Operating an international e-commerce website has its challenges — finding a payment processor who allows you to process in multiple currencies and making sure your website will properly translate into multiple languages are just a few. One of the most important things to keep in mind when designing your site is that different cultures associate different symbolisms with colors. You can find hundreds of articles on the Web that talk about color psychology, but I bet you didn’t know that your customers in the United States associate the color red with something completely different from your customers in Russia.
If you’re targeting an audience in a specific country, do a bit of research to make sure your color scheme isn’t sending the wrong message. Below is a chart that compares each of the eight basic colors (yes, I know white isn’t a color — humor me!) and their symbolisms across the world.
| Western Hemisphere | Eastern Hemisphere | |
|---|---|---|
| Red | General: energy, danger, warning, love, passion, anger Cherokees: success and triumph |
General: prosperity and good fortune China: used in weddings, funerals, and other festive events, good luck Japan: life, anger, danger South Africa: mourning Russia: communism |
| Orange | General: affordable or inexpensive items Ireland: religious color of Protestants |
General: happiness and spirituality |
| Yellow | General:hope, joy, cowardice, caution | General: sacred, imperial India: sacred, symbol of a merchant Thailand: represents Buddhism, royalty Egypt: mourning Middle East: happiness and prosperity France: jealousy Greece: sadness |
| Green | General: luck, spring, nature, jealousy, greed USA: money, jealousy Ireland: religious color for Irish Catholics, color symbol for the country of Ireland South America: death |
General: new life, fertility, hope China: new life, hope, disgrace, exorcism India: color of Islam, hope, harvest, virtue Japan: eternal life, youthfulness Indonesia: a forbidden color |
| Blue | General: trust, peace, baby boys, depression USA: liberalism Columbia: associated with soap Mexico: mourning, serenity |
General: immortality China: feminine color, associated with pornography India: color of Lord Krishna Egypt: virtue, protection Belgium: color for baby girls |
| Purple | General: royalty, spirituality, military honor Brazil: death and mourning |
General: wealth India: sorrow and comforting Japan: privilege and wealth Europe: royalty |
| Black | General: death, funerals, mourning, power, rebellion | General: wealth, health, and prosperity China: color for young boys India: evil and anger Thailand: bad luck, unhappiness Middle East: evil, mystery Africa: age and wisdom |
| White | General: brides, weddings, angels, peace, purity, hospitals, cleanliness | General: death, funerals, mourning, sadness China: death, humility, age, misfortune Japan: death Korea: purity, innocence, birth and death Middle East: purity, mourning |
| Source: http://www.empower-yourself-with-color-psychology.com/cultural-color.html | ||
Color Psychology in Web Design – Don’t Rule It Out Completely!
Don’t get me wrong — traditional color psychology should still play a vital role in web design. With a fine arts background, I had to take a color theory class while in college. One of my projects revolved around Robert Plutchik’s wheel of emotions. His wheel associates basic emotions to colors. My project, a chart of portraits where the model depicted the eight basic emotions, reinforced Plutchik’s theory.
Each of the eight basic emotions on Plutchik’s wheel coordinates with one of eight basic hues — the purest and brightest form of color. Each pair of hues and emotions fades and becomes less intense. For example, the red hue portrays rage, lessening down into anger, and finally annoyance. The chart below lists each pair of hues and emotions.
| Basic Hue | Basic Emotion | Lighter Hue/Emotion | Lightest Hue/Emotion |
|---|---|---|---|
| Red | Rage | Anger | Annoyance |
| Orange | Vigilance | Anticipation | Interest |
| Yellow | Ecstasy | Joy | Serenity |
| Yellow-Green | Admiration | Trust | Acceptance |
| Green | Terror | Fear | Apprehension |
| Blue | Amazement | Surprise | Distraction |
| Indigo | Grief | Sadness | Pensiveness |
| Violet | Loathing | Disgust | Boredom |
Choosing a Color Scheme
When deciding on a color scheme for your website, you should consider both color symbolism and color psychology — and depending on what part of the world you live in, they may even been the same thing. Let’s take McDonald’s website for example.
The primary colors on McDonald’s website are red, yellow, and white. While red evokes a feeling of anger (which may be so for parents whose children constantly beg for Happy Meals), some view red as a color of excitement and energy. As you can easily see from the smiley face on the Happy Meal box, yellow evokes a feeling of happiness. Since it is a US-based franchise, the white signifies a sense of cleanliness and purity — a wise move to steer away from the fact that most of the food served isn’t exactly healthy.
Now let’s take a look at another well-known brand’s website: Marlboro cigarettes.
Being another US-based company, figuring out what the colors mean on this site is simple. The brand represents cigarettes and tobacco, a huge health hazard. Red evokes a feeling of danger and rage while black reminds viewers of death. On the bright side, at least they aren’t pretending to be something they’re not!
Since I don’t want to end a blog post on the thought of death and illness, let’s look at one more example website: Ford, another well-known brand.
Although there isn’t an actual color scheme to Ford’s website, the designers were wise in choosing the colors they did. Set on a natural landscape with a bright blue sky (amazement, peace, trust), vibrant green grass and mountains (nature, luck, apprehension), and a blacktop road (power, rebellion), they carefully places three different colored vehicles.
What do these websites make you think of? What are some other websites with dominant and obvious color schemes? What do you consider when choosing a color scheme for your website?
Hey Meghan,
You have some great information here. I took a design class in college a long time ago and learned about some of these differences among cultures. You went into more depth, but one thing I wanted to add was that my professor told me that in India white is the color of death as well. How you use color should depend hugely on what culture you are working in. I don’t always keep that in mind myself, but since I am marketing to audiences all over the world I guess it is hard to strike that balance.
Hi Kalen,
Thanks for your input! At Instabill, we work with merchants all over the world, and you’re right! It is sometimes difficult to keep everyone in mind.
Colors definitely matter in Web design, promotional materials and advertising. What I find most fascinating though is the symbolism in the advertisements of major brands.
I would love to discuss that symbolism with others as I believe it is significant – showing what they think of their customers and bragging about what they are doing.
Hi Gail,
What is your favorite brand to talk about in terms of it’s symbolism? Mine would have to be Subaru, because the company has branded itself as the safest car. While Subaru vehicles may be safe, they aren’t the safest. Subaru knows this, but the branding is what helps them sell. We used to talk about this a lot in my advertising class.
Great article Meghan! I have never given much thought to color schemes differing in different countries. That makes so much sense. I hope people take this to heart. Every once in a while, I’ll work with a client who insists on using a color scheme that they personally like rather than taking into account that it’s all about our target customers and clients – not us.
What a lovely familiar face! Thank you for your kind words, Sherryl! I bet it can be tough trying to explain to a website owner why their preferred color scheme isn’t a good idea. Good thing they have someone like you to help them out!
Love Subaru’s! Have one myself.
Thanks for contributing this awesome article Meghan. I’m with Sherryl, outside of choosing colors I like for my site and those of my clients, I’ve never really given to much thought to colors and how it impacts the users’ experience.
Reading your article has definitely changed my perspective. I no longer have an e-commerce site, but I still work with clients that do. I will make sure to share this article with them when this topic comes up.
Thanks again!
Thank you for your kind words, Michele, and for publishing my guest post on your terrific blog!
Dear Meghan, I have been living in South Africa for over 5 years and I can say with certainty that South Africa is not in the Eastern Hemisphere, and the vast majority of the population do not wear red in times of mourning. Hope that helps.
Hi Nicholas,
According to WorldAtlas.com (http://www.worldatlas.com/aatlas/imageh.htm), South Africa is certainly in the Eastern Hemisphere, but thank you for your input!
Meghan
Thanks! That’s must-read topic for every webmaster and anyone who’s planning to build a site. In the meantime I’ve came to the question about combinations of two or more colors and their influences. What would you say about orange + black ? This is what I’m going to apply to my site.
Jane,
Orange and black are two colors that go well together. I’m not sure where you live, but here in America, we associate those two colors together with Halloween. I’m glad my post could help you. Have a wonderful day!
Meghan
Hello Meghan Wolff!
I do agree with you that color has a big say when it comes to design of websites. But I think, color resemblance can be depending on the products you’ve market with. It doesn’t mean that you are not allowed to use white when it comes t advertising your foods just because it expresses death in a certain country. What we usually express that we use white color to express that our foods are healthy, clean and delicious! We should not consider race when it comes to color. Well, anyways, I do appreciate your post. Very informative!
James,
I agree with you that you shouldn’t avoid using white on your website just because it represents death in a certain country. However, I strongly believe that there is a time and a place to consider the colors you’re using on your website when your e-commerce business is targeting a specific geographic location.
If I was creating an e-commerce website for consumers in Russia only, I wouldn’t use red as my dominant color unless I wanted my visitors to think I was a Communist.
Thanks for your input!
Meghan
Hi there-
Nice food for thought here. Can’t believe no one has noticed, but the words in your column describing the emotions of violet are in the wrong order. You wrote:
“Boredom Disgust Loathing Violet”
Cheers-
Good catch, Tanis! It must have gotten mixed up in the HTML process. Thanks for pointing that out!
Nice tips. I sure many bloggers are aided with this idea. Thanks for sharing.