Competent Blue and Exciting Red: Examining the Effect of Logo Colors on Consumers' Brand Attitudes in Different Product Categories

Abstrakt

Colors have inherent meaning and influence consumers' thoughts, feelings and behavior. Colors are fundamental to brand identity and convey the desired image, much like a carefully chosen brand name and logo. A brand logo can be considered a key element of a company's visual identity, which can affect consumers overall attitude towards a brand by conveying meanings and brand personalities. This study examines which logo colors are appropriate for certain product categories by assessing consumers overall brand attitude and behavioral intentions. Specifically, this effect is analyzed by means of a survey experiment with four studies, distinguishing between a blue and a red brand logo and between two product categories, namely the sports and the insurance industry, and examining differences between Danish and German consumers. The results show that when designing the brand logo, adherence to product category color standards leads to more positive attitudes toward the brand. Therefore, the results of our study contribute to the theoretical literature on logo design as we find empirical evidence that the color of a brand logo has a significant impact on consumers' perceptions and thus on their brand attitude and other behavioral outcomes, such as purchase intent. Specifically, our findings show that brand attitude has a strong mediating effect on the relationship between logo affect and purchase intent. Another interesting finding is that Danish consumers generally perceive the color blue more positively than German consumers. The results of this study provide brand managers with insights into the use of certain colors in brand logos in combination with specific product categories, enabling them to significantly improve consumer-brand relationships by designing their company's logo based on their brand personality.