COLORS: WHAT DO THEY MEAN
By Joelene Wickens-Orlando

Red is the first primary color of the spectrum. It emotionally triggers the sense of power, impulsively, sexuality and increases one's appetite. Be careful how you use red. It can also shout anger, forcefulness, impatience, intimidation, conquest, violence and revenge toward your site visitors.

Yellow is one of the three primary colors. Visually it is the most difficult for your eyes to focus on. It is actually brighter than white and stronger in its emotional impact. It also has a stimulating impact on your memory. (Remember the popularity of the yellow notepads and pale yellow Post-It Notes?) It triggers the following emotions: intelligence, joy, and organization. It’s opposite effects when used in the wrong manner or with the wrong combination of other colors can create feelings of criticism, laziness, or cynicism. A splash of pale yellow is the best choice since many tones/shades of yellow are difficult for the human eye to focus on for very long. However, if used with short burst of text as a background, it grabs your attention and helps hold what you read in your memory banks. :)

Blue is a primary color. It is the easiest color for the eyes to focus. It generates feelings of tranquility, love, acceptance, patience, understanding and cooperation. Its negative qualities if used inappropriately are fear, coldness, passivity and depression. Blue is a favorite color choice among all age groups.

Orange is a secondary color comprised of the primary colors, yellow and red. It emotionally triggers steadfastness, courage, confidence, friendliness, and cheerfulness. Its opposite effects are ignorance, inferiority, sluggishness and superiority. Orange is generally considered a social color but used in the wrong manner and with the wrong color combinations could create the opposite effects listed.

Green is the combination of two primary colors, yellow and blue. It includes all the qualities of yellow and blue and the emotion it triggers depends on which of the two primary colors is dominant. Green triggers the following positive emotions: hope, growth, good health, freshness, soothing, sharing, and responsiveness. Its negative attributes are envy, greed, constriction, guilt, jealousy and disorder.

About the Author: Joelene Orlando is a Web enthusiast and a staff writer/consultant for eMarketing Answers with a broad knowledge of topics covering Internet marketing and communication strategies for both consumer and small business .owners www.emarketinganswers.com is dedicated to providing free, comprehensive emarketing resources and online promotion tools.