How to Choose Brand Color? (Example of Top Brands to Learn)

Perhaps, you are hooked up with your existing brand logo or want to start a new one. Besides, you may be confused on how color works, how it plays a role in your branding or how to mix different color palettes professionally.

Then you’ve arrived at the right junction.

We will discuss here about which points you may stuck on your branding journey. Especially on implementing color theory. Besides, you will be educated on how popular brands combined their color psychology to be on top.

So, let’s dive.

What is Brand Color?

Brand color is a combination of different color palette or accumulation of color hexes to identify a company in a competitive market. Moreover, it raises the emblem of a brand.

Brand color may be used on different sections of a brand to delight your consumer. 

You may implement the thing on your store interior design, or may be on staff dress ups or packing your product for delivery.

You’d have a transport vehicle that may convey your color on the road. Besides, when a consumer receives your product, he/she will get aware of your color on packaging or wrapping.

Some media personalities may wear your brand color. It will enhance your customer reach and will turn your brand pinned in their mind.

Color Theory Behind a Brand

Remember one thing that every brand has its own color theory. What they want to pipeline across the market largely depends on how they paint their brand.

Not necessarily focus on a competitor but you have to visualize the thing.

Let’s have a deep dive into the color theory; a must read for any brand.

Before we dive, have a classification of the sections of color theory as it will ease your study.

Color Category

We can categorize colors into three basic sections.

Primary Color

It denotes red, yellow, and blue. These colors are self made as they can not be created from the mixing of other colors.

Secondary Color

Three colors-orange, purple, green are the secondary ones that can be created from mixing two or three primary colors.

Tertiary Color

Colors like magenta, vermillion, violet, teal, amber, and chartreuse are termed as tertiary. These can be made from the accumulation of primary and secondary. 

Color Term

To understand color theory in depth, let’s see how a color is mixed or how to balance colors.

Hue

The fresh color from the primary and secondary section denotes hue. It refers to the pure pigment of a color; no mixing, no additive.

Shades

How much darkness you apply on your color expresses shades. This implies deep color, for example deep green after mixing black on it.

Tint

This indicates the lightness of a color contradicting shades. Mixing white on primary or secondary color to make it soft is termed as tint.

Tone

A mixture of black and white refers to the tone. Grey color is the only color that contains black and white. In other words, modification through grey is called tone.

Color Temperature

If you have already made up your mind to design your brand, you may have heard of words like cool or neutral. These words denote temperature.

Warm colors contain yellow and red that express excitement as well as creativity. Sometimes it prefers optimism over depression.

Cool colors include blue, green and purple. These colors show peace, calmness, and harmony.

Neutral colors consist of brown, grey, black, and white.These colors are ideal for creating a well-balanced and harmonious color scheme.

How to Choose Your Brand Color?

In the above section we have already discussed the basics of color. Now it's time to  do it practically.

You may endorse some steps like-

1. Research on Your Brand Insights

If you’ve already started to design your brand without meditating yourself on it, then you’re on the wrong track or else you’re wasting your time.

There’s no worth of constructing your brand logo if you haven’t listed down the roadmap of your brand’s insights.

Besides, your brand design will not connect you, let alone your customer. 

So, to get rid of this hindrance, you may ask yourself several questions; such as-

1. What am I supposed to do with that brand?
2. What’s my insights have to do with the brand?
3. Whom am I targeting?
4. What do customers expect from my brand?
5. Which criteria should I fulfill to move on?

Do research on these enquiries. There may be some other relevant thirst that will arise when you explore the queries above. 

2. Learn the Psychology of Colors

Different colors have different insights, different expressions, and different personalities.

Let’s move forward towards the secrets of color psychology.

Color Psychology

3. Learn Color Wheel & Go for a Combination

Just imagine. You select a random color for your logo, implement it to your marketing, and the operation goes in vain.

How’d the situation be then?

To overcome this hindrance, you must  have the knowledge of how the color wheel works and how you can combine color with your brand.

In the image below, you can see that the direct opposite of one color is the primary/complementary of another color. Such as– green is the complementary of red color as it is the primary for green. Same for Blue is the primary complement for orange.

These opposite colors on a wheel are termed complementary colors.

Give another look at the above wheel. You may find that red, orange, and yellow sit together on the same bench. In addition, green, blue, and violet are the same.

They are called analogous colors, used as dominant color or supporting color on mastercard, BP etc.

Lastly, see the last wheel above.

What does it express?

Just draw a triangle on taking three points from the wheel. If the apex points hit three colors, then you call them the triadic colors. Burger king, Popsicle use it to get more visualised and make their logo more harmonious.

4. Keep Researching on Your Competitors

One of the most significant duties for newbies marketer is continuously researching how the market is going. What your competitors do, how they keep stand on market, or where they put emphasis most are your first concern.

To get aware of this knowledge, you may go for some questions, say questionnaires.

We set up the sequences for you below.

1. Which colors do your competitors use, and how do they reflect their brand’s identity?
2. What feedback have you gathered about your competitors’ designs, and where did you find this information?
3. Do you see any patterns in how other businesses use colors for things like marketing or sales? How do those choices align with their messaging?
4. What sets your brand apart, and how could your colors communicate that uniqueness?
5. Have you consulted any industry experts about picking colors? If yes, what insights did they provide?
6. What methods, such as surveys or focus groups, did you use to decide on your brand colors? How effective were they?
7. How does your color palette help differentiate your business from others in the same space?

Pro tips: Investigate the on-going activity of your competitor. Purchase a premium analytics tool and do research on their movement. Be yourself on their detection too.

5. Use a Palette Generator to Create Variation

Adobe Color

Adobe Color is the ultimate tool for digital creatives looking to generate stunning color palettes or harmonies from any base color. 

Unlike some other color palette generators, Adobe Color is more extensive, making it ideal for detailed projects rather than quick, simple needs. 

The 'explore' section lets designers browse user-crafted color palettes at random or by popularity. With an Adobe account, you can log in to save your generated palettes for later use or share them with other users.

Coolers

Leading the list is Colors, a favorite among designers for its user-friendly interface and growing collection of color palettes available on both iOS and Android. 

Its intuitive drag-and-drop functionality makes Colors ideal for beginners. You can modify colors, change their order, and view a range of alternatives.

A quick press of the space bar generates additional color options. After creating your perfect palette, you can copy the hex codes or export it as a URL or PNG.

Color Hunt

Color Hunt provides thousands of trendy, hand-picked color palettes on a free platform that celebrates the beauty of color. Designers can save their favorite palettes, manage their collections, and quickly access color codes.

Plus, Color Hunt comes with a handy Chrome extension. It's a fantastic tool for any designer.

6. Create Your Brand Color palette

‍For an effective brand color palette, stick from two to six colors whether it is primary or secondary. Here are some brand color formulas to help you develop a compelling palette.

One Main Color 

Brands like IBM, Spotify, and Apple maintain simplicity with a single, leveraging primary color.

One Main and One Accent Color

Companies such as McDonald’s, Pepsi elevate their branding with dual-color palettes.

One Main Color and 3-4 Accent Color

Slack, Microsoft, and Burger King create more elaborate but memorable palettes by combining a bold signature color with complementary accents.

7. Test Your Brand Color

Once you've chosen your colors, place them side by side and try out various combinations to ensure they harmonize well and communicate your desired message.

You may go for your brand logo recognition whether it runs smooth or not.

For website accessibility, test your palette to ensure clear legibility. Many online resources and browser plugins can help you check color contrast for accessibility.

Tools such as Contrast Checker and Colour Contrast Analyser are highly recommended.

Example of Top Brands to Learn

1. Starbucks

Starbucks' brand colors are founded on a family of greens, accompanied by four neutral colors. The primary color, "Starbucks Green," is iconic and central to the Siren logo.

The expanded color palette blends this primary green with other "fresh and inviting" shades. These include an accent green and two secondary greens.

This contributes to a cohesive and appealing brand identity.‍

2. Google

Google's logo is a timeless design that is universally recognized. The logo's four colors—blue, red, yellow, and green—are as iconic as the design itself.

These colors are Google's primary colors, along with white, which is frequently used in Google interfaces. The secondary colors are darker versions of the primary colors.

Along with a range of grays that serve as neutral colors for presenting information, such as in written text.

3. Instagram

Instagram's brand colors include a gradient that shifts from blue to yellow, with a mix of purples, pinks, and oranges in between.

This gradient is a contemporary interpretation of the brand’s rainbow from its earlier, skeuomorphic logo.

It also acknowledges the importance of color in the app’s filters and community contributions.

4. Mastercard

The Mastercard logo is made up of two overlapping circles, one red and one yellow, resulting in a bright orange.

Light and dark gray are used as background colors. The secondary colors in the palette are gold, yellow, and green. The accent colors are red and teal.

5. Dropbox

Dropbox uses blue, black, and white as its primary brand colors. The key aspect is the versatility of different color combinations.

Dropbox offers 18 brand colors that can be paired in 32 different ways. The rich color spectrum is meant to generate unique mixes that work well together. This creates interesting and often unusual combinations.

Make Your Own Brand Color

So Folks!

We have tabled all the hooking points on color discussion. Moreover, you have gone through the core theory of color and how to incorporate it in your branding.

Now it's time to create your own logo. Do gradual analysis. Compare it with your competitor.

You had better book a 15 min Strategic Call with the great designer to know their insights on color directly.