Brands have long tried to figure out a way to display a consistent visual representation of their assets inside email clients. Email is vital to ecommerce in every capacity – from promoting new products and offers to sending tracking updates and invoices. Yet, the growing threat from email fraud and impersonation has built a level of distrust. This can undermine the effectiveness of even the best email marketing campaign. You must leverage the power of email logos to improve customer interaction.
That’s why Brand Indicators for Message Identification (BIMI) is the new standard for positively impacting an organization’s digital presence and performance.
Key Takeaways
- Email logos, via BIMI, boost consumer interaction and trust in marketing communications.
- Displaying validated logos in emails increases open rates by 21% and purchase likelihood by 34%.
- BIMI enhances email authentication and helps prevent domain impersonation by providing a reward for DMARC compliance.
- Organizations of any size can benefit from BIMI, improving brand experience and competition regardless of their market share.
- BIMI contributes to a robust email ecosystem, helping marketers refine strategies and improve inbox presence.
Survey says: Email logos have power
Our report found that showing a logo positively affected consumer interaction. When brands display validated registered logos in their email communications, it boosts open rates and interaction levels. We also found that showing a logo positively affected buying behavior, brand recall, and email brand confidence. This was part of a survey looking at consumer interaction when brands can display their logos in an email inbox. It is consistent with the BIMI standards for displaying validated registered email logos.
Among consumers, the inclusion of a registered logo increased open rates by 21%, irrespective of brand strength or market share. Recipients were also more responsive to messages that displayed a logo alongside emails. Additionally, the average purchase likelihood increased by 34%. Prospects said they were more likely to make purchases when brand logos were displayed in the inbox. Consumers also noted that the use of BIMI increased their confidence in the legitimacy of an email by 90%.
When looking at how Gen Z respondents decided to spend their money, not deploying BIMI negatively impacted purchasing decisions by 28%.
The BIMI Standard
BIMI is a new email standard that enables the use of registered logos on DMARC authenticated emails. DMARC is a security protocol that protects against exact domain impersonation.
In July, Google announced that Gmail would embrace BIMI, enabling registered email logos to be displayed in the avatar slot of DMARC authenticated emails, using VMCs. The move has been welcomed by the email community. This is given that an estimated 80% of businesses use email as their primary communication tool.
Three major goals of BIMI are to help businesses provide a more immersive customer experience, increase brand impressions, and ramp up global adoption of DMARC, the security protocol that enables it. Environments that support BIMI automatically display an organization’s registered logo in a premium and defined location in the receiver’s inbox. This is where an avatar would otherwise appear.
Large or Small
Another interesting note is that organizations of all sizes can benefit from BIMI. Bigger brands can use the standards to ensure strong email authentication and create a deep brand experience with their customers. Smaller businesses can implement BIMI standards to add strong email authentication. This will increase their interaction, and more effectively compete with bigger brands.
But there’s one point to emphasize with BIMI: it is not a security standard. It is more of a reward for correctly implementing the security protocol DMARC. So, while the presence of a logo in an email indicates DMARC compliance, it does not offer domain protection. That is done by the DMARC protocol it sits on.
BIMI is important for marketers and businesses for a number of reasons. Likely, the widespread adoption of standards like DMARC and the benefits that come with them (such as BIMI) will make a real difference in keeping email ecosystems robust for years to come. It will also help strengthen other common email marketing strategies. These include tweaking subject lines, curating email content, and cleaning email lists.
We can all relate to wanting to get rid of spam in our inboxes. Even the most advanced spam filters can still let in those annoying emails. With BIMI, you can have your email logo end up in a target customer’s inbox. That means a winning outcome for your organization, mailbox providers looking to stop spam, and your customers.
