ProBlogger: The Psychology of Color: Is Your Color Choice Making or Breaking Your Website?

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The Psychology of Color: Is Your Color Choice Making or Breaking Your Website? Posted: 23 Feb 2014 05:49 PM PST This is a guest contribution from Thai Nguyen, of The Wantrepreneur Journey. Image by Flickr user Kari Along with the human emotional response to music, perhaps there is nothing more universal in experience as the human response and perception of color (of course unless you are color-blind). Despite the ubiquitous nature of color in reality and indeed our daily encounter with different colors, the concept and understanding of color psychology seems to be somewhat lacking and even esoteric in practice. So much so, that when we choose colours for our website, we may not have thought about what effect it can have on our readers. Many ancient cultures have practiced forms of color therapy, otherwise known as chromotherapy, light therapy, or colourology. Even today there are groups practicing such therapies as part of holistic and alternative treatments. Artist and interior designers have long understood the relationship between color and human emotional response. Some of the most intriguing research on color response has included: students exposed to the color red prior to an exam having negative effects- reducing scores and grades. wildlife and park rangers have planted red flowers to deter people from entering into certain areas. sports teams dressed in black are more likely to receive penalties. warm-colored placebo pills get more of a response than cool-colored placebo pills. the installation of blue-colored streetlights have suggested a reduction of crime in those areas. Here is a breakdown of the major colors and their parallel emotional response: RED Positive: courage, strength, warmth, energy, excitement Negative: defiance, aggression, danger. BLUE Positive: intelligence, trust, serenity, calmness, coolness, reflection. Negative: distance, aloofness, emotionless, unfriendliness. YELLOW: Positive: optimism, confidence, self-esteem, extraversion, friendliness, creativity. Negative: irrationality, fragility, depression, anxiety. GREEN: Positive: harmony, balance, refreshment, love, restoration, equilibrium, peace. Negative: boredom, stagnation, blandness, enervation, envy VIOLET Positive: authenticity, truth, quality, awareness, attunement, luxury, royalty, Negative: Introversion, decadence, suppression, inferiority. ORANGE Positive: comfort, security, abundance, fun, passion, stimulation/hunger/food. Negative: deprivation, frustration, immaturity, frivolity. PINK Positive: tranquility, nurture, femininity, sexuality, love, delicate. Negative: inhibition, emasculation, weakness, fickle, claustrophobia. GREY Positive: grey is psychologically neutral. Negative: lack of confidence, lack of energy, depression, hibernation, reclusiveness. BLACK Positive: sophistication, glamour, security, emotional safety, efficiency, substance. Negative: opression, coldness, menace, heaviness, intimation. WHITE Positive: purity, cleanness, simplicity, sophistication, efficiency, clarity. Negative: elitism, sterility, distance, isolation, coldness. BROWN Positive: earthiness, connectedness, reliability, support, grounded, stable. Negative: heaviness, lack of sophistication, lack of humor, dullness. In light of the impetuous development of technology in our current day and age, and life becoming more online, perhaps nothing could be more pertinent than the need to consider not only what our choice of color conveys about our personality, but what kind of a response is evoked from the color we use on a website layout. Some considerations in choosing color schemes for your website: What is the nature of your work? Media? Environmental? Music? Business? Religious? If your theme is environmental and you are heavy on the use of red and orange, this would produce a conflict in the reception of your message. In like manner, if you are a religious organization, then a dominant use of pink might not be very appropriate. What is the purpose or mission statement of your business or website? What kind of a response are you trying to elicit from your audience? Once they spend time on your site, think of some words to describe the way you would like your audience to feel. Inspired, encouraged, relaxed, at peace, energized? Match up these responses with the color and response list. What artwork or photographs are featured on your site? Do these match up also with the message that you are trying to convey? You may have chosen great colors but you can easily undermine your color/message synchronicity with a photograph or piece of art that is not in line with your color scheme. It is also important to have consistency if you are going to use a variety of colors, keep in mind that colors are grouped and divided into primary, secondary, and tertiary colors, and work best when used in these relations. Variations are perhaps best used in individual blog posts when you are writing on a specific topic and trying to bring about a certain response- this is very important when you are choosing photographs to be incorporated into the post. Thai Nguyen is the founder of www.wantrepreneurjourney.com the site dedicated to inspiring people to step out build a business around their passions- to make a living, living the dream. Thai has been a successful chef and athlete, and now teaches on the topic of personal growth. Originally at: Blog Tips at ProBlogger The Psychology of Color: Is Your Color Choice Making or Breaking Your Website?

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Shoemoney - Skills To Pay The Bills

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Wake Up! Nobody Wants to Read Your Boring Blog Posts Posted: 24 Feb 2014 06:53 AM PST Welcome to the Content Revolution! Anyone with access to a computer and an Internet connection can start a blog. Whether you're blogging about entrepreneurship or things your 17-year-old cousin Bennett texts you, the Internet is your sounding board. This has given way to some great content. Content that makes you rethink your priorities, content that makes you laugh until you can't breathe, content that helps you run your business – the list is endless. Unfortunately, it's also given way to some pretty terrible content. Content that is boring, content that is repetitive, content that lacks personality, content that just plain wastes our time – it's everywhere. Are you writing content that people actually want to read or are you just producing boring blog post after boring blog post? There's only one way to find out… Is There an Echo? Echo? Echo? Remember the famous expression about beating a dead horse? Well, it's famous for a reason. When you create content, be sure you're not saying something that has already been said by every blogger in the history of ever. It sounds simple, but many of us still do it. If you don't have something new to talk about or something new to add to a current debate, don't bother writing about it. No one likes the sequels anyway! Bottom-line: Don't write content that has been rephrased and republished 100+ times over the past five years. To Be a Thought Leader, First You Need Some Thoughts This goes hand-in-hand with the previous point. You don't need to avoid popular topics. That's the last thing I'm proposing. In fact, piggybacking on popular topics is a great way to get your content in front of a larger audience. Just make sure you're adding something valuable. If you want to establish yourself as a thought leader, you can't be wishy washy. That's not valuable. You can't steal other bloggers' opinions. That's not valuable. Bring something new to the table or no one will offer you a seat. Bottom-line: Have an opinion and don't be afraid to voice it. Neutrality means you don't really care. Make Seth Godin Proud: Tell a Great Story "Marketing is storytelling. The story of your product, built into your product. The ad might be part of it, the copy might be part of it, but mostly, your product and your service and your people are all part of the story. Tell it on purpose." ~Seth Godin Blogging is storytelling too. What makes your entrepreneurship blog different from the thousands of other entrepreneurship blogs out there? Your story. It's unique. No one else has it. No one else can tell it like you can. But so many of us are afraid to tell our stories, to get personal. If you're not personal, you're just another faceless voice. Rand Fishkin writes very candidly about his struggles and his experiences at Moz. He's arguably one of the most transparent bloggers I've ever encountered. And he's killing it! Bottom-line: You have a personality, you have unique experiences. Share them through your content! Just Because You Can, Doesn't Mean You Should Like I said, anyone with access to a computer and an Internet connection can start a blog. It's both a blessing and a curse. Why? Because some people are blogging when they can and some people are blogging when they should. There's a clear distinction. If you're blogging when you can, you're blogging to ensure you have three posts a week, for example. If you're blogging when you should, you're blogging because you have something to say, something worth reading. You're not sitting at your computer at 1 a.m. trying to come up with a good topic. You're blogging about something of substance, something that matters to someone. More importantly, you're blogging about something that matters to you. Bottom-line: Don't share content unless it's amazing. Stop trying to fill an imaginary quota. Only write when you should, not just when you can. Conclusion It's time to wake up, bloggers. No one wants to read your boring blog posts. Let's all make a pact, right here and now. Let's stop producing content for the sake of producing content. Let's start producing content because we actually have something to say. Looking for an SEO service that won’t get you banned?

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