Why business email is your organization’s new digital fingerprint

Email communications are a significant and distinctive part of your organization’s digital identity. Let’s dive into what that means for your organization and why you should protect this valuable brand asset.

What is a digital fingerprint?

Your organization’s digital identity, or digital fingerprint, is a unique collection of data formed from all your online activity. Think of it as an online ID card holding masses of information about your business, how it behaves online, and what people think about it.

Most of us understand that we need to be cautious about how we behave online. This is to maintain our reputation and protect ourselves from fraud or theft. The same is also true for organizations.

How does business email play a major role in digital identity?

There’s one channel in your marketing mix that plays a central part in forming your organization’s unique and distinctive digital identity: email. Your email communication is a key identifier of your brand. As such, it needs to be protected from fraud and misuse, and also from being poorly deployed or just underused.

Here are a few key reasons why business email is your organization’s new digital fingerprint:

Emails are everywhere

Email is one of the most used methods of communication in the business world. Your organization probably sends hundreds or even thousands of emails every day to communicate internally and externally, exchange messages and information with customers, and for marketing campaigns.

Record keeping

Each time your organization sends an email, whether it’s to a trusted long-term partner or a new prospect, you’re adding more data to your brand’s digital fingerprint. Many of those business emails will be archived, organized, and stored, forming a digital paper trail of interactions, decisions, and transactions.

Trust and reputation

When a customer or partner trusts your organization, they extend that same trust to the emails you send. How you use business email to communicate with them will shape how your organization is perceived.

Why it’s important to protect your organization’s digital fingerprint

Your email communications are a trusted entry point to your customers, prospects, and stakeholders, so it’s vital that your email system isn’t compromised.

A hacker with access to your organization’s email could send phishing messages to your contact list, containing malicious links or attachments designed to steal sensitive information. Or they might use compromised email accounts to send fraudulent invoices and payment requests.

These kinds of business emails will look like they came from your organization and because they trust you, your audiences will be more likely to open them and comply with any requests.

So, just as you protect your real-life unique identifiers, it’s vital that your organization prioritizes robust cybersecurity measures to protect the unique position your business email holds within your digital identity.

Any security vulnerabilities or breaches must be promptly addressed to minimize potential damage to your audiences’ data and your precious digital fingerprint.

Your brand forms a part of your digital fingerprint

There’s more to protecting your organization’s digital fingerprint than simply safeguarding against cybercrime. You should also protect your brand from the impact of inconsistent and underused email communications.

Email is a powerful tool that can positively reinforce your organization’s unique brand identity, so make sure your digital fingerprint accurately represents your brand-leading position.

Consistent branding and tone

Using professional email signature templates that comply with your brand guidelines means every message you send will consistently reinforce your brand identity. Recipients will come to recognize not just the sender in their inbox, but the organization they’re sending from.

This consistency should extend to the management of email signatures. Don’t just leave them to individuals to control as it’ll threaten the reputation of your organization’s digital fingerprint or your IT department to make sure every email signature is on-brand. Using centrally managed email signature software allows your IT and marketing teams to keep your business email communications consistent from start to finish.

A great experience

Keeping email messages clear, concise, and easy to understand makes life simpler for your recipients. One way to achieve this is to make better use of your email signature.

For example, making sure the contact information in your email signature is accurate means you don’t have to provide it within the message body. Segmenting your contacts into different audiences also allows you to provide appropriate messaging and promotions. This will keep them interested, providing them with a great experience.

With Exclaimer’s email signature management software, you can easily add interactive elements such as polls and quizzes, invitations to events, links to useful downloads, and give your marketing campaigns a turbo boost.

Conclusion

In a digital-first world, business email is your organization’s new digital fingerprint, a unique and indelible part of your brand identity. Just as no two fingerprints are the same, no two organizations are identical. The way you manage your business emails sets you apart from your competitors and reinforces your core values.

Centrally managed email signature software is invaluable for ensuring your organization is properly represented in all business emails. When every email counts, make sure you leave a digital fingerprint that’s a mark of excellence.

Discover the power of our email signature software by signing up for a free trial or starting a self-guided interactive product tour now.