HOW TO DESIGN THE PERFECT EMAIL SIGNATURE

We see so many organisations without a professional email signature. So we ask “Would you send out company letters or invoices on unbranded paper?” Well, it’s the same with email, sending emailing without the correct company branding can damage your business.

When it comes to creating the perfect email signature, less is often more. You don’t want to create something like Gary, do you?

When it comes to creating the perfect email signature, less is often more. You don’t want to create something like Gary, do you?

Sending emails that are inconsistent could cause reputational damage to your organisation. We strongly believe that the key to establishing a brand and building trust is through consistency. This is true with email too. If you received an email from a supplier which is off-brand you may suspect that it was a phishing email.

It is essential that every email sent from your organisation is consistent with your branding. This includes font type, colour and size, and logo.

Keep It Simple

Your email signature should be designed in the same way you designed your business cards, so keep it simple, structured, and try to imagine it fitting within that 3.5 x 2 rectangle. We would typically recommend that your email signature contains the main elements as a business card.

But what about the most controversial element for an email signature, your Email Address?

Should you include your email address within your email signature, after all, they are already reading your email right, so they have your email address. But, by including it within your email signature it can make it easier for people to copy it into their contacts list.

In Mac Mail, for example, it’s just a few extra clicks to pull it from the top of a message. After that, just keep your details to a minimum, name, title, phone number, and website are all you need. For many organisations, we’d also recommend including your social media links and icons.

Your email signature should compliment your organisation website, creating a cohesive visual identity. If you don’t have a visual identity avoid the overuse of too many colours (we recommend a maximum of 4) and keep the font consistent, Tahoma or Verdana are always a safe bet and avoid fonts that are not pre-installed on both iOS and Windows devices.

Keep In Contact

Remember the main point of the email signature is so that your clients are able to contact you in the future. Social media is extremely important these days, don’t clutter your email signature with every single social network profile you’ve got. We’d advise against using personal profile links, so pick the ones that are popular and right for your business and the sector you work in. In addition to social links including a graphical banner can also be used to great effect when promoting upcoming events or promotions, but again make sure it’s in keeping with your visual identity.

Email banners give you an opportunity to turn your emails into part a marketing channel. These banners are highly effective in promoting new products, webinars, or services to existing customers. However, you need to make sure that the banners remain consistent with your overall brand, and don’t detract from the email itself.

Try to keep your email banner image as small as possible, ideally, no more than 10kb, with a maximum height of between 90 and 150 pixels.

Do not attach the image, but instead embed them within the HTML. When designing a banners aim for a web resolution of 72dpi so that it can be displayed correctly on smartphones and within preview panels.

Keep It Compatible

Not testing your email signature with different email clients is one of the most common mistakes we see with in-house designed email signatures. Different email clients will render your emails differently.

So unless you want your boss calling you during dinner complaining that his new email signature looks rubbish on the latest mobile device make sure you test it. We test all our designs against the major email clients, but if you don’t have a team of engineers check out services such as Litmus or Email on Acid who will be able to check your email signature for you.

It’s also a little-known fact that most email clients have a limit on the number of characters they allow within an email signature, and as your email signature is likely to be HTML there will be more characters in your email signature that you can actually see.