you to use 2014 spring and summer trend colors without compromising your brand’s visual identity. But you can still incorporate trend colors each season and each year into your marketing, décor and other visual elements in order to refresh the look of your brand to make it feel more “current” to customers and prospects.

To update your look by incorporating trending colors for spring and summer 2014:

  • Use overlays and frames on signs in trend colors
  • Add (or change) window treatments, wall hangings and fabric room dividers in trend colors
  • Create merchandising displays with seasonal items that come in trend colors
  • Use trend colors in displays at the point of sale
  • Update service or product menus customers use while in-store or at home with trend colors in fonts, backgrounds or imagery
  • Update web banner and other display ads in trend colors
  • Update your entryway, lobby or waiting area with accents (pillows, artwork, furniture, displays, etc.) that pop in trend colors