Analogy: Andy Wolber/TechRepublic

People place all sorts of images in email signatures. In organizations, the inserted image is typically a logo, an advertizement or a promotional image. Sometimes information technology'southward a photo or stylized epitome of the sender. Images in personal electronic mail signatures oftentimes signal something well-nigh the person or the person's interests.

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If you use Gmail, you may upload an paradigm or insert an image from the web or Google Drive into your signature. And if you apply Gmail equally part of Google Workspace, an ambassador can configure a signature—including an image—that appends to all outgoing email, besides. But whatsoever image an administrator includes must be available at a public web link, and so the steps below describe how to get your image onto a Google Site in lodge to obtain a public link.

But before yous add any image into your signature, permit me add a note of caution. In full general, I recommend people go along electronic mail signatures text-only. Text is much more than accessible to people with depression or no vision than an image in a signature. As well, text uses far less bandwidth than an image. (Make sure to resize and/or shrink your image to advisable dimensions and quality.) That said, there are many times when an image in a Gmail signature may be merited.

How to add an paradigm in a personal Gmail account signature

To add, edit or manage signatures in a personal Gmail account:

  1. Go to Gmail in a desktop-class spider web browser.
  2. If needed, sign in to your Gmail account.
  3. In the upper right area, select the Sprocket (settings) | See All Settings | General (from the menu options listed across the top).
  4. Scroll down to the Signature section.
  5. Either choose the "+ Create New" button or select an existing signature.
  6. In the signature expanse to the right, enter and format whatever text or links you want in your signature.
  7. Select the Insert epitome option (Figure A), then navigate to the paradigm yous want.
  8. When finished, scroll to the lesser of the page and select the Salvage Changes button.

Figure A

In Gmail Settings, select the prototype icon, then upload or insert an image from the web or Google Drive.

Google Workspace admins: How to add an image in an appended Gmail footer

A Google Workspace ambassador may manage email footers that suspend to every outbound e-mail for an arrangement. In the Admin console, the important settings are at App | Google Workspace | Gmail | Compliance, select an organization (or organizational unit) from the left (if needed), and then curlicue to Suspend Footer and cull Configure (Effigy B). To learn how outbound footers work in Google Workspace, read my article, How to ready a Gmail signature for your organization.

Figure B

A Google Workspace administrator may cull to append a footer to outbound electronic mail for an arrangement. Any image inserted into this appended footer must be available on the web with a public link. However, images stored on Google Drive, even if publicly shared, will non work.

Simply if you try to insert an paradigm stored on Google Bulldoze into an outbound footer, information technology won't work. You lot may but add an prototype with a public link into admin-managed appended footers (Figure B). A publicly shared epitome stored on Google Bulldoze won't work.

I propose you create and maintain a Google Site where y'all add images, since any image stored on a Google Site page may exist used in outbound footers—as long as the Site is published and public. Those last 2 criteria are important: The image insertion into the footer won't work on sites that aren't public or aren't published nonetheless.

To create a new Google Site dedicated to your outbound images, you might:

  1. Type site.new in a desktop-form browser.
  2. Edit the title for your site (e.g., Promotional Footer Images).
  3. Then select Insert | Images to either Upload or Select images to your site (Effigy C). Alternatively, you might select Insert | Drive and and so choose images stored on Google Drive to add to your Site.

    4. Figure C

    As you edit a Google Site, with the Insert tab active, select Images. Yous may then choose either to Upload or Select an paradigm.
  4. Select Publish, then edit the web address for your site (due east.g., Footers).
  5. Under Who Tin can View My Site, select Manage. Then, under Links, select Change.
  6. Next to the Published site selection, select the drop-down and choose Public (Figure D), so select Done.

    7. Effigy D

    Change your Site settings to make your published site Public.
  7. Select Done again. The box should now display Anyone under Who Can View My Site. Select Publish.
  8. Next, select the drop-down to the right of Publish, and so choose View Published Site (Figure E). This should open the site in a new browser tab. Switch to that tab.

    9. Effigy Eastward

    In one case public and published, select the drib-downward options next to the Publish carte and cull View published site.
  9. On your site, right-click on the image you want to insert into your outbound footer, then select Re-create Epitome Address (Figure F).

Effigy F

While viewing the published site, right-click (or Ctrl-click) on an paradigm, then select Copy Epitome Accost from the displayed card.

You lot at present have the public link you need to paste into the prompt after yous select the paradigm icon in the Suspend Footer department of the Admin console. Equally an editor of the site, you lot can always render to the site and re-create the link to the published page. Share the link with others, and they'll exist able to admission the page.

Optionally, yous can have steps to make the footer folio a flake less easy to find. To practice this, make certain you lot have at least 2 pages on your Google Site, and that your images are not on the Habitation page of the site. And so, while editing your Site, select Pages, then click on the three vertical dots to the right of your Footer page name. Choose Hibernate from navigation (Figure G), which will remove the page from Google Site navigation menus. Since the page is omitted from the menu construction, it won't be bachelor for a casual site visitor to access.

Figure G

You might make your footer image page more difficult to find with the Hide From Navigation option.

How practice you lot use images in Gmail signatures?

Practise you include standard data, such every bit contact or company information, in your signatures? Or practise you personalize your signature with favorite images, phrases or quotes? Or exercise you "go minimalist" and omit the use of signatures entirely? Let me know how you use—or don't use—images in Gmail signatures, either with a comment below or on Twitter (@awolber).