Choosing a Colour Scheme for Your Singapore Website

Are you finding it difficult to select a color scheme for a website?

Selecting the colour scheme for a website is often done impulsively by some business owners and web design teams.

The choice is usually based on what looks cool to the owner; some even delegate the work to ‘someone with a good eye’ in the organization.

This can be detrimental to the business as the color scheme for websites has severe implications on the buying decisions of clients.

According to research conducted, 85% of buyers base their decisions on the color while 93% say that the visual appearance of a new product will convince them to click on buy.

Psychology backs this claim: it tells us that the first impression is critical. Luckily, a lot of research has been done on the impact of particular colors on individuals.

Therefore, you should choose the color scheme of your website should be a combination of colors that can have a significant impact on the business.

There are certain things that you should keep in mind when selecting the color of your site. Note this is one of the factors that have a major impact on the success of the Singapore website design.

 

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• Gender

Some companies cater to a specific gender. If this describes your business, it is crucial to know that men and women love different colours.

For example, black will appeal to men as it communicates power and sophistication while pink will appeal to women as it conveys beauty and compassion.

• Logo

The logo of a company enhances its image to the public and can make it easily recognizable in a competitive industry. The color used on the logo determines what you are trying to sell.

It is vital to complement the color on your logo with the color scheme you choose for your site. A primary color on the logo could be complemented with a secondary color on the site.

• Products

A product can be associated with the colors used on it so much that whenever a client thinks about that particular product, the color comes to mind.

This is commonly referred to as brand association.

The business owner can take advantage of this brand association by incorporating the colors on to his/her color scheme for the website.

• Age

Research done by Joe Hallock indicates that people will change their preferences for certain colors as they grow older.

Businesses that rely on a specific age group thus cannot afford to make the mistake of choosing the wrong color.

These are the significant factors that influence a buyer’s decision to purchase a product.

They all hinge on knowing information about specific colors to make an excellent choice for your site.

 

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The following is the research carried out on various colours:

• Green

Green has been known to give users a calm and soothing feeling. The clients feel reassured they are in the right place because green represents health, nature, and wealth.

Having green on your site can also mean that you have embraced environmentally-friendly measures in your business.

Adopting eco-friendly practices is becoming increasingly important in a world where concern for the environment is high.

• Blue

The reason a communication giant such as Twitter uses blue is that it creates a sensation of trust and security.

Blue also communicates credibility, reliability, and integrity.

As such, companies have adopted blue as their official site colour.

• Yellow

Yellow is often used to show optimism, youthfulness, and cheerfulness.

It should be used to grab the attention of potential clients but should be used sparingly as it can sometimes lead the client’s attention elsewhere.

• Red

Inspiring clients to take actions once on your website is not always easy. Using red on your site will motivate clients to click on critical call-to-actions as red typically communicates urgency.

This is the reason many companies use red in their clearance sales.

It can also be used to indicate energy.

This is the reason Coca-Cola loves portraying high energy individuals in their marketing campaigns.

• Black

Black is used to indicate power, mystery, and sophistication. It is mostly used to advertise men’s products as these attributes appeal to them.

Black is also an excellent color for marketing luxury products.

• White

This is a colour that shows goodness, cleanliness, and simplicity. It is typically used to create white space – the portion of a page that is left blank. White space increases readability on your site by breaking down paragraphs.

• Orange

Orange is a bold color that brings the attention of the user to a call-to-action that you want them to click. The action can either be to buy or subscribe to something.

• Pink

Pink is a colour mostly used to market women’s products as it communicates romance and sensitivity.

 

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How to Combine the Colours to Create an Effective Colour Scheme

An effective colour scheme is where the primary colours – yellow, blue, and red – stand out. You can make these colours stand out by using them on the call-to-action to compel users to click on them.

The secondary colours, on the other hand, are used to complement the primary colours to enhance the user experience. Combining the colours with the help of a colour wheel is relatively easy.

The colour wheel will help you to quickly establish the relationship between primary, secondary, and tertiary colours.

You can use the colour wheel to combine colors in a complementary, analogous, or triad manner.

Complementary colours are colours opposite of each other on the colour wheel. Colours are mixed in a complementary manner when you want something to stand out.

An analogous colour scheme is one that uses colors that are next to each other on the colour wheel.

The analogous scheme is typically pleasing to the eye. However, the colours should be of the right contrast for the scheme to be effective.

The last type of scheme, the triad scheme, uses colours that are equally spaced out on the wheel.

The similarly spaced-out colours form an inverted triangle if you connect the dots on the colour wheel.

 

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Lots of factors ought to be taken into consideration when designing a website in Singapore.

These include site layout, architecture, CTAs, setting up a host, choosing the domain name, configuring back-ends, choosing a theme, and perfecting your value proposition’s wording.

Often, website colour schemes ends up being an afterthought for many website designers.

Few web designers and site owners think about the right colour palette, leave alone trending colour schemes.

They tend to believe that website colours are unimportant and do not have any impact on the ability of their sites to convert.

The colours that you choose when designing your website have a more significant impact on site visitors than you may know. Research indicates that people develop opinions toward websites within the first two minutes of exposure.

90% of these opinions are based on colour schemes used.

Choosing the right colours when designing your website can increase readability by nearly 40%. Similarly, it enhances learning by 78% and comprehension by 73%. Colours add a sense of professionalism and credibility to your site.

According to HubSpot, more than 45% of Internet users consider the design of websites as the main factor in determining their credibility.

Contrary to what you might think, people prefer simple colour combinations.

Often, only two or three colours are perceived as appealing.

Therefore, sticking to one colour palette can play a crucial role to your site’s success and consequently, your business.

With over 10 million colours, choosing a suitable colour palette can be overwhelming.

 

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Trending Website Colour Schemes That You Can Count On To Revamp Your Site

1.  Soft Tones

Your website needs soft tones since they are appealing and classy.

If you are building a fashion website, soft tones should be your go-to colours. These colour tones perfectly complement each other and can make your site stand out.

You should think of the soft tones that Creations Namale used on its website.

A simple layout augments the site’s colour scheme.

The addition of white space allows the page to breathe. Similarly, there’s minimal text. Instead of attempting to cramp many products on one page, the site lists one product at a time.

Only a few colours are used on the website, thus making it appealing. Had many colour tones been used when designing this website, its trend-setting yet straightforward look would be lost.

2.  Off Whites, Simple Greys, and Pops of Red

Choosing pure grey, a pop of red and off-white will ensure that your website has a simple yet elegant look.

Keep in mind that you do not need busy colours on your site to achieve that much-desired appealing look. Simple website colour schemes are less distracting and also allow your visitors to focus on what is important to them.

Tareq Portfolio is one website that beautifully combines grey, white, and a splash of red.

The site has a significant amount of text. Nonetheless, the colour palette used makes the text appear simple and easily readable.

Instead of using a purely white colour scheme, the site designer chose off-white to combine with the red and grey colour palette.

3.  Gradient Greens and Blues With White Text

Stripe is a popular payment platform for e-commerce companies.

Being a tech brand, Stripe must stay up-to-date with the latest tech trends. Its commitment to keeping up with trends is attested to by the trendy website colour scheme used.

Compared to how its website looked in 2013, Stripe has made lots of adjustments by incorporating the gradient colour technique to make the site appear more visually appealing.

The website features tones of green, blue, and white. Just like Stripe did, you should consider adding colours gradient to your site to give it a modern and trendy look.

4.  Classical Orange and Red Tones

Retro-style colour palettes made a comeback in 2018, a trend that is likely to persist throughout 2019.

Dozens of notable brands are increasingly using classic colours that were popular in the 80s and 90s on their sites.

They are also adding a twist of modernity to these colour schemes.

Spotify’s homepage is an excellent example of how you can roll back the years by adding tones of red and orange.

The warm colours make website visitors feel nostalgic about the years gone by.

Spotify similarly incorporated a trendy design that leverages gradient scales to blend the colours beautifully.

When choosing retro-style colour palettes or any other colour schemes, your target audience should guide your decision.

Bear in mind the fact that your choice goes beyond merely picking bluish designs for me and pinkish designs for women.

Therefore, choose a retro colour palette that suits your audience.

5.  Bright Pink, Soft Pink, and Jet Black

Online retailer Cowboy distinguishes itself by selling electric bicycles via a site that features a modern design and pink colour palette.

Traditionally, the words “pink” and “Cowboy” cannot get mentioned in the same line. Nonetheless, the sleek and trendy look of the website beautifully merges masculinity with pink colour.

On the retailer’s homepage, a soft pink tone is used in the background.

It makes the charcoal black bike more outstanding and the centre of attention.

Through the addition of brighter pink accents in some locations around the homepage, Cowboy ended up with a modern and trendy colour palette on its site.

Often, we assume that pink can only be used to attract females.

Nevertheless, there’s nothing feminine about the Cowboy Bikes website since it perfectly appeals to both women and males.

Therefore, the right colour schemes can help you subdue typical stereotypes relating to “male” and “female” colours.

6.  Deep Green, Soft Yellow, and Grey

If you are looking to incorporate shades of deep green, soft yellow, and grey into your website, you should seek inspiration from QED Group’s site.

The company has a unique business model and consequently, applied the same in selecting colour palettes for its website.

At first glance, the colour palette that QED Group used on its homepage looks busier than other trending colour schemes.

Nonetheless, the company still managed to pull off its unique colour palette with the trendy design that it adopted.

Purple, green, and yellow tones can be difficult to read.

To make the browsing experience more pleasant, QED Group incorporated dull and lighter tones in the background.

Likewise, brighter contrasting colours were added to the middle outline.

7.  A Light Touch of Earth Tone

The use of earth tones on the Konstantopoulos S.A. website makes sense because the company sells Greek olives.

The company’s homepage has a simple layout and design, and also uses a visually appealing colour scheme that resonates with the product on sale.

Olive green is the primary colour.

Nevertheless, the olive green colour is used sparingly throughout the homepage.

This is done to give the site a modern look as well as a classic colour palette.

Instead of saturating the entire homepage with olive green, Konstantopoulos S.A. website features tones of grey.

As a result, the green logo and text seem to have a more prominent presence on the homepage.

8. Red Tones Balanced With Muted Colours

Looking back at all the above website colour schemes, you will notice that red rarely gets used. Red may be a dominant colour but it’s challenging to use on websites.

To effectively use red on your site, only add splashes of it.

Red will look good on your website if it’s used lightly to add a pop of colour to key words in your text, for instance.

Pairing red with more muted tones will also create rich contrast, which makes your website design appealing and your text readable.

9. Futuristic Pastels and Primaries

When choosing a suitable colour scheme for your site, it makes sense to follow the precedence of those who are experienced in this sphere rather than trying to reinvent the wheel.

Anton & Irene’s website is an excellent place to start. This is a professional web design company whose site has a trendy and modern colour palette.

The most exciting thing about the website is the use of a futuristic colour scheme.

Lots of colours feature on the homepage without making it appear messy or unappealing.

Therefore, this is the direction that you should take if you intend to add an artistic spin to your site’s colour scheme.

10.  Black All the Way

Of all the website samples above, black doesn’t feature anywhere.

Often, black is used for text rather than the primary or background colours.

You can still use heavy blacks in abundance. In this regard, consider adopting different tones of black.

For inspiration on how you can successfully use different shades of black, check out JY BH’s homepage.

The heavy gradient used on the homepage gives the website a mysterious yet alluring look.

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What Should I Consider When Selecting a Website Template?

Yes, there are downsides to using a template to create a website, but sometimes brands have no option but to use them, especially during the business’s infancy.

The truth is, templates are great for placing a new business on the map.

More importantly, they offer business owners a clear perspective of the market and additional information that come in handy when creating a custom website once the business is fully established and on an upward trajectory.

Here are 8 tips and steps that you should take when selecting a website template.

• List down Definite Goals and Website Type

Failing to plan is planning to fail. Before you search for a website template, you must first list the website goals. You must also factor in future growth and extensions to build a site that supports growth.

Here are some questions to guide you when setting the business goals.

• • What is the primary content type? This refers to the content format you intend to use to communicate with the target audience. If you want to post photo galleries and videos, choose a template that accommodates such content and is responsive.
  • Will you be selling something through the website? If Yes, choose an eCommerce website template with sufficient integration opportunities for robust product management, fast checkout, and order tracking.
  • How will you be communicating with visitors? If you only need basic information about the visitors, a simple contact form, live chat, call-to-action blocks, and user acquisition tools will get the job done.

Involve all the team members and analyse your competitors’ websites for more inspiration.

Don’t copy their template, as that would make it difficult for you to stand out and make the competition fiercer. Instead, use the analysis as a guide to finding a better website template to knock them off the top spots in the SERPs and market.

Four other primary elements you should consider when setting the goals are:

• • Your buyer personas
  • Project goals
  • Your niche or business
  • Problems the website should solve

The selected template should check all the four element boxes if it’s to be effective in helping you establish a successful business.

• The Website Design

Website design is more about usability and functionality and not just having exclusive landing pages, homepage designs, and sliders.

The template should give your website a thoughtful architecture that enables visitors to navigate from one page to another seamlessly. Earlier, we discussed the need to consider what the website will do. Make sure that you keep the website intention when selecting the template.

This stage is usually the most complicated one for most first-time website owners. Picture this; you run a modelling agency that relies on videos and photos to showcase the different fashion trends and products. And so, the website relies heavily on stunning images to communicate with the visitors.

Thus, you need a template with a full-size stack header image that doesn’t require lots of text. You will only need one or two sentences to describe the photos. In most instances, you may not need to say a word.

Such a website template will not work for a construction company relying on photos and text-based content to communicate. The company requires a template whose header type has enough above-the-fold space to accommodate the essential info about the brand and CTA buttons.

Here are the essential elements you should consider when selecting a template in the design context.

• • Location of the logo
  • Header layout and style
  • Content width
  • Preferred navigation

Thanks to new website design trends, the modern templates are highly customizable compared to the previous versions. You can modify any elements as your business scales up to suit the changes in the market and audience expectations.

The bottom line is that you should be keen on template user experience and usability as Google now considers the two as ranking factors after the recent Core Web Vitals algorithm update.

• Go for a Mobile-Friendly Template

Many moons ago, Google introduced the mobile-first algorithm update, which saw mobile-friendly responsive websites ranking better than static websites. Surprisingly, there are still businesses with websites that are non-responsive.

63.4% of mobile users use their devices to browse the internet; you cannot afford to have a website that isn’t mobile-friendly. It’s the only way to connect with a large customer base without spending a fortune on marketing.

Therefore, confirm that the website template is 100% mobile-friendly before installing it on your website. Preview the different pages and visuals to be sure it’s the right ones for your business. Check how the different elements appear on various mobile devices before the site goes live.

If possible, find a template whose HTML/CSS can be edited to change how the different pages appear on mobile.

• Ease of Use

Ease of use refers to how convenient and easy it is for website visitors to interact with the different pages and take desired actions. The action can be as simple as navigating from the homepage to a landing page, adding products to the cart, and checking out.

It’s imperative to monitor customer movements on your website to determine the friction points. 

What are website friction points?

Website friction points are sections of the website that distract the visitor from completing the desired action. It can be anything from an unresponsive image to an inactive CTA button or a complicated checkout process.

When scouting for a website template, please pay attention to its ease of use by looking at other websites developed using it. Consult widely and involve your website development team to make the right decision.

You can also use AI-powered tools such as Weblium to enhance the website template to offer customers the most immersive and memorable browsing experience.

Work on other elements required for the website to be fully functional, such as media files, forms, and content, as they all directly impact the ease of use.

The best website template platforms have a drag-drop feature that allows users to add and remove elements from pages.

No special coding skills are required, but you must know which element to add to different pages.

Go the extra mile and check the dashboard to determine if it’s intuitive enough for your team members to understand. The team should be able to edit pages and add new ones independently.

If you are unsure about anything, watch the video guides and tutorials. They usually contain invaluable information not available online, such as how to add images and charts to pages.

We recommend spending a few minutes watching the tutorials before installing a new template.

• Flexibility and Features

As mentioned earlier, ready-made website templates are ideal for new businesses on a tight budget who want to test the waters before investing in a custom website. That said, you cannot afford to ignore the usability expectations of your visitors during the initial stages of your business.

Templates are perfect for non-tech business owners who don’t want to spend hours changing the code. However, it’s essential to consider the flexibility of the template.

As a new business, you need a flexible template to perform daily primary functions such as guiding customers through the checkout process and helping them contact the support team. Thus, check whether the website template allows these functions and analyse the degree of use before moving forward.

The next step is the features that come with the template.

The best website templates come with in-built widgets and add-ons to help you make the site functional. During our research, we noticed that most website templates for companies in the insurance and finance niche come with blocks for testimonials, quotes, plans, contact information, and more.

On the other hand, portfolio website templates have blocks that support photo galleries, sliders, and blogging sections.

Consider the available sections to know if the template suits your business. If you hire a web developer to add blocks, you may have to look for an alternative template.

Remember, templates are only recommendable for new businesses with no internet footprint. The main reason for this recommendation is that thousands of other companies are probably already using the same template, so standing out is a significant challenge.

Concisely check the features and flexibility of the website template before making the final decision. Having a flexible template with many essential elements will save you time and money and would have been spent looking for a new template months after launching.

• Availability of Customer Support

Even though most website templates are easy to install and customise, you may encounter challenges when adding certain elements. Most of the people who use them have little or no coding experience.

Based on this fact, choosing a template from a company that offers ample customer support is prudent. The support team should be available on the phone, via live chat, or by email. Most companies that provide the templates only offer dedicated support to premium clients who pay for templates or custom web development services.

Either way, you should be able to get help promptly from the team. Test the team’s responsiveness by emailing or calling the numbers on the website. Gauge the quality of support offered before downloading the template.

A website template from a company that offers poor customer service would quickly result in your website being offline for hours before they respond. Such unfortunate incidents could wash the reputation and credibility you have worked so hard to build down the drain.

Check the reviews posted online by other users to ascertain the quality of support offered by the team. Ideally, it would be best if you steered clear templates from companies with a poor reputation.

• Template Source Reliability

One of the downsides of opting for a website template is that some of the elements and sections are not changeable. As your business grows, you may decide to add a new page or transfer the contents to a new website.

Such processes are usually very complicated and time-consuming. You may have to pay a fee to the company for their personnel to oversee the process.

Avoid such challenges by choosing a website template from a reliable source. The template should support business growth and run smoothly after updates. If not, your website will suffer from unexpected downtimes, and customers will opt for your competitors if they cannot access it.

Here are three primary factors that you should consider when evaluating a website template supplier or company.

• • The number of website templates available: The higher the number of templates, the better, as it shows the developer is determined to release new templates continuously.
  • User testimonials and reviews: Avoid website template developers with a poor reputation in the market. That could be a sign that the quality of the templates is low or customer support is unreliable.
  • Additional features and add-ons: Go for a template that offers other features and add-ons. Even if you have to pay for them, they will save your business from the hustle of creating a new website when you are not yet ready.

• SEO and Marketing Capabilities

Google and other search engines continuously update their algorithms to ensure that only websites that match users’ needs and recommended practices are ranked on top. Therefore, ensuring that your selected website template is in line with the recommended SEO practices is essential.

Here are three basic capabilities that the template should have.

• • SEO settings: It should have dedicated settings to enable you to optimise the pages and content accordingly using H1-H3, meta descriptions, image alt text, and more.
  • Dedicated analytics page: The template should have an analytics page you can view to know the amount of traffic your website is getting and more.
  • Integration: You should be able to easily add new tools such as email marketing software and ad campaign monitoring tools.

It isn’t easy to gauge these three requirements from the outside.

Therefore, we recommend reading reviews posted online by users and website template reviewers to make the right decision. Don’t shy away from contacting the support team for clarification.

 

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Conclusion

Whether you have a pre-existing site that requires a facelift or you are designing one from scratch, you should be aware of trending website colour schemes.

Go the extra mile and hire a professional website design team to select the right colour schemes to use on your website.

We are best known for designing spectacular websites for businesses in Singapore. Call us today at +65 6789 9852.