Small Business Marketing: Color in Marketing Rules of Thumb

Many small business marketers anguish over which colors to use in their marketing. They wonder what do certain colors mean? How should I use color in my marketing ? Which colors should I use in my marketing? Every situation is unique for a small business, but here are some rules of thumb for using colors in your marketing:

1) Pay particular attention to your background color. Readability is easiest when the background color is white.

2) Pay just as strict attention to the color of type you use for your content. Research has shown over and over that the easiest type color to read is black.

3) Avoid using white text on a black background. Although this offers a high-contrast style, the eye experiences great strain reading large sections of white type against a black background.

4) Use screened colors (creating a lighter shade of a color) to give the impression that you are using more than 2 inks.

5) The color of the paper you print on will have a huge effect on the colors you've chosen. Pick colored papers carefully.

I cover many more of these rules of thumb for using color in your marketing in my book Stand Out from the Crowd; Secrets to Crafting a Winning Company Identity.

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