How to Add a Signature in Gmail (5 Easy Steps)

Creating a professional signature in Gmail is easy to do and can really make your external messages stand out. A professional Gmail signature is the best way to promote your brand and provide recipients with your contact details.

This article gives you all the information you need to create a signature in Gmail. The native functionality of Gmail lets you create a signature template with important contact information and exciting imagery.

How to add a new signature in Gmail

It is quite easy to add a professional Gmail signature that will make you stand out from the crowd. However, it is important to note that you are not able to create more complicated email signature designs.

Follow our guide below to learn how to automatically add a Gmail email signature.

1. Log in to Gmail.

2. In the top right of the screen, click Settings (gear symbol) > See all settings. Scroll to the Signature section, and go to Create new to start building your signature in Gmail.

3. Give your new Gmail signature a name.

4. Open the signature editor. Create your email signature in the text box.

5. Once complete, click Save Changes.

How to create a professional Gmail signature

If you’re looking to create a more professional email signature design using more than just plain text, a bit more thought is required. Let’s look at what goes into creating a professional Gmail signature in more detail.

1. Firstly, you need to add your contact information. As this is going to be a professional email signature, you need to include the following elements at a minimum:

• Your full name

• Job title

• Company name

• Phone number

• Email address

For more information on what to include in a professional email signature, go to this article.

2. You can then add additional formatting to make your signature look more interesting without going too overboard. Resist the urge to use loads of different fonts as it will make your signature look messy:

3. You will want to add at least one hyperlink for something like your website, email address, or your social media accounts.

a. Highlight the signature text you want to add a hyperlink to and click the Link icon as shown below:

b. You can hyperlink the highlighted text with a web or email address. You also have the option to change the display text in your Gmail signature if you wish:

c. Click OK and the text will now have a hyperlink:

4. If you’re happy with your signature, scroll to the bottom of the screen and click Save Changes. However, as this is a professional signature, you should also add an image like your company logo.

5. Choose an image you want to use. You can either embed an image or use an image hosting service.

a. Click on the Insert Image icon as shown below and enter the link for your image:

b. To embed the image, simply click Upload or My Drive and find the image you want to upload. Click Select:

c. To host the image, click Web Address (URL) and paste the URL of your image into the field. You should see a preview of your image appear below. If there is no preview, the URL is most likely incorrect. Click Select when done:

d. The image will now appear in your Gmail signature, which you can then resize. You have the option to choose from Small, Medium, Large, and Original Size. You can also hyperlink the image to a specific URL. This is true of any other images you might use like social media icons.

5. You now want to assign how your Gmail signature is applied to messages. This is done using the Signature defaults option under the signature editor. You can set your signature to appear on new emails, replies/forwards, or both.

6. Below the Signature defaults section, there is a checkbox with the text ‘Insert this signature before quoted text in replies and remove the “–” line that precedes it.’ If you click this box, you can append your Gmail signature to all replies whenever you remove the small ‘dashes.’ If you choose to not click this, your signature will appear at the bottom of the entire email thread.

7. Finally, if you are happy with your signature, scroll to the bottom and click Save Changes. Your new email signature will now appear every time you compose a new message in Gmail.

How to add a signature in the Gmail app

You can also create a professional email signature in the Gmail mobile app.

Open the Gmail app and click Settings in the main menu. Choose the email address you wish to send from and select Mobile Signature on Android devices and Signature settings on iOS ones. Enter your signature text and click OK when done.

You will only have text options available to you when it comes to using the Gmail app.

Managing signatures in Gmail companywide

This process works well if it’s just for an individual user or for a personal account. If you want everyone in your company to use the same default signature, you’re going to run into issues. You’ll want all staff to use the same design so that your organization has a consistent look. Asking everyone to create the same signature template is not going to be manageable.

If you have an IT department, you could get them to manually go to each person’s desk and carry out signature updates, but that will be a long and drawn-out process. You also won’t be able to stop your users from modifying and/or changing their signature in Gmail.

In other words, you’re not going to have any level of control if you let your users add a signature in Gmail to suit their purposes.

Using Exclaimer to manage signatures in Gmail

To centrally design and control professional Gmail signatures for all employees, you’ll want to choose a third-party email signature management solution to do all the hard work for you.

You can then ensure that all users get the same consistent design whenever they send an email and save hours of time that you’d spend carrying out manual signature updates.

Getting started

Exclaimer transforms everyday emails into a valuable platform to drive sales and build stronger relationships.

Start a free 14-day trial today (no credit card information required!) or book a demo with one of our product specialists to find out more.

• Start free trial

• Book demo