What’s your favorite color? As children, it’s one of the first questions many of us learn to answer. People assign deep emotional significance to colors and may react very strongly to colors they dislike. That’s why it’s so important to choose the colors of your commercial sign wisely. The best colors for commercial signs attract customers and are consistent with your brand. The wrong color can be unattractive, obnoxious, and even alienating.
Questions To Ask When Choosing A Sign Color
As with most things in sign creation and branding, there’s no right choice for everyone. The right sign and color vary from business to business. The secret to finding the best color choices for your commercial signs to ask the right questions. Here are a few to get you started.
1. What’s Appropriate for the Industry?
Every industry has its own branding norms. Design companies may want bright, artistic themes and colors, but these same elements would be inappropriate for a medical practice. When selecting a sign color scheme, consider what your competitors are doing. At National Signs, we like to look at what’s typical in the industry, then help you design a sign that falls within those norms while still standing out. The goal should be professional and appropriate without being boring.
2. How Does the Sign Fit Into its Environment?
We always take a photo of the location where the sign will go. If this setting changes with the seasons, it’s important to take that into account, too. A relatively barren location in the winter could become a lush forest in the summer. And this can make it more difficult, or even impossible, to view the sign. The right color should complement the scenery. A picturesque landscape will look strange next to a bright, contemporary sign. Yet it’s also important to ensure that the sign doesn’t fade into the scenery. A green sign is almost always inappropriate situated among trees, while a red or pink sign will be hard to distinguish from a large floral landscape surrounding it.
3. How Does the Sign Look With the Logo?
When we designed Oakbend Medical Center’s sign, their logo was a key part of sign color considerations. They were used to seeing their logo on a white background. On Oakbend medical center had logo they were used to seeing on a white background. This is true of many of our customers. So on a brighter color, the logo looked a little off. The design process often involves tweaking the logo. Sometimes we reverse the logo and sign color. We might also add colors to the logo to ensure it works well with the sign hue. The takeaway here is that we can work with your logo, no matter its color. But we also want you to consider what will look best–and, of course, what you’ll be proud to show the world.
4. Color Psychology: How Does the Color Make People Feel?
It’s easy to reduce color psychology to simple aphorisms: red and orange are energetic colors, while blue is soothing and yellow is joyful. The truth is that how colors make people feel is a highly individual process. The way a person feels about, say, pink is a complex product of their own experiences, the culture they grow up in, and even the pink signs they’ve seen before. It’s important to consider not just general rules about color, but also information about your customer base. What do they like? What do they think? One thing we find is that people are often reserved with color. They want muted hues of beige and white. Those colors are safe. They’re also boring. You don’t have to take a generic approach, or do what everyone else does. Choose something you like, and you’ll never get sick of your sign.
5. Is the Color Consistent With the Company’s Branding?
Branding. It’s the buzzword we hear everywhere. There’s a reason for that. Your company’s branding matters. The sign color must be consistent with how you brand your business. A mental health provider that helps clients cultivate calm mindfulness might want to steer clear of energetic red and orange. A cutting-edge arthouse should likewise avoid dull colors. Remember also that the colors on your sign should complement that which is on your website, social media pages, and other branding and marketing materials.
6. What is the Lighting Like?
Work with your sign designer to deal with lighting issues. Nothing reflects light quite as well as white, but there are lighting strategies that can work with any color. For instance, we find that blue can be tricky, but that light blues work well. Even if you prefer a rich, deep blue, there’s a lighting strategy for you. This is why it’s so important to look at lighting–both natural light and shadows, and any artificial light you opt to use.
Work With The Experts
National Signs is Houston’s favorite sign designer for a reason. We’ve done it all. No matter what you have in mind, we can make it work, and help it stand out. And if you’re not sure what you want, we can help with that too. There’s a perfect sign for you. We’ll help you design it. Give us a call today!
