Business Email Signature: Dos, Don'ts & Tips for Implementation

Okay, hand on heart: When was the last time you consciously dealt with your e-mail signature? It's probably been a while. This topic should not be underestimated.

Email signatures are an important part of your corporate branding, they can effectively support various marketing measures with little effort, and they are even legally required for business emails.

In this article, our guest author Carina Graskamp educates you about the topic of business email signatures, presents the most important dos and don'ts, and gives you valuable tips and tricks for implementation.

First Things First: What is an email signature and why is it important?

The email signature refers to a short delimited block of text at the end of an email and contains important data and information about the sender. The text is often supplemented by logos, images, links or even an eye-catching banner.

The most important goals of an email signature are:

1. Giving the recipient the opportunity to identify the sender and
2. Facilitating contact between the sender and recipient.

Furthermore, email signatures can also be used to strengthen your own brand, maintain a consistent image, support recruiting measures, generate leads, and increase engagement with the brand. But more on that later.

What many people don't know: In addition to the goals of clear authentication and facilitated contact, email signatures are legally required in a business or commercial context.

Because: By definition, business emails are considered business letters (= all written communications directed outward that have a business-related content).

And since January 1, 2007, according to the "Law on Electronic Commercial and Cooperative Registers and the Company Register" (EHUG), any form of business letters - including emails - must contain certain formal minimum information.

But before we take a look at what exactly these formal minimum information are, we first clarify the question of who is required to use an email signature.

Who is required to use a business email signature?

Whether you are required to use an email signature depends largely on whether your company is registered in the Commercial Register and whether the sender of the email is professionally active.

This includes among others:

• Individual businesses registered in the commercial register
• Open trading company (OHG)
• Limited partnership (KG)
• Company with limited liability (GmbH) and entrepreneurial company (limited liability) (UG)
• Stock corporation (AG)
• Cooperative (Gen)

But also, if there is no registration in the commercial register, but the sender of the email is commercially active:

• Small business owners
• Self-employed
• Freelancers

What legal mandatory information belongs in a business email signature?

In a broad sense, an email signature is a slimmed-down version of the imprint. Therefore, it is often referred to as an email imprint. However, the question of the legal requirements for an email signature cannot be answered in a general way.

The reason: The mandatory information of a business email signature varies depending on the legal or corporate form - and whether a commercial register entry exists or not. So the email signatures of a GmbH require different mandatory information than for a sole proprietorship or a stock corporation.

Nevertheless, there are some mandatory details that overlap between the legal forms and must therefore always be stated in a commercial email according to § 37 a of the German Commercial Code:

1. Company with legal form
2. Place of trade branch
3. The responsible registry court
4. The commercial register number

Which other mandatory disclosures must be considered in addition to the company form with commercial registration entry, you can see from the following table.

The Email signature of sole proprietorships, which are not registered in the commercial register, must (according to an online contribution by the Janke law firm) contain three mandatory pieces of information:

• The name of the company / firm
• The owner (s) with first and last name
• A summonable address

What you should definitely keep in mind (since we were talking about the email imprint earlier): Simply a link in the email signature, which refers to the imprint on the company website, is not sufficient. According to Attorney at Law Heike Mareck, a link does not meet the legal requirements.

What does not need to be in the business email signature?

In contrast to the obligation to identify on the company website or on invoices, according to Law firm Janke, neither the VAT ID nor the tax number need to be stated in the email signature.

Details such as the telephone and fax number, as well as the email address, or the website link, make it easier for the recipient to make contact, but they are also not mandatory to indicate in the email signature.

And what about data protection notices in an email signature?

According to the EHUG, data protection information does not have to be stated in an email signature. And even after the GDPR, there is no obligation to indicate data protection notices in the email signature.

However, according to Art. 13 of the GDPR, there is a duty to inform when collecting personal data. Companies must comply with this information obligation before the data is processed. The form and type of provision should always meet the needs of the group of people.

For example, a privacy notice in a newsletter is not necessary as this was already communicated to the recipients in the registration form. With “normal” emails, on the other hand, it is not always known where the sender got the email address. This could possibly have been on a business card or even been forwarded by a third party.

This is the reason why a data protection notice in the email signature is recommended,. Your effort is very low and in case of doubt you have proof that you have provided the information. The reference could look like this, for example:

"Our hints on data protection can be found here: <Link to data protection>"

What happens if mandatory information is not listed in the email signature?

We can keep this part very short, because you should not let it come this far. If you forego the mandatory information in your business email signature, you may face a compulsory fine of up to €5,000 and a warning from competitors through a lawyer.

If you're still unsure, learn here how to properly implement electronic signatures,

The benefits and uses of business email signatures

After we have so far dedicated ourselves to the essential - but rather legal and theoretical - questions and answers about business email signatures, we will now be a bit more practical. Because as teased at the beginning, email signatures can do far more than just meet mandatory information.

The likely biggest advantages of email signatures are that they are on the one hand versatile and on the other hand extremely cost-efficient. Little effort with simultaneously high influence - exactly these two aspects make the mail signatures so interesting.

In addition, your emails reach a multitude of business contacts. And, unlike other marketing measures, you know exactly who is behind your mail contacts. This in turn gives you the advantage of tailoring your messages specifically to your recipients.

If you do not take advantage of the opportunities this inconspicuous communication tool called email signature offers, you will at the same time miss a lot of potential. Here are a few ideas and examples of how your email signature can have a positive impact:

• Marketing campaigns: You can boost awareness for current campaigns and actions*
• Recruiting activities: You can draw attention to open job offers
• Brand perception / Corporate Branding: You can boost perception of your brand
• Lead generation: You can link to your email newsletter
• Engagement: You can refer to your social media channels
• Customer relationship: You can build trust with your customers
• Sales: You can support the sales process*

* Provided your recipients may be addressed in an advertising manner by email.

10 Dos & Don'ts for Business Email Signatures

The following dos and don’ts will help you perfect your business email signature and leave a positive impact on your recipients, i.e., your customers, business partners, and other key stakeholders.

Dos for Business Email Signatures

1. Consider mandatory information

This point is clear. You cannot avoid the mandatory information in your email signature. Therefore, make sure you have indicated the mandatory information required for your legal form in your email signature.

2. Observe design elements and design rules

If you want to sign off your email with style, you should design your email signature simply, clearly and readable. This is not about creating a work of art, but about structuring the essential content of your signature properly. It is important to draw the attention of the recipients to the important information.

The following points will help you increase readability and leave a serious impression with your recipients:

• Use different fonts and sizes, to highlight important content in your email signature. However, less is more here. Otherwise, your signature quickly appears chaotic or overloaded. Therefore, do not use more than two different fonts.
• By additionally adding meaningful paragraphs and breaks, your signature gains a visual hierarchy. The demarcation of the contents creates a tidy overall impression in combination with the different fonts and sizes.
• Support the visual identity of your company and add your company logo and your corporate color as a highlight color. But again, you should be careful to use the highlight color very sparingly.
• Ensure enough white space between the signature contents, so that your email signature does not appear overloaded.

3. Use responsive design

Do not forget to design your email signature mobile-friendly: According to a study conducted by Litmus, about 39% of emails were opened on mobile devices in 2020. Therefore, you should ensure that your email signature is not only readable and clearly designed in the desktop view, but also on mobile devices.

The same applies to the various email programs. Depending on which program is used, content can be cut off, displayed smaller or larger. However, you can easily and uncomplicatedly check this with a simple test of different email programs.

4. Create links to the website and social media

Use the opportunity to make your recipients aware of other communication channels of your company - such as your website, or your social media channels,. On the one hand, this increases the chance of increased engagement with your brand. On the other hand, you are making it easier for your recipients to get to know your company, your products or services better.

5. Use a consistent email signature company-wide

Communication goal of every company is to guarantee a consistent appearance to the outside. This also includes a consistent email signature for all employees. Often your mail contacts have contact with several people from your company. Different email signatures make you look untrustworthy. Provide your employees with a consistent signature as a template.

Don'ts for Business Email Signatures

1. Integrate too much and irrelevant information

In a business email signature, only the legally required and essential additional information about your company belongs. It is important that the additional information provides added value for the recipients and thus contributes to a clear goal for your company. This could be a link to your newsletter, for example.

Therefore, make sure you don't overload your email signature with too much content and irrelevant information. Personal information, favorite quotes, or extensive lists of features, for example, have no place in an email signature.

2. No regular adjustment

Don't make the mistake of losing sight of your email signature - that happens quickly. You should rather check it at regular intervals and question whether the current contents still contribute to the goals of your company. This way you also do not run the risk that you mistakenly refer to outdated accounts, websites, or posts.

If possible, you should regularly play your mail signatures with current content and, for example, point out upcoming events. In this case, you can also perfectly give your email a personal touch and encourage to meet at an event and exchange ideas personally: “I will be at the #OMR23 in Hamburg on May 9 and 10. Will we meet?”

3. Prepare email signature as a pure image format

You should also better leave this alone for various reasons: Links cannot be clicked, telephone numbers or e-mail addresses cannot be copied out and your e-mail will unnecesarily big. Preparing an email signature as an image format brings more disadvantages than advantages.

And: HTML formatting should also be avoided as far as possible in an email signature. Here, display errors often occur.

4. Underestimate the impact of the email signature

Yes, everyone has an email signature. Nevertheless, its effect should not be underestimated. According to a Bitkom study, every worker received an average of 26 emails a day in 2021. If this number is extrapolated to the number of all employees of a company who send and receive emails, quickly a large range comes together. And: The scattering loss is also extremely low. The small stage that an email signature offers you should therefore not be left untouched.

5. Include unauthorized advertising

However, with explicit advertising messages in email signatures you should be careful. Unauthorized advertising can have data protection and competition law consequences,. Therefore, check exactly whether

• your email signatures contain advertising and
• whether your recipients may be addressed in an advertising manner by email.

How do you create an email signature for business purposes?

To answer this question, we have put together a short checklist for you. You can simply work through this and define the content for your email signature and bring it into form.

• Find out what mandatory information belongs in your email signature.
• Define the most important additional information that you would like to include in your signature. These could include the job title and your relevant contact information.
• Consider how your email signature can best support you right now. Do you want to draw attention to open positions or a special event?
• Check that your signature content does not contain any unauthorized advertising.
• Once all content has been defined, you can shape your signature. Be sure to follow the above design tips.
• Test through sample emails whether your email signature is displayed correctly on your smartphone and through various email clients.

If that's not enough, you can find out here in very basic terms, how to create an email signature. And in this post also once Email Signatures for advanced users.

Example of a business email signature

How the checklist can be implemented in practice, you can see using the following example - my own (anonymized) email signature.

All mandatory information as well as the most important additional information are included. I refer to both the website and our newsletter. The content is separated accordingly with meaningful paragraphs. A logo and the use of corporate colors strengthen the brand reference. A data protection notice is also included.

Which tools can support you?

Are you still looking for the right software or tool that can support you around the topic of email signatures? Then you have every reason to be happy, because there are already plenty of digital helpers on the market, such as:

Crossware Mail Signatur

Exclaimer

Newoldstamp

Incidentally, if you have questions about the related topic “E-Signatures”, take a look at the software comparison page of OMR Reviews,. Here you will find detailed information, reviews and experiences about the individual tools for digital signatures.

Conclusion: The best comes last

The saying could not be more fitting for this article. Business email signatures may seem like an inconspicuous topic at first glance. But if you look more closely, you quickly realize that there is a lot to know and consider about it.

The strengths of the email signature lie in its flexibility and cost efficiency. At the same time, it is a marketing channel that is used daily and can achieve a high reach compared to other channels or measures in marketing with almost no scattering losses.

Rethinking and then perfecting your own email signature, both in content and visually, will definitely pay off for you.