If you have ever painted your living room, you know how difficult it can be to figure out just the right color. We felt a similar challenge as we re-designed our website earlier this year. It was eye-opening to read this short piece (below) about the values color can communicate, written by Yoram Samets, Chairman of jVillage Network and also Managing Director of the advertising agency, Kelliher, Samets, Volk.
What Color Conveys by Yoram Samets Studies have shown that color is has greater influence than anything you might say. Or put another way, the right colors increase the effectiveness of your message. In 2011, with the world in total chaos, the colors that you use for your website are more important than ever. Color provides your viewers with a specific interpretation of your values. Color sets the overview of who you are.
The overall use of color is an opportunity to reflect your values, here is a chart from Iconoculture which matches colors to values:
White: balance, honesty, simplicity, serenity, thrift
Black: affluence, attitude, cool, prestige, subversion
Blue: health, prevention, responsibility, serenity, wellness
Red: comfort, identity, indulgence, moxie, personalization
Purple: courage, curiosity, nonconformity, spirituality, status
Green: balance, freshness, legacy, vitality, youth
Brown: comfort, environmentalism, security, trust
Orange: ambition, collaboration, energy, relationship, sharing
Yellow: happiness, passion, style, vitality
The opportunity for your website is to use color that reinforces your values, while using spot color to cue action items.____________________ It was comforting to realize that the color choices we at Behrman House struggled over might have just the resonance we hoped for: a warm brown frame for white pages to convey the trust so many educators have said they have in us, and that we take so much to heart; purple to signify the spirituality and courageousness of our educator colleagues; orange to embrace the energy of our students and the ongoing relationships we know you want to establish with them, and red to highlight the comfort and strong identity that we all take as ongoing gifts from our families. My colleagues and I will continue to work to make Behrman House the resource educators, students, and families turn to help transform Jewish learning into meaningful living.
