Quick question: How powerful do you think colours are on your website? What impact do you think they have? I’m betting that you think they are there for just aesthetic purposes, right? Well, sure they are important for aesthetics. After all, we all like it when a website looks good. But even more important is the role that the different colours play in increasing your website’s conversion rates.
You see, several studies have shown that colours influence your buying decision by 85%. In fact, 26% more people are attracted to colour ads in the daily newspapers in spite of the average individual’s learned ability to ignore advertising. Colours are basically the essence or heart of your website.
Want to retain more visitors and engage your audience? You need colours. Want to increase your list subscription and sales volume? You need colours. As you can see, you really can’t do without them. They can be the difference between a 1% conversion rate and a 10% conversion rate.
Contrast Colours
The first rule of conversion rate optimization is to vary and contrast the colours on your website. For instance, a red call to action button on a background of blue or white is more likely to increase your conversion rates than duller or more related colours.
There’s a colour spectrum that you should always consider: colours that are directly opposite each other in the colour wheel tend to be complementary. So, if you take a quick look at that link, you’ll find that those complementary colours typically influence each other’s brightness and enhances their effect. In essence therefore, the colours you choose for your website and the important buttons must complement one another.
Keep the Colour Spectrum Simple
Don’t go crazy and add lots of colours to your website all at once. This not only makes your website look amateur, the many colours can be distracting for your visitors. You know how they say, less is more, that’s the case here.
As a rule, you should probably have no more than three colours on your website or web pages at every point in time. Take a leaf from successful websites online. Keep your colours simple. That way, you will not only appear professional and credible, but also record tremendous success in getting people to take the action that you want them to take.
Choose Certain Colour Elements for Specific Parts of Your Website
Most websites tend to have bold headers, lighter backgrounds and specific colours in their call to action buttons. Others have light headers, heavy page backgrounds and lighter call to action buttons. The point is find what works for your market. Always factor this into your website design. If you’re in the law industry, then conservative colour hues such as white, black and blue will always work for your background.
Use Popular Colours for Your Web Pages
Some colours aren’t popular among conversion rate experts for nothing. It’s because they work! Well known colours with a history of changing and improving your conversion rates include red, yellow, orange, black. Test these colours on white, blue, grey and black backgrounds. These are proven to be effective at increasing your site’s conversion rates. In particular, use yellow and red call to action buttons with excellent copy and see what happens.
Now that you know what to do about increasing your website’s conversion rates, use these colour elements and let us know what you found. If you need any help with increasing your website’s conversion rates, get in touch with us at JAG Digital and we’ll be happy to help.