Improve open rates, brand awareness and purchase behavior by displaying your logo in emails with BIMI/VMC

Every day an average of 320 billion emails are sent worldwide, making email one of the most important communication channels available to brands. Even though new means of communication are constantly being developed, email use is still predicted to grow by +17.5% by 2025.

The way companies use email as a channel is also evolving. One major step in the direction of keeping email relevant as a means of communication is  BIMI and VMC. BIMI, which stands for Brand Indicators for Message Identification, is a new standard that allows companies to display their logo alongside the email they send out to consumers – without the recipient having to open the email. This also requires a VMC, Verified Mark Certificate, which is a certificate that validates that existing security protocols are in place on the domain in question and that the company has the logo registered as a legal trademark.

Together, BIMI and VMC allow businesses to stand out in the recipient’s flooded inbox and capture consumers’ attention, while at the same time improving their email security. Something most businesses are already looking to do.

Recently, Red Sift and Entrust released a study evaluating the impact of the new BIMI standard on open rates, brand awareness, and purchase behavior. The results were overwhelmingly positive, among other things, open rates increased by a staggering 39% (!)… A dream come true for most marketing departments.

In addition to the (greatly) improved open rate mentioned above, some of the main conclusions were:

1. Increased interaction from consumers. BIMI and VMC are proven to increase consumer interaction. The study presents several results where visible logos generate higher open rates for both transactional emails and promotional emails. For example, the use of logos in promotional emails increased open rates for a well-known company by 39% in the UK and 21% in the US.
2. Previous brand recognition by the consumer is not a prerequisite for the effect obtained. The study shows that engagement with emails increase when the logo appears in the inbox – regardless of how well-known and established the brand behind the email is, and even though market-leading brands are clearly preferred when the logo is not present. The survey showed examples where a completely unknown brand in the UK increased its open rate by 62%, by having the logo visible in their customers inbox.
3. BIMI and VMC boost interest in DMARC. The marketing benefits of the new standard will lead to more companies implementing DMARC. This is best practice in email security, benefiting both companies and their customers.
4. Logo design has a big impact. The appearance of the logo, i.e. color and style, influences how consumers remember the brand.
5. Visible email security. BIMI/VMC, together with DMARC, allows consumers to visually ensure that the email comes from a legitimate source.
6. Increased ROI. BIMI increases market value because every percent of opens and purchases generated translates into revenue. The study reports on an experiment that examined whether including the logo in the email contributed to more business for selected US grocery chains. The results of the experiment again showed a positive impact of BIMI/VMC. The sales share of the market leader (with half the market share in the US) decreased by 24% when the logo was not displayed in the e-mail. In contrast, its competitor, which did have the logotype in the email, saw a 34% increase in sales share. In the UK, similar results emerged. Without the benefits of a visible logotype, a leading brand lost 39% sales share while its competitor, with the visible logotype, increased its sales share by 32%.
7. Most impact on younger generations. According to the survey, logo visibility in email has the greatest impact on Millennials (b. 1981-1996) and Generation Z (b. 1997-2015), which seems promising for initiatives like BIMI and VMC to become the de facto standard in in the future.

If you want to read the study in full, you can find it here.

To find out more about how you can start enjoying the benefits of BIMI, please feel free to contact us at hello@dotkeeper.com and we will help you!