Design for Persuasion by @TheGrok

We always do wireframes before starting on the design which show which elements go where.

While I get what you are saying about leaving color out, I think it’s also part of what should be considered in part of the original considerations concerning just conversions because it does convey emotion. Also, colors can be important for defining elements beyond what simple contrast can do. Colors have strong psychological meanings and you can use that to your advantage at the very beginning to.

So, I think you could start the design in colors, but then make sure the contrast is high enough by checking it in grayscale, which is something we also do.

On the other hand, sometimes it’s good to break the rules. We released our site redesign last month and so far it’s been really successful for us. I decided to purposely break the rules to see what would happen. So, it’s decidedly low-contrast, dark and it has large loading times.

I’d certainly think really hard before doing this on a client site, but on our own it worked really well by making us stand out, filtering out potential clients who may not be a good fit, and attracting those that will.

So, sometimes you just never know. 🙂
.-= Naomi Niles´s last blog ..Should Designers Specialize In One Industry? =-.

Unfortunately, I think that there is often a disconnect between designers and business managers; rarely is there a performance assessment after implementation to determine whether the project was successful.