How Color Affects Purchasing Habits

How Color Affects Purchasing Habits

How Color Affects Purchasing Habits

For retailers, shopping is the “Art of Persuasion.” There are many factors that influence how and what consumers purchase things. However, a great deal is decided by visual cues. The strongest and most persuasive of these visual cues would be color. When marketing new products, it is crucial to consider that consumers place visual appearance and color above other factors such as sound, smell and/or texture.

Color plays a vitally important role in the world we live in. It influences thinking. It changes actions as well as causes reactions. Color can irritate your eyes as well as soothe them. It has the ability to raise your blood pressure or affect your appetite. When used in the right way, color can save on energy consumption. When used in the wrong ways, color can contribute to global pollution. As a powerful form of communication, color is irreplaceable. Red means “Stop” and green means ”Go”. Traffic lights send this almost universal message, for example. Likewise, color used for a product, a website, a business card or logo cause powerful reactions.

In my research of this topic, “How color affects purchasing habits.” I was made aware of all the different factors color plays, leading up to the actual purchase of a product. I will be covering these initial factors and how color affects the purchase itself. In this paper you will be explained as how color affects marketing, how it affects branding and how it affects the consumers. I will also touch on the symbolism of different colors and their part in a consumer’s purchasing habits.

People make subconscious judgments about a person, an environment, or product within just 90 seconds of initial viewing them. Between 62% and 90% of that initial assessment is based on no other reason then that we need something to go with something else with a similar color. Research done by the Henley Center suggests 73% of purchasing...