Email Signature
All you need to know about creating and using Email Signatures
People always remember how you finish your thoughts. No matter what you have said or done, final words are the summary of what it all meant. With email correspondence, your signature is what the recipient will pay much attention to most likely. The email signature you have is what helps your addressee learn the essential information about you. Making it outstandingly unique is undoubtedly important, if you want to write expert emails.
Your email signature⊠huge opportunity for a call-to-action. I change mine depending on what's most important to me. The email signature is the easiest place to get full exposure continuously because you're always using it and you're interacting with business people and⊠there it is.
What Is an Email Signature?
Everything that goes below your email body can qualify to be an email signature. By default, it is an email closing phrase (for example, âBest regardsâ) followed by the senderâs name. You can also upload some images and implement a lot of graphical and text content to the footer of an email. The definition of an email signature has evolved in recent years to a digital call card.
An email signature usually contains the necessary contact information of the sender, their photo or logo, and linked social media icons. Alternatively, one can add a call-to-action (CTA) or a signature-wide promotional banner.
Why Does It Work?
On average, office workers send about 40 emails per day. If your company has, say, 100 employees, there are 4000 emails they send daily, and 84000 monthly. Being used in the right way, these can turn into 84,000 branding opportunities. Thatâs why an email signature automatically added to every email of your colleagues pays off a lot.
For example, we added a simple call-to-action link to our sales managerâs email signature saying âBook a demo.â 20% out of 216 people who actually clicked on a link, did book a demo. Having to pay about $50 per year for a signature, we generated 341 times more revenue. That is roughly $17000! Can you think of a sales tool that can return 34100% of investment?
The beauty of this example is that you pay for signature usage disregarding how many times you send emails. Imagine launching a cold outreach campaign with thousands of emails sent. For $5000 spent on a 100-people-teamâs signatures, you could get $1.7 million back!
Moreover, a signature can help email stand out and allow an immediate response with the contact information added. You can use an email signature to advertise your website and its content, offer social media profiles subscription, or promote new events. However, it should look attractive enough and adequately complement the email body.
Email Signature Formats Best Practices
There are four ways to make an email signature:
- Make it in text
- Design it as a table in Microsoft Word or as a whole image in Canva, Photoshop, etc.
- Code it with HTML and CSS
- Use an online email signature generator
Remember that making your email signature in a visual editor and uploading it as a whole image file might result in your email being flagged as spam. Moreover, you will never know how it will display in all the email clients; on Windows, Linux, or Mac.
You can avoid these issues by using HTML coding. Although this may take a lot of time spent on testing in most email clients. Use the online email signature generator instead.
How to Code Email Signature with HTML & CSS
If you want your email signature to look good in most email clients, you should create it in HTML. As this universal language is used all over the web, you can rest assured any tools and software will have no problem âreadingâ it.
The process is nothing different from creating a website. You can use lots of HTML techniques and commands to make the signature look truly awesome. With that said, it would take a considerable amount of time, even if you happen to know how to code with HTML.
As HTML is made to add lines of text or visual content one below another, you should use tables to organize everything. In this way, your email signature wonât get torn apart when sent to different email clients. And if you would need a signature-wide banner, just add another table below.
Any visuals, like your photo or a banner, are added through links. Use âa hrefâ and âimg srcâ commands to insert the link itself and alt tag of the image. Doing so instead of uploading images straight to a signature will save your emails from spam filters. However, you will need to use some style adjustments through special commands.
The best alternative to HTML, is using an online email signature generator. It has a clean and simple editor where you can organize everything visually. Once youâre done, the tool will automatically convert everything to HTML.
How to Design Email Signature
No matter what format you choose, making a superior design for your email signature can help bring a lot of positive attention. In the long run, this will get you closer to your marketing or sales goals. Follow simple tips below to make your email footer look comfortably beautiful and the most efficient.
Email signature design size
Your email signature should be noticeable but not too big. We recommend making it in a 3:2 ratio (width and height respectively) for horizontal orientation and 1:3 for vertical. Also, it should be optimized for mobile.
The size of your email signature should not exceed 50 kB. If it does, emails you send may get flagged as spam. As it might be somewhat difficult to convert an image to such a small size, using an online email signature generator is the best option in this case.
Email signature colors
Anything too bright seems a little suspicious. Use simple colors that do not oversaturate an email body. The best tip regarding color is âuse no more than two.â In this way, you will not make the signature too clumsy. Do not make these colors too bright as well.
Email signature width & height
The email signature width should not be more than 600 pixels so that it is not wider than the email body. The height of a horizontal signature is ideally not exceeding 400 pixels. For a vertical one, make it no more than 600 pixels. For mobile, these dimensions should be half less.
Email Signature Templates
It is always better to make your email signature look intuitively simple. Newoldstamp email signature generator has a gallery of more than 25 templates that are already optimized to look good and work properly.
Many email conversations have more than one message sent. Create a more simple email signature to send it with reply and forward messages. In this way, your recipients wonât get annoyed by it.
Horizontal email signature templates are suitable for adding promotional banners that will take half of your signatureâs space.
Vertical templates are excellent for emphasizing the photo and call-to-action buttons. They are also perfect for mobile email clients.
Email Signature Examples
When creating your email signature, you should think about what is the most important information to include. Depending on what type of content you would like to promote or what information to share, the email footer may differ a lot.
In addition, if you require making similar email signatures for your employees or colleagues, think about the essential elements all of them need. The most useful thing for an email signature is banners. For example, Newoldstamp tool allows building banner campaigns. These will help you choose a banner for all different kinds of customers according to specific buyer persona personalization or the content that you are currently promoting.
Email Signatures for Gmail
Gmail has a really simple email signature implementation setting. Just open âSettingsâ and find the âSignatureâ field. You can add anything there, from plain text to HTML code or image.
With Newoldstamp online tool, installing a signature to Gmail is even simpler.
- Create the signature you want in the online editor
- Click âSave and installâ
- Click âInstall with Googleâ and choose the account you use
Thatâs all you need to do. The process is a lot easier, and all the visual elements from your signature are stored on Newoldstamp servers. You wonât have to worry if it uploads every time.
Email Signatures for Outlook
Microsoft Outlook uses a different approach in email signature installation process. You cannot install a signature with a single button click like in Gmail. Thatâs why you should consider using an online tool, like Newoldstamp. Disregarding how youâve made your email footer, hereâs how to install it:
- After creating an email signature in Newoldstamp, choose the Outlook installation option and copy the signature.
- On the desktop version, when composing a new email, click the âSignatureâ option in the header. Then click âNewâ button and paste your signature.
- In a web browser, go to âSettingsâ -> âMailâ -> âCompose and reply.â
You can paste your signature to the special field.
There are several more options to adjust your signature in Outlook.
Newoldstamp works with more than 30 different email clients, service providers, and customer relationship management tools.
How to Write a Great Email Signature
An email signature represents your brand, your vision, and the content you care about the most. In some instances, it is the only connection between your recipients and your website/service. So, making it look perfect and according to your brand book is crucial.
Limit the size of your signature to four lines of text
Your email signature should be noticeable, but making it too big results in the opposite effect. You donât want people irritated of your email footer. Thus, it is better to keep it 3-4 lines of text long. It is just enough to include all the essential information. Too long signature might be considered spammy or irrelevant. However, you still can add a legal disclaimer to it, if needed.
Make your name and contact information emphasized
The most significant purpose of the email signature is communicating it to an addressee who is contacting them. Thus, always include your full name, position, and company. Also, some recipients may want to contact you ASAP after reading an email. Add the necessary phone numbers, email address, website link, etc.
Make your signature colors brand consistent but simple
Stick to your brand book and try to make your signature similar to your logo. It adds up to brand awareness and helps people remember your company. The whole signature looks complete when its colors complement your logo.
Place elements according to design hierarchy
Design hierarchy is used to arrange all elements by their importance. In your email signature, your name usually goes first and is written in the biggest font. It is then followed by your position, company, and so on. The main idea is helping a recipientâs eye go through the email footer logically. So that people see what they expect to see. The best formula to use in this case is:
Add a winsome call-to-action
An âAs Featured Inâ or âAwarded/Certifiedâ blurb in your email signature shows them youâre legit and can be trusted.
Call-to-Action is probably the best way to use an email signature for your benefit. It is one of the most common things in email marketing for a reason. You can utilize CTAs as an invite to call your sales manager, visit your website, or check your new blog post. The possibilities are endless.
Always try to make your call to action simple and to-the-point. An ambiguous CTA wonât get you any clicks. Also, a too big and bright button will seem pushy and spammy. Call people to do some action, but make it a respectful call, to avoid receiving a decline.
Use promotional banners to advertise anything
Promo banner is the most efficient and beneficial part of an email signature. The basic contact information and elements of your email footer usually do not change. As for banners, you can change them any time you want. You can use them to:
- Promote your website
- Promote your recent blog post
- Ask recipients to sign up
- Ask for an appointment
- Add link to your portfolio
- Schedule a demo
- Invite recipients to an event
- and so much moreâŠ
If you want to make personalized content for your subscribers, use banner campaigns. These allow you to assign special banners for various buyer personas, lead generation process stages, etc. that will change automatically if triggered by some action.
With Newoldstamp, you can upload your custom banners to an email signature or use a large gallery created by our design team. Also, you can assign a banner to all signatures in one department in a single click.
Promote your social media accounts with clickable icons
Promote your social media profiles with an email signature. We recommend having 3-4 icons linked to your accounts. Recipients may be interested in checking out your feed. Moreover, active social profiles add up to social proof. So, be sure to advertise them in your email.
Use colorful images in your signature
The image you add to your email signature should be colorful and exquisite. If it is a photo, use the one where you smile. If it is your company logo, make it easily noticeable. As for promotional banners or buttons, utilize color combinations to make CTAs stand out. For example, apply a light grey color to the banner background and a bright yellow to a CTA button on it.
Consider using âSent from my iPhoneâ
Your default email signature on a mobile device might be like this. It is mostly used for sending concise messages. So, it might be useful in some cases. However, adding an optimized-for-mobile email signature is a much better solution. You will not have to worry about it after installation.
Track your links
People are used to being able to click on a picture as a link. Linking all the images in your signature is always useful. For instance, link a company logo to its website, a promo banner to some specific page, or social media icons to your accounts.
Adding links to your logo, buttons, and social icons in a signature, make sure you add tracking functionality with UTMs or Newoldstamp. You will be able to tell how many people visited your website specifically from an email signature. Also, you will know what elements perform better.
Newoldstamp online email signature generator has an embedded Analytics tool. It tracks impressions and clicks on every element of your signature, which can help the sales team identify when to send a follow-up.
Include space dividers
We would never encourage adding too much information to your signature. But no matter how many fields you have in an email footer, consider using space dividers. These elements help easily separate some info like phone numbers. Or you can add a vertical line between your photo and contact information. Itâs all about style preferences.
Some email signature templates have these dividers. You can also use the vertical line symbol to separate values in the same text row.
Add a calendar appointment schedule to your signature
If your recipient wants to schedule a meeting with you, they should be able to do so in one click. Donât take it away from them. Use a banner or a CTA button and link it to your calendar scheduling tool. Youâll see the number of appointments made rise a lot.
This option is especially useful in communication with a younger audience of customers. Millennials are scheduling everything online without having to talk directly to a sales representative. Even via email.
Make your phone numbers easy to call from all over the world
Donât forget about your foreign addressees. Including phone numbers to an email signature, put an international prefix in front of them. It will save people the busywork of looking for the right code to call you. And that will result in more calls.
Design a mobile-friendly email signature
About half of email messages are opened on mobile devices first. So, making any signature mobile-friendly is a must. Thereâs no rocket science to imply here. All you need is using email signature templates with big, easy-to-read texts and large enough social media icons.
Consider including an email address in your signature
Some argue that having an email address in a signature is somewhat excessive. However, we believe that it wonât hurt. After all, itâs about the recipientâs convenience. If your email body is long, they will want to be able to contact you right from the bottom. It is only a matter of seconds, of course. But even this can be decisive, especially in some thank-you emails.