So, what is an email signature? It is a block of text, and sometimes images, that your mail app adds to the bottom of every message you send. It usually holds your name, your job title, your company and a way to contact you. You write it once in your mail settings and the app does the rest.
That is the whole idea. The details are where it gets useful, so this article covers what goes in one, how it differs from a sign-off and a disclaimer, who uses them and why.
What an email signature looks like
The simplest email signature is two lines of plain text:
Maya Chen, Head of Partnerships Acme Inc. | +1 415 555 0142
A fuller one has a logo, a photo, a website link, a booking link and icons for social profiles. Here is one drawn by emailfooter, so you can see what a business email signature often looks like.
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A profile layout with photo, booking link and company details. The company and person are made up.
What is an email signature at heart? The meaning is the same in both cases. It tells the reader who sent the message, in the sender’s own words, without the sender typing it each time.
What is an email signature made of?
What is an email signature made of in a business? Most email signatures contain some mix of these:
- Name and job title
- Company name and sometimes the registered name
- Phone number, often both an office line and a mobile
- Website or a link to a page the sender wants read
- Address, for companies that receive visitors or post
- Social links
- Logo or photo
- A legal footer, such as a registration number or a confidentiality notice
Not every one of those belongs in every signature. The complete guide to email signatures goes through which to include and which to leave out.
What is an email signature, compared with a sign-off and a disclaimer?
What is an email signature compared with the other things at the end of a message? People mix these up, so it helps to separate them.
- A sign-off is the line you type at the end of a message, like “Best regards” or “Thanks”. You write it each time.
- An email signature is the block your mail app adds automatically, after the sign-off.
- A disclaimer is a notice, often legal, such as a confidentiality statement. It is commonly placed inside the signature, in small text, but it is a different thing with a different purpose.
So a message might end with “Thanks, Maya” typed by hand, followed by a signature block with her title and phone number, followed by a one-line notice about confidentiality that her company requires.
Is an email signature the same as a digital signature?
No. A digital signature, or electronic signature, is a way of proving that a document or message came from a specific person and has not been altered. It is a security and legal tool. An email signature is only the block of contact details at the bottom of a message. It proves nothing. Anyone can type any name into theirs.
That is why a company should never treat an email signature as proof of identity. If someone emails asking for a payment, the name in the signature does not tell you the sender is who they claim to be.
Why businesses use an email signature
What is an email signature good for? Four things, and they add up.
There are four reasons, and they stack.
- Identification. The recipient sees at once who wrote to them and at which company.
- Contact. The phone number and website save a second email.
- Brand. A consistent logo and colours across everyone’s messages make a company look organised. In a company where every employee has a different signature, that is lost.
- Required information. Some companies have to show particular details in their business communications. The rules depend on the country, and our pages on the UK and Nigeria show how we handle that: we only state a rule when we have read an official source.
Where is an email signature stored?
The signature lives in your mail settings, not inside each message you have sent. That has two consequences. First, if you change the signature, only new messages carry the change; old ones keep the version they were sent with. Second, signatures set up in a desktop app do not automatically exist on your phone, so people often send from a phone with no signature at all.
Behind the scenes a rich signature is a small piece of HTML. When the app builds a message it adds that HTML to the end. If it contains an image, the image is either attached to the message or fetched from a web address when the reader opens it. The second method is the one that keeps messages small, and it is what emailfooter uses: the logo is hosted on your site and linked from the signature.
How to create an email signature
You can type one in a few minutes in most apps:
- Open your mail app’s settings and find the signature section.
- Create a new signature and type your name, title, company and phone number.
- Choose whether it goes on new messages, replies, or both.
- Save.
The step-by-step guides cover Gmail and Outlook, and a general guide handles other apps.
For something better looking than plain text, you can use a generator or a ready-made layout. The article on email signature templates shows several.
For companies: what is an email signature when many people send mail?
When a whole company wants the same signature, the usual problem is keeping it consistent. People copy from each other, change fonts, drop the logo or forget to update the phone number. A common fix is a shared design where the company fixes the layout and legal line and each person only fills in their own details. That is what emailfooter does, as a free WordPress plugin.
Frequently asked questions
What is an email signature used for?
It tells the reader who sent the message and how to reach the sender, automatically, without typing it each time.
What is an email signature in simple words?
It is your name and contact details, added automatically to the end of every email you send.
What is an email signature in a business setting?
It is the block that carries the sender’s name, role, company and contact details, plus any legal line the company needs, on every message the sender writes.
What is a professional email signature?
One that shows your name, title, company and a way to contact you, in a clean layout, without extras like quotes or heavy images.
Is an email signature required by law?
There is no general rule that every email needs one. Some countries require companies to show particular details in business communications. Ask your lawyer which apply to you.
Can I have more than one email signature?
Yes. Gmail allows several, and Outlook does as well. You can pick which one is used for new messages and which for replies.
What is the difference between an email signature and a footer?
In everyday use they mean much the same thing. People often say footer for the legal notice at the very bottom, and signature for the contact block above it.
Keep reading
- Email signature: what it is, what to put in it and how to set it up: Everything about the email signature: what to include, how big it should be, design rules, legal lines, examples and how to set it up in Gmail and Outlook.
- Email signature size: width, image size and character limits: What is the best email signature size? Recommended width, logo dimensions, image file weight and the character limits in Gmail, so your signature looks right.
- Free email signature templates: ten layouts you can copy: Free email signature templates in ten layouts, from classic and executive to compact and wide, with advice on choosing one and how to get it into your mail app.
Make every signature in your company match
emailfooter is a free WordPress plugin. You design the signature once, and each person adds their own details and installs it in their mail app. Prefer not to run a website? emailfooter Managed is the same software, hosted for you.