The 5 IT factors to evaluate when choosing an email signature solution

Managing email signatures might not feel like a top IT priority, but ignoring the risks could leave your entire organization vulnerable.  

While email signatures often seem like a design or branding task, they actually carry a technical footprint that affects your infrastructure, compliance, and user experience. Poor email signature management can result in major issues, such as phishing attacks, impersonation, inconsistent branding, and failed audits. 

In a recent IT-focused webinar, Nick Cavalancia, 4-time Microsoft MVP and CEO of Conversational Geek, and Karl Bagci, Head of Information Security at Exclaimer, broke down the five essential IT considerations when assessing an email signature solution. If you're tasked with evaluating a platform, here’s what you need to know. 

Why IT can’t afford to ignore email signatures 

Email signatures should be seen as more than just contact details. Every one represents a potential risk, source of miscommunication, or inconsistency. Without centralized control, organizations often rely on manual setups, poorly enforced templates, or third party tools that bypass internal security measures.  

During the webinar, Nick highlighted cases where IT teams spent up to 60 hours a week managing signature updates manually. This wastes time, creates productivity challenges, introduces security vulnerabilities, and poses compliance risks. 

This is where email signature management solutions make all the difference. Automating email signature updates can dramatically improve consistency and security across all employee emails. This then frees up IT teams to focus on more critical tasks. 

So, what should IT consider when choosing an email signature solution? 

The main considerations when choosing an email signature solution 

1. Security architecture matters more than you think 

Some email signature solutions route emails through external servers to add signatures. This process redirects internal and outbound emails outside your organization’s secure environment. If the solution doesn’t include enterprise-level security in place, this creates significant risks. 

A robust email signature solution should: 

• Support both server-side and client-side deployment based on the use case  

• Ensure encryption during signature application, especially when signatures are added during email transport 

Karl highlighted the importance of zero-trust design principles, a security framework based on the idea of "never trust, always verify." Unlike traditional models that assume everything within a network is safe, zero trust requires strict identity verification for every person or device accessing resources. By limiting system access to only what is necessary, zero trust reduces exposure, lowers the risk of breaches, and provides stronger control over sensitive data.  

2. Data privacy and compliance aren’t optional 

Email signatures often contain personally identifiable information (PII), such as names, email addresses, phone numbers, and job titles. This data is governed by strict privacy regulations like GDPR and CCPA, and mishandling it can result in compliance issues, legal penalties, and a loss of user trust. Organizations must handle PII in signatures responsibly, storing, sharing, and using it in full compliance with privacy laws to safeguard sensitive information. 

Look for email signature solutions that: 

• Provide regional data residency options, allowing organizations to store their data in specific regions such as the EU, UK, or US.  

• Offer top security through ISO 27001 and SOC 2 certifications, highlighting data protection, risk management, and operational excellence.  

• Include security features like audit logs and data sovereignty controls to promote transparency, monitor usage, and comply with jurisdictional rules and policies. 

If an email signature platform is hosted in a country that doesn’t meet your data privacy requirements, it could put you at risk. You might even be in violation without realizing it. 

3. Role-based access empowers others, safely 

Email signatures are a critical, cross-functional tool that serve multiple organizational needs. Marketing teams use them to maintain consistent branding and promote campaigns. HR relies on them for internal messaging and sharing employee resources. Legal uses them to include email disclaimers for regulatory compliance. 

However, IT often takes on the responsibility of managing email signature updates. And balancing this task alongside other critical priorities can lead to delays. 

A modern email signature solution should allow you to: 

• Enable non-technical users to design and manage email signatures with an easy-to-use interface, requiring no IT expertise.  

• Use role-based access control (RBAC) to assign roles like administrators, designers, or auditors with specific access levels.  

• Streamline email signature templates by pulling attributes from directories like Azure AD or Google Directory so contact details are up-to-date. 

Nick pointed out how employee self-service reduces IT involvement, while maintaining control. And with the right email signature solution, the marketing team can launch a new campaign without opening a support ticket. 

4. Downtime shouldn't break your brand 

Your email signatures must remain consistent and functional, even during platform downtime, to uphold your brand identity and professionalism. Maintaining business continuity avoids inconsistent communication and safeguards trust with clients and partners.  

Before selecting an email signature management provider, it’s important to ask the right questions: 

• What’s the uptime guarantee? Look for a vendor with at least 99.99% uptime to minimize downtime and ensure consistent service.  

• What happens if the service goes down? Ask about their contingency plans. A good provider ensures emails are still delivered during outages.  

• Is the platform hosted in geo-redundant regions? Geo-redundancy means the provider’s infrastructure is in multiple locations. This means service continuity if one datacenter fails. 

Solutions like Exclaimer are built for reliability, making sure signature application is never a single point of failure. It might seem like a small detail until it matters most. 

5. Consistency across devices, clients, and users 

Every employee should have a consistent email signature, whether using Outlook, Gmail, or a mobile app. Brand consistency is a powerful trust signal, especially in 1:1 email communication. Without a centralized solution, inconsistent email signatures can create confusion and weaken your brand.  

Choose a solution that supports: 

• Multiple deployment options: Choose client-side deployment for visibility and real-time updates or server-side deployment for security, control, and centralized management.  

• Granular targeting: Target specific groups by department, role, location, or recipient type to ensure the right message reaches the right audience.  

• Dynamic elements: Add features like promotional banners, CTAs, or disclaimers that update automatically based on pre-set conditions or real-time inputs. This keeps your content relevant and aligned with business needs. 

What this means for IT teams 

Whether you're a systems administrator, IT manager, or security lead, your role in selecting an email signature solution is more important than ever. It doesn't mean you're helping the marketing team make signatures “look nice”. You're guaranteeing secure delivery, regulatory alignment, and operational efficiency. 

As Karl put it, “Email signatures are a surprising blind spot in IT. But once you dig into the security and compliance aspects, it’s clear they deserve more scrutiny than they usually get.” 

The good news? With the right email signature solution, you can give non-technical teams the flexibility they need without compromising on security or scalability. And all while reducing IT workload. 

What to look for in a trusted email signature solution 

When assessing solutions, use a checklist based on these five areas. You can also refer to our Email Signature Management Solution Buyer’s Guide for detailed worksheets and evaluation tools. 

Here’s a summary of what your shortlist should include: 

Ready to take control of your email signatures? 

If your current approach relies on manual updates, user compliance, or legacy tools, it’s time to rethink how you manage signatures. 

Exclaimer's email signature manager gives IT teams a secure, centralized platform that: 

• Works natively with Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace 

• Offers full role-based access and directory syncing 

• Maintains brand consistency across every message 

• Supports compliance through certifications and secure architecture 

Get a free trial to see how Exclaimer simplifies email signature management—without putting IT in charge of every update.