5 ways to get the best email signature for 2021

How many emails will you and your employees be sending in 2021? More than you think – in fact, about 12,000 each! Because, with all the challenges of 2020 and those to come in 2021, email remains the top everyday business communication channel.

Is your email signature up to the challenges ahead? Remote-working staff, retaining your customer base, driving sales and boosting your brand profile?

To meet the business challenges and opportunities of 2021 you need the best email signature and what better time to review and revamp your business email signature than the New Year.

In this blog post I’ll show you 5 simple ways you can start 2021 with the best email signature for your business.

OK, let’s get started…

1. Add email signature marketing banners to drive sales

At times like this you can’t afford to miss out key (and cost-effective) channels from your marketing mix. How can every email become a marketing channel? Simply by adding eye-catching interactive email signature marketing banners. Not only do they make instant brand impact but also, by adding the all-important clickable call-to-action, recipients can click through to your landing pages, latest content or direct to your sales platform.

What could it look like?

Best email signature banner tips:

• Add to your signature or place at the top of every email for immediate impact.
• Add clear branding and always use your best imagery.
• Add a clear, compelling and clickable call to action (CTA).
• Target and schedule banners so the right message reaches the right recipient at the right time.
• Measure every recipient interaction with your banners ( Make sure your email signature software can do this)!

Need some banner design inspiration? Take a look at our 33 great email signature banner examples.

2. Add an email signature survey to measure customer satisfaction

How happy are your customers? Find out with every email. After all, you don’t need me to tell you that great customer service is key to retaining your customers, which is now more important than ever. 1-click surveys can achieve over 50% response rates and even as high as 80%. In fact, just having a survey on your signature is a visible demonstration of, and commitment to, customer service!

What could it look like?

Best email signature survey tips:

• Keep it short, quick and simple. It doesn’t get simpler than a 1-click survey!
• Use on-brand icons and ask the survey question in your brand voice.
• Consider following-up positive feedback with a more detailed survey.
• Set-up instant alerts for any negative feedback so you can demonstrate your customer service by dealing with it immediately.
• Use response data to build customer relationships, by integrating with your CRM.

Check out our case study on 1-click survey campaign success.

3. Add an email signature disclaimer for complete compliance

On top of all the other challenges in 2021, you can’t afford to leave your business open to legal action. Proactively minimise this risk and protect your brand and your staff by adding an email signature legal disclaimer. An email disclaimer can cover everything from compliance and confidentiality to contracts and copyright. Having an email disclaimer is more than likely a legal requirement where you are (eg. USA, Canada and the EU) and it’s certainly email best practice.

What might it look like?

Best email disclaimer tips:

• Seek legal advice to keep your email signature disclaimer up to date with the legal requirements for your business sector and location.
• Ensure all your email signature disclaimers are tamper-proof and are centrally controlled.
• Add an extra level of compliance by dynamically personalising your email disclaimer with sender and receiver email addresses and a time stamp, providing proof of intended recipients and date and time sent.

You’ll find answers to the most frequently asked email compliance questions, on our email disclaimers page.

4. Ensure every email signature element is on-brand and up-to-date

OK, this might seem an obvious one but your brand needs to be stronger than ever now. And when it comes to presenting a united brand to the world, consistently branded email signatures are a key touchpoint. Are all your employees’ contact details up to date? Perhaps your brand guidelines have been revised – have these changes reached your email signatures? And with the ‘new normal’ of remote working it’s more important than ever that every employee’s email is perfectly on brand (and tamper-proof!).

What could it look like?

Best email signature branding tips:

• Run through a ‘checklist’ of your latest brand guidelines – logo, colourways, fonts etc.
• Check that your email signatures are displaying properly on a range of recipient devices.
• Keep in control. Centrally-controlled email signature management is the only way to ensure your employees aren’t tampering with their own signatures.
• Only include social channels that you’re actively managing.
• Keep every employee’s email signature details up-to-date by choosing email signature software that syncs with your Active Directory.

To help you keep your business email signatures looking professional and on-brand, we’ve produced comprehensive email signature design guidelines for reference.

5. Add ‘internal marketing’ banners to motivate your staff

Employees worldwide have faced huge professional and personal challenges in 2020. So with the ‘new normal’ of 2021 – remote working and other restrictions – it’s a bigger challenge than ever to keep your staff engaged, informed, trained and motivated. Make everyday internal email your ‘hero’ HR channel simply by adding ‘internal marketing’ email signature banners that capture your employees’ attention and demand interaction with your company culture-boosting content.

What could it look like?

Best email signature internal marketing tips:

• Keep staff up to date with company news and video content.
• Onboard new staff quickly and remotely and show them ‘how things are done around here’.
• Promote training sessions and internal events so nobody misses out.
• Advertise internal job vacancies.
• Run internal staff satisfaction surveys.

See how Euphoria Telecom succeeded in connecting colleagues with Rocketseed email signature internal marketing campaigns.

Meet the business challenges of 2021 by making smarter use of your biggest form of daily communication – your everyday employee email. By adding marketing banners, satisfaction surveys, legal disclaimers and engaging ‘internal marketing’ messaging to your email signatures you can make every email consistently-branded, compliant and compellingly clickable!

Need some help getting the best email signature for your business? We’d be happy to give your email signature a free, no-obligation review and make our recommendations (just send us an email with your signature on) or book a personalised demo.

Happy New Year!

Leonie van Aswegen | Marketing Coordinator

Connect with Leonie on LinkedIn