Creating brand consistency in all touch points, no matter how insignificant they may seem, is extremely important. Have you ever considered how your corporate email signature appears? Does it adhere to your brand standards? Does it accurately represent your brand or include some elements of your corporate identity? Is it consistent across all your employees? Brand effectiveness is all about the little details.

To get the most out of your corporate email signatures, there are a few things that you need to consider.

1. Length

Limit the number of lines you use in your signature. Information can be separated by a colon : or pipe | to reduce the length of your signature. Four to seven lines of text are the ideal length. It is important to consider how your signature will appear on mobile or tablet devices.

2. Consistency

Everyone at your company needs to use the same layout for their email signatures. This ensures that your brand is properly represented and brand standards are followed. The only information that should vary is the contact information. This means that font type and style, font size and weight, and text colour should be consistent between all employees’ signatures.

There are various hosted email systems available that can centrally configure a company-wide signature to automatically apply to each user. You can consider using Office 365 or Google Apps. If you require something more in-depth, consider CodeTwo, which works within Office 365, Exchange, and Google Apps to provide a central email signature manager. Alternatively, a simple template (saved on a shared drive that all employees have access to) that can easily be copied and pasted into the signature bar of your email preferences tool would be sufficient.

3. Necessary Information

This is the most important component of your corporate signature. You need to include the most relevant information without providing unnecessary details in your signature. All signatures should include your name, job title, company name, company URL, your direct phone number and company address. There is nothing worse than needing to call one of your contacts, and the only information provided in their signature is their name.

What about including social media links?

Only do this if you actually use your social media accounts professionally. If you never post, there is no value in including these social links. Similar to if you only use your social accounts for personal reasons. A blog link can also be added provided it’s updated regularly and is a driving force in your business.

What about images?

These should be used sparingly. Images increase the message’s file size, don’t always render properly, and may not automatically load. If you have designed your whole signature as a jpeg, the “clickable” links won’t actually be clickable.

A Few Other Things to Remember for Effective Email Signatures

You can also add timely messages to your signatures. For example, if your company is celebrating a milestone birthday, you can include a brief message about it. “Celebrating 50 Years” or “75 Years of Business in Calgary, AB.”

Do you want to use the same signature for all messages? Or do you want to use a shortened signature for your reply messages only? If you use a shorter message, ensure that relevant contact information is there — specifically your phone number. This would mean that your long signature (with all the corporate information) will only be included in the first message of each new email chain between you and the recipient.

It is important to take these little details into consideration when representing your brand. Remember, your email signature is a snapshot of your company’s brand, visible in all of your professional correspondence.

Here are some Email Signature examples that follow the three Golden Rules outlined above:

[row]
[col count=6]
Standard Email Signature:

John Smith
Company ABC | Account Executive
Tel: 403.999.1234 | Fax: 403.999.4321
111 – 10 Ave SW, Calgary, AB
www.companyABC.ca
[/col]
[col count=6]
Social Media Email Signature:

John Smith
Company ABC | Account Executive
Tel: 403.999.1234 | Fax: 403.999.4321
111 – 10 Ave SW, Calgary, AB
www.companyABC.ca
@JSmithCompanyABC
[/col]
[/row]
[row]
[col count=6]
Reply-To Email Signature:

John Smith
Company ABC | Account Executive
Tel: 403.999.1234
[/col]
[col count=6]
Special Message Email Signature:

John Smith
Company ABC | Account Executive
Tel: 403.999.1234 | Fax: 403.999.4321
111 – 10 Ave SW, Calgary, AB
www.companyABC.ca
Company ABC – 60 Years of Excellence
[/col]
[/row]