You must be familiar with the email signatures located at the email footer. Find out how to create a professional email signature for yourself.
Whether you are a new or seasoned professional, the email signature is crucial to your communication strategy. Do not consider it just a sign-off at the email footer — grab it as an opportunity to display your professionalism and an easy way to make a lasting impression.
This guide will show you how to write an email signature that is catchy and informative at the same time. Also, we will share some resources where you can create email signatures or get signature templates.
What Is an Email Signature?
When you receive emails, you must have seen a block of text, images, and links at the end of some emails. This is called the email signature. It usually contains the name and contact information of the email sender. It can also include designation, website URL, photo, disclaimer, etc.
The prime objective of an email signature is to offer assurance to the recipients that they are communicating with a real human being instead of some bots. Using a professionally designed email signature, you can establish the identity of you and your company. Hence, email signatures also serve the purpose of a digital business card.
Why Do You Need a Good Email Signature?
In case you are still wondering about the necessity behind a good email signature, here are some reasons.
Personal Reasons
#1. Ensures a Positive First Impression
A positive first impression is crucial for every professional communication or networking setting. A well-crafted email signature can rightly project your image to the recipient.
#2. Saves Valuable Time
When you have set an email signature for all outgoing emails, you do not have to add the salutation and signature individual every time you write an email. Thus, it saves valuable time.
#3. Promotes Personal Brand
You can add a logo and tagline to your email signature to promote your personal brand. If you are a freelancer or have started a small business recently, adding brand information in your signature will make your brand familiar among your acquaintances.
#4. Makes You Easy to Remember
Do you want people to remember you? Add a memorable and distinctive email signature to your emails. With the right kind of signature at the end of your email, you can ensure the recipients remember you.
#5. Show Your Personality
At times, you may not have enough scope to portray your personality in your email. However, you can always use the email signature to show your personality. Choose the style, color, and font that resonate with your personality.
Professional Reasons
#1. Shows Your Professionalism
While interacting with the world as a professional, every word of your email, along with the email signature, should show that. A sophisticated email signature will allow the recipients to work with you.
#2. Establishes Credibility
A good email signature also plays a crucial role in establishing your credibility with others. Therefore, a professional email signature is necessary while communicating with clients, colleagues, or potential employers.
#3. Allows Others to Contact You Easily
Email signatures contain your contact details, such as telephone number and email address. It enables them to contact you easily if they want to.
#4. Gets New Followers on Social Media
You can also include the links to social media accounts of your organization, like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Instagram. With this, you can make others aware of your social presence and get new followers for your company pages.
#5. Promotes Brand Consistency
An email signature also helps reinforce company branding and visual identity. By ensuring everyone in your company uses email signatures of the same style, you can promote brand identity.
Step-By-Step Guide to Creating an Email Signature
On Gmail
Gmail users can add an email signature to their emails using this method:
- Go to your Gmail Inbox.
- Click on Settings (gear icon) in the top right corner and select See all settings.
- On the General tab, scroll down till you find the Signature option.
- Click on Create new button.
- Add a name for the signature before clicking on Create button.
- Now, your cursor will be placed in a box where you need to add your email signature.
- Here, you can choose the font style, font size, text color, bold, italics, underline, alignment, and bullets.
- Gmail signature also supports hyperlinks and images.
- You can also make necessary changes to the signature settings.
- Scroll down more to click on the Save Changes button.
- The signature will be ready for use.
On Outlook
To add a signature to your Outlook email, this is what you need to do:
- Open Outlook Inbox and click on the File menu.
- Choose Option from the left side.
- Select the Mail tab from the Outlook Options window.
- On the right panel, click on Signatures…
- The Signature and Stationary window will open with the Email Signature tab.
- Select your Outlook email from the drop-down menu for your Email account.
- Click on the New button. After adding a name for the signature, click OK.
- Write and customize your signature in the Edit signature box.
- You can select font style, size, bold, italics, underline, alignment style, links, etc.
- It also lets you import information from a business card.
- Click on the Save button.
- Select which signature to use for new emails and replies/forwards.
- Click on the OK button, and the signature will be ready for use.
On Yahoo Mail
If you want to create an email signature in your Yahoo Mail account, here is what you need to do:
- Log in to your Yahoo Mail account.
- While in the Inbox, click on Settings in the top-right corner and choose More Settings.
- Select Writing email from the left panel.
- Under the Signature section, click on the slider button beside the email id to which you want to add the signature.
- Once the option is turned on, a box will appear where you can add your email signature.
- You can customize it with emoji, bold, italics, alignment, indent, bullets, and strikethrough,
- It also lets you choose font style and size and allows you to add hyperlinks.
- Exit settings when done. The next email you send will have the signature you just created.
Email Signature Best Practices
✅ The thumb rule for an email signature is to keep it short and include only the necessary information.
✅ While creating a professional email signature, use a clean, legible, professional font such as Arial or Times New Roman. Avoiding stylized fonts for professional use is suggested, but you can use those for strictly personal emails.
✅ Unless you have separate emails for personal and professional use, it is better to use multiple email signatures. Thus, you can use suitable signatures while interacting with different audiences.
✅ Make it visually appealing using the right fonts, format, spacing, and graphics.
✅ Even if you want to make the signature catchy, you should stick to using one or two colors. Too many colors can distract people.
✅ The email signature should include your headshot photo, company logo, website URL, and link to social media profiles.
✅ Create an email signature that can be easily read from any device, including smartphones and tablets.
✅ Before using a new email signature in your email, test it on different devices and email clients to ensure the look and functionality of the signature elements.
✅ If all of your company employees are going to use email signatures, they should use a single format consistent with the brand identity.
✅ Always use the latest information in the email signature, such as email address, phone number, URL, etc.
✅ Never include your personal information, such as your home address and personal contact number, to avoid any security risk.
✅ There could be restrictions about what information you can add to your email signature, deepening on your industry and location. You should find out those from your legal team to ensure compliance.
Best Tools to Create Email Signature
#1. HubSpot
HubSpot offers a free email signature generator to create an email signature for yourself. It has six templates to choose from that can be customized according to your profession and brand identity.
Here, you can add your name, designation, company name, contact info, and more. You can even include links to your social media accounts, such as LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. If needed, you can even add additional custom fields to your email signature.
For stylization, HubSpot provides customization options for theme color, text color, link color, font type, and font size. There are also options to upload your headshot and company logo along with creating a custom CTA.
#2. Newoldstamp
Newoldstamp is a platform to generate custom signatures. This web-based tool is perfect for you and your team to create email signatures tailored to your brand requirements.
On this solution, you get a fully branded signature generator page that contains customizable templates. You can add your own design and use the colors and fonts of your choice on the email signature.
There is also a centralized dashboard that can be used by the companies. Newoldstamp also got an analytics and banner management system that will be useful for you. The signatures can be integrated with Google Workspace, MS Exchange, and Microsoft 365.
#3. WiseStamp
If you are looking for a platform to create email signatures for individuals or organizations, you can choose WiseStamp. It can design professional email signatures that can transform your email into a compelling marketing tool.
The email signatures generated by this solution suites Gmail (individual or Workspace,) Outlook (desktop and web,) Apple Mail, and Yahoo. This easy-to-use email signature designer lets you pick the right font, color, layout, shape, and other elements.
There are also options to add rich features, including the disclaimer, video, button, banner, etc. If you are creating signatures for your company, use it to generate a unified company-wide email signature.
Popular Email Signature Template Resources
#1. Microsoft 365 Email Signature Templates Library
Those looking for a professional-looking Outlook email signature should opt for Microsoft 365 Email Signature Gallery. This resource library contains 20 email signature templates that can be easily customized with photos, website links, company logos, and social profiles.
Using these 100% fully customizable templates, you can add a professional touch to your Outlook emails. It allows you to get creative with fonts, graphics, photos, videos, animations, and transitions.
The templates are available on MS Word, so you can effortlessly edit them for personalization. After creating the email signatures, you can quickly share and publish these anywhere.
#2. Mail Signatures
If you need free email signature templates that are dark mode friendly, Mail Signatures is the right place. This website lets you download ready-to-use signature templates for business and personal usage. It does not even need you to have HTML knowledge to create or customize email signatures.
This built-in signature generator also enables you to customize the templates. Signatures generated here can be used on Outlook, Office 365, Apple Mail, Thunderbird, Gmail, Exchange Server, and many more. There are also options for custom font style and three font colors.
Popular Examples of Email Signatures
Email Signature for Green Energy Company
This example is perfect for anyone working in an environment-friendly company. The banner asks a rhetorical question that indirectly asks the recipients to save paper by not printing the email. The primary font color used here is green, which is the symbol of nature and forest.
Email Signature for Car Company
In this email signature, the award won by the car company gets highlighted with a large banner. The headshot ensures the sender’s info does not get lost due to the banner. The primary color of this signature is maroon, but it can vary based on the brand color of your company.
Final Words
An email signature is a great way to approach others professionally. It also enables the recipients to easily communicate and connect with you. Now that you know how to create a professional email signature, you can add that to your favorite email client by following the steps mentioned here.
You may also want to know about eSignature solutions and eSignature APIs.
