When you understand that different colors evoke vivid memories, emotion, and sometimes visceral responses, you’ll realize that the color choice in your brand’s personality is not to be taken lightly. What thoughts pop into your head when you see yellow? You’ll likely think of foods like bananas, eggs, and corn. You can’t help but think of a bright yellow flower or the warm sun of a cheery new day.
Yellow is a natural choice if you want to express positivity or prompt mental stimulation; sunshine yellow is a symbol of optimism and hope. Interestingly, yellow has been known to evoke both feelings of stimulation and peace at the same time. Use yellow if you want to show customers that your business has a warm and inspiring atmosphere. Yellow can help associate your brand with joy, helpfulness, and positive outcomes.
Let’s dig in to all the ways society and companies use yellow successfully. Yellow could help communicate your company’s values, as its often used to convey courage, frugality, fun, quality, reliability, security, speed, and trust. If yellow feels as cheery and warm as the sun, and brings to mind the optimism of your childhood, then your company could convey those positive sentiments by using yellow in your branding. Yellow has been shown to help grab our attention when passing store windows.
Yellow Makes Us Smile
In the words of Vincent Van Gogh, “Yellow is capable of charming God.” It is a color that evokes a feeling of happiness. It’s no coincidence that smiley faces and emojis are mostly yellow. Famous brands have used the positive and inspiring power of yellow effectively to create instant recognition, like the yellow border around National Geographic magazines.
Some brands have chosen yellow because it conveys the warmth and cheerfulness of a bright morning, a fresh new sunny day. Brands like Cheerios, and NesQuick can be found in our kitchens, ready for breakfast prep. Denny’s restaurants are popular for breakfasts, so it’s fitting that they use yellow to give you that “rise and shine” feeling of having a great breakfast.
Yellow Protects
Bright yellow is an attention grabber and used to signify caution and safety. Yellow alerts drivers and pedestrians with its use in traffic lights, road signs and caution tape. This is because yellow is the most visible color in the spectrum. It’s easiest to see at night or in dark environments.
Expanding on the theme of safety, it’s clear to see why if you want to show that your company protects your customers, include yellow in your branding. This is best shown in the construction industry’s use of yellow to suggest confident strength and power, as in the Stanley tools and Caterpillar logos. These building industry companies associated with dependability use yellow to help customers feel strong and rugged.
Yellow Makes Us Hungry!
The brain processes color before it processes words or shapes, so that’s why McDonald’s uses red and yellow: this powerful combination of colors makes you hungry, encouraging you to want to buy the product they sell, and as a result, makes you feel happy.
Throughout the world, McDonald’s iconic red and yellow logo is easily recognizable because they were based in the science of colors. As we mentioned in last month’s blog, red is stimulating and is associated with being active. It also increases heart rate, which helps to jumpstart your appetite. The stimulating effect of yellow evokes energy and increases the rate of metabolism. As with red, it is also said to induce appetite.
Because we associate yellow with happiness, and because it’s the most visible color in daylight, you now know why a McDonald’s is so easy to spot from miles away. McDonald’s golden arches are one of the most recognized brand icons on earth, and while the actual logo has been modified over the years to keep with modern times, their color scheme has been purposely consistent.
Yellow Saves Money
And to top it off, yellow is also associated with saving money. That’s one reason why you will find yellow in the color scheme of many fast-food restaurants. Other well-known food companies that use yellow successfully to evoke satisfying hunger on a budget include Denny’s, Lay’s, and Subway.
Yellow can be found in other types of famous companies associated with affordability: Best Buy, Hertz, and IKEA.
Can You Use Yellow in Corporate Branding?
Even in corporations, yellow is seen as fun, energetic, young, and attention-grabbing. There’s nothing subtle about yellow, so in your online presence, you may want to use yellow as a subtle accent, a splash of bright focus, a quick reminder of brand identity.
Using yellow as a primary color for your branding design can work well by positioning it against darker and more neutral colors as accents. It also work well by using tones that feel softer on the eyes. Use it in accent pieces to draw the buyer’s attention, like in a call to action button.
Once you’ve chosen your company’s brand identity with specific colors, it’s wise to keep them consistent through the years. Making small and subtle changes to maintain a fresh modern look will be seen as a positive – no one likes a stale brand that won’t keep up with the times. But making frequent jarring changes for no reason will only confuse customers and speak negatively for your brand.
References
https://www.rd.com/article/mcdonalds-logo-yellow-red/
https://brandingcompass.com/branding/color-theory-yellow-as-a-branding-color/
https://www.kimp.io/yellow-in-branding/
https://www.logomaker.com/blog/2017/09/07/why-you-should-or-shouldnt-use-a-yellow-logo-for-your-business/.
https://www.impactplus.com/blog/psychology-of-the-color-yellow-in-branding-design
https://logo.com/blog/brand-colors