Can Changing Your Website’s Color Make More Sales?
What is Your Website’s Color Saying To Shoppers?
The color of your website or blog may have a big impact if people are coming to purchase or stick around to read your blog. I had written about the psychology of colors people wear before on different blogs but the person in charge (hubby) of the retail sites really loves black backgrounds. And so the website’s color experiment began.
One of our sites, the lingerie site has had the black background for 2 years and sales very slowly picked up. The other site for medical scrubs was in blue and always had good sales. We decided to change it to a black background last week. It did look sharp but maybe hard to read. Once launched we did not receive a sale for days. After 5 days I could not take it any longer and changed to a lighter blue. Within less than an hour of the color change sales started to come back. What is your website’s color doing for you?
What Colors Mean
Black - Elegant, fear, seductive – great for luxury products but cannot be overdone.
Blue - Trustworthy, peaceful, integrity are the meaning for blue. Blue is the most popular website’s color used across the web. (Color we had for medical scrubs that we changed to black and went back to a light blue)
Gray – Traditional and dull. We used this as a highlight color with the pink for lingerie. (There was no choice with our store builder from Stores Online but it does look nice)
Green – Calmness, color of wealth and green is easy on the eyes. (Maybe use for another site in the future)
Orange – Stimulating and a call to action color. This color us used for impulse purchasing type of products by marketers.
Pink – Feminine, love, sexuality and a call to buy color especially for the ladies. (This is the color we went to for the background from a black background on lingerie)
Purple – Creative and soothing – used more in beauty product marketing.
Red – Excitement, danger and can make one’s blood pressure rise. Red is sometimes used for sales. You will see the prices or sale word in red. Red is definately used to draw attention to something. (Ladies, red clothes will do this too!)
Yellow - Optimistic and youthful color. Window shoppers like yellow (We want buyers, right?)
White - Purity, used to wipe the slate clean. White is also an encouraging color and many websites have a white background making the text easy to read.
Other Factors Affecting A Website’s Sales
- Speed – A slow site will not help your website sell more even if the website’s colors are the best.
- Functionality – A website that is hard to find what you are looking for will make readers go elsewhere.
- Pricing – A beautiful site with the wrong pricing will probably have higher bounce rate and no sales.
- Small Text – There is nothing worse than tiny text when you are shopping online, a color can’t save you there.
What colors would you now choose for your website’s color or for your blog?
Are you happy with your current website’s color?
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About Lisa
Helping Others to Thrive Online Through Social Media, Blogging and SEO. What good is knowledge if you cannot share it with others?
20+ years experience in marketing/advertising with 3 years experience blogging, social media and SEO.
44 Responses to Can Changing Your Website’s Color Make More Sales?
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Hi Lisa,
Website color and design have huge impact on website or blog success, the big challenge for any website owner is to make the perfect design and choose the best color of his website while keeping it simple and easy to navigate, thanks for the tips and recommendations on choosing the website color.
qasim recently posted..Edge Rank, Photo Sharing & Squeezing Traffic from Facebook
Hi Qasim, I believe it sure does now
A lesson learned. I should have added not too flashy – and pops ups. I will go back and add it, thanks for comment on this post.
Hi Lisa,
Very NICELY done
That’s really a wonderful post. As I go through colors, I’ve visualized blogs of my friends 
It goes with most used color in the site or can we apply qualities of other colors if there are two major colors appearing on a site? 
On the web design aspect, color and flow of the website really matters. Sometimes user feedback on website colors can help find user friendly color for site if they have no idea. However I think readability matters. Personally, I’m not much into darky colored sites if they haven’t done well with the colors. It’s just my likeness and that’s what matters to drive, right?
Cheers…
(dofollow)
Mayura recently posted..How to Change Your Blog Address in Blogger
Hi Mayura, thanks and the sales have kept coming in with these color changes – really amazing to me. Now I’ll be checking out many sites too to see if their colors are good or not. I think the black we had was not readable to many – especially on different browsers. Thanks for commenting.
Interesting Lisa!
Never really knew there is so much more to color that meets the eye.
Yes, I had read about the colors and how they affect you and more of what you mentioned long back. And we read about it so often in other places too. But what effect it has on your website or the sales part of it is news to me. Guess I would any-day go with the pink I have at present, not for anything else but the fact that I love that color after deep red.
Thanks for sharing more about colors with all of us.
Harleena Singh recently posted..Does a Painful Breast Indicate Breast Cancer
Hi Harleena, yes it has made such a difference. Yes, pink is perfect for your site. You knew instinctively
Love the post Lisa! I’ve read several blogs in the past about dark backgrounds and like text. There are certain people, especially color blind people, that have difficulty reading it. When I first started blogging, I loved dark with light. When I changed up to lighter colors, I noticed me readers and comments. Funny how it works that way. I love what you’ve done with all your blogs. Very professional.
Brenda recently posted..Let’s Be Frank
Thanks Brenda, I appreciate the feedback and what you had done too. I’m so glad I changed them even if I spent hours doing so. And I’m still finding things along the way. Even the typefaces I did all one way with Arial.
You’re welcome! Anytime I can help, you just holler! There is another thing that I hate on a blog, if the paragraph font is very cursive or squirrelly and it’s hard to read. I don’t care about the blog title. That’s usually big enough you can still read it. But a paragraphs of lucinda handwriting? Ewwww…. you’ve done well! They all look fabulous!
Brenda recently posted..How Much Can You Tell?
I agree on that one Brenda, the text must be legible. Thanks, I try to be a reader too when blogging.
Hi Lisa,
I’ve heard this myself when I started building my website but I really liked how you defined the colors! Great post!! Have a great Friday!
Corina
Thanks Corina, appreciate it! I am so glad we did change them and it’s really helped make a difference. Have a nice weekend.
Wow! This was quite a research Lisa! Wanted to ask you a question – Does dark or light have a difference on the effect? For example, my blog has a very darker red color which doesn’t harm the readers’ eyes. But if I had a very brighter red, it might just annoy the reader, isn’t it?
I just checked yours out Raaj and it’s not the background color so I think it should be fine. Nice looking blog. I really like the name of your blog too
Just liked your FB page but didn’t see any Twitter avatar? Thanks for coming by and commenting.
Thanks Lisa
Surprised to hear that! My Twitter Button was just a few pixes above the FB box
My pleasure! Cheers
I will go back and see if I can find it, maybe enlarge it? Thanks Raaj!
It was very light gray text, I think that’s why I missed it earlier and I was already following you
I love that i have a blog that I can change the color scheme anytime I want the last oen I had I could not do that as easily. I like change right now I have some different colors I like something bright and something that people will remember the blogsite for.
Kita recently posted..Theme Thursday: Gold and Green/Pumpkins
Hi Kita, just be careful it’s not too bright that will make them click away
Hi Lisa
I changed my blog theme a while back as it was all getting a little bit fussy.
I went for a more minimalistic look and with that a white background with a blue border.
I just had an experiment in creating a header graphic too in blue.
I’m happy with the colours I’ve chosen. I previously had a red theme and it seemed a little harsh.
Tim Bonner recently posted..The New Creative Me
Hi Tim, I think that was the problem with ours with the red, too harsh. Should only being used for special effects. Thanks for commenting.
what a timely post for me, i just changed my blog color and will observe the results over the next month! thanks for the insight!
Love to hear how it goes Gregory, really like the name of your url! Thanks for coming by and commenting.
This is a very interesting topic Lisa. I have read about colors and that they have different meanings, and that people will react different to different colors. But, I haven’t thought much about it when it comes to my own website. I just wanted a minimalistic design, and good structure. And then use the content to build relationships. On the other hand, I might get more customers if I start adding some new colors to the site
Thanks a lot for sharing this.
Jens P. Berget recently posted..Social Metrics Pro – More Traffic From Social Media
I think minimalistic design/colorr is good for your blog. Sometimes adding color can be distracting. Thanks for commenting.
Fascinating article, Lisa.
I’ve heard that green is used a lot in product packaging, or at least it was. Interesting results with blue vs. black. I was also surprised that slow sites helped to drive sales.I would think the opposite would be true.
Lauren recently posted..Day 7 of 30 Days of Photographs III – Craftsman
Thanks Lauren, did I do a typo with slow sites? I’ll re-check. That would not be right
Hi Lisa,
Great post. Colors of a website are important. The wold of Internet is always changing, and one of the things I like to do is to take a look at the site of the real big players.
There’s a trend going on to the ‘all white’ site color scheme for the background and primary colors for the headlines and other details. (Google+).
Some of the aspects that can play a role are readability (On a computer screen, but also on a mobile device), simplicity (less is more) and the purpose of a website. Websites that display pictures (Photography sites) very often have a 50% grey background, so the pictures show better.
A bright red background with a green font? I wouldn’t do that…
Thanks Jan, so you think white may be best huh? I somehow wanted ours to be different but did go lighter shades of pink on one and light blue on the other. Sales have come daily since the changes
Maybe I’ll go to white on one, time will tell.
Now that was interesting Lisa and thanks for sharing with us about your little experiment.
You know I’m a lover of white because I can read it so much better. I personally don’t find any of the colors entice me into buying something or not. Now if a site is too loud for me I won’t stick around to even finish reading a post. So I know that for me, colors are important in that respect.
I’ve always heard that some entice buying more then others but I guess I can only go by what works or doesn’t work for me. Interesting though and I might give this a try. I’m creating another blog as we speak so since it’s not even launched yet I might test this little theory.
You’re the woman, thanks Lisa.
Have a great week and enjoy your day too.
~Adrienne
Adrienne recently posted..The 3 Most Important Tasks
Hi Adrienne, I do think white is the most popular and I think Jan found that too – I just like to be a little different
I bet one of the sites we had was too loud (black with red lettering) sales have really picked up since the change there. Another blog? Do tell Adrienne, can’t wait to read. Enjoy your day and week too. I’m off one more day from the day job this week.
Interesting post, Lisa. My FWD site is primarily white with black and red accents. I guess it’s like a newspaper (black and white and red *read* all over) – LOL. Of course, the home page features a LOT of images, much like a digital magazine. Does that make some sort of psychological difference?
If the images are too crazy which I’m sure yours are not Samantha it should be fine. Some photos could take away readers from reading content. I know I don’t like flashing images and pop-ups. I tend not to stick around those kind of websites. Thanks for the input today
UI plays a great part in popularity of a ecomm website or any other website ,so if you want to have sales then you should have an awesome UI.
Bishwajeet recently posted..Top 10 Best Must Have iPhone 5 Accessories
Hi Lisa,
I think a website’s color scheme definitely has an effect on conversions and bounce rate. It is all subconscious, but very important. The initial impression that your website has on a reader can make or break their “trust” level. As you mentioned above, different colors mean different things, and there is always a right color for everyone but generally speaking people like colors that elicit a trust, response and I find that blues, greens, and oranges (with white) work very well.
Liz recently posted..How To Buy The Best Princess Cut Diamonds Online
Hi Lisa!
i agree with you that color image and design make a good impression o the blogger and they attract to the bloggers.i like it.thanks for sharing this blog lisa.
anshul recently posted..MLM Software Providers
You are welcome Anshul – have you played with colors before on yours?
I have played a lot with colors (in fact, early on in my blogging career, I used to change my template every 3-4 months). But, these I stick with simplicity (Mainly like three colors: Blue, Red and White).
Hmm, I think I need to think about the colors I am going to use for my new blog (I was thinking of sticking with blue, but your post gives me something to think about; never knew colors had this deep of a meaning).
As with font size, I like using 14 pt or more (not much strain to the eye and clearer to read).
I love size 14 Jeevan, I don’t like reading blogs that have delicate fonts in small sizes. A big turn-off. I would keep the colors pretty simple or with a light shade to not distract.
I always knew that color could have an effect on visits and sales. I think lots of photography sites love black because it highlights the images better. However, I always thought that the standard color was white, although I only have one website that’s white; now that’s something to really think about. lol
Mitch Mitchell recently posted..100 Things About Me
Hi Mitch, yes I would say the standard is white. Many websites I visit are in white which is why I choose a little color to stand out (I hope, right?)
For affiliate websites, what I do is use same background colour as the merchant site.
I think it could make a huge difference providing it’s designed right. Colors have so many different meanings, but I remember learning what some of them meant early on. When I worked for an IT consulting firm, they used orange as a symbol to get buyers to shop, while green was used to educate customers interesting in taking a course. Funny how it all worked out and it did for many years when we had our education program.
Hi Sonia, interesting – maybe I should put more orange on the retail sites. Thanks for your tidbit on this one.