Fonts, Colours Influence How Your Message is Perceived and Received

When it comes to finding the right font and colour palette for your brand the "i"s have it.

And so do the "a"s, the "t"s, and the "z"s...

It may seem like a minor thing, but the fonts and colours you choose to represent you and your brand have a significant impact on how you're perceived. Your content is your message, but how you deliver that message matters -- and appearance, while not everything, is important.

Fonts

Let's start with fonts. You may have a favourite font that you use for your personal correspondence. Or you may just use whatever defaults on Microsoft Word or Google Docs. But when it comes to the font you use to represent your brand, you should put a little more thought into it because, even at a subconscious level, your readers and customers are going to form some of their opinion of you based upon the fonts you choose.

You don't need to be a font expert to have an appreciation for fonts. When you look at something like Franklin, it gives you an industrial feel. The old standby Times New Roman can be seen as just that -- old. Although it also carries a sort of professionalism and weight that gives it that newspapery-gravitas feel. And, of course, if you choose ComicSans, you'll be shunned.

Well, that may be harsh. But ComicSans is much reviled by the public. And, at the very least, it's not overly professional.

When choosing fonts, I recommend going with Google Fonts. Ideally, you're going to choose something that has at least six different weights, such as light, regular, semi-bold, bold, bold italic, regular italic, extra-bold italic,etc. Why Google Fonts? Because they're free and they're pretty much universal. For Web, you don't want to rely on a proprietary or paid font that people may not already have in their font set. That can impact the way people see your content and even mess up some of the styling.

Also, please don't go font happy.

I see it on posters all the time -- five, six, seven different types of fonts and it drives me nuts. You want to stick to a maximum of three fonts -- preferably two. And you want to make sure that the fonts are used consistently throughout your content, both print and web. Maybe choose one font for headlines and one for body content. You could argue a third for pull-out quotes or calls to action, but be judicious about their use.

When you choose what you like for web or print, you can use a tool like Canva's Font Combinations to find other fonts that would complement the one you've chosen. Likely you're not going to have the same font for print and web, but you want to have fonts that are in the same ballpark so they can convey a certain feeling. And remember -- free is good.

Colours

The colours you choose to represent your brand can have a huge impact as well. There are reasons why certain industries favour certain colour combinations -- but you don't want to be the same as everyone else, right? So it can be challenging to find that balance and that's why it's always good to get professional opinions.

Think about major industries and you'll usually be able to match a colour to them. Technology and financial industries? Usually a modern feel with blue tones. Environmentally focused organizations? You'll see earth tones like green and brown hues. You want to find something that reflects your brand but also resonates with the user.

Once you've chosen your colour, you're going to want to find what complements it well. Using a tool like Coolors can help give you ideas as to what works well with what you've chosen. And it even provides you with the hex codes that you can use for your web work.

The Combination

And the ultimate connection comes from matching good typography with your brand colour to send the right message about who you are. Let’s take orange for example, orange is used to convey enthusiasm and warmth and is often used in food and sports industries. But take orange and mix it with a cartoonish font and you get the Nickelodeon logo - optimistic and energetic but not overly professional. Now take that same orange and use a san-serif font like Proxima Nova, and you get the Payless logo - modern and clean but still upbeat.

There are no right or wrong answers. Well, there's ComicSans, that's always wrong. But there are better answers and more appropriate decisions for your brand. A lot of thought, time, effort, and experience goes into finding the right font, the right colour, and the right combination of both for a brand -- and that's why it's always good to seek professional advice.

In the end, what you say is always going to matter the most -- but how you say it and the medium you use to deliver it can strongly influence how that message is perceived and received.