What is BIMI?
BIMI, or Brand Indicators for Message Identification, is an email standard that enables your brand logo to be displayed in recipients’ mailboxes. As a result, this enhances recognition of your emails, builds trust, and helps mitigate the risk of phishing attacks.
What is the purpose of BIMI?
Without BIMI, ESPs show a generic placeholder logo with just your brand’s initials. Consequently, this can make it harder for recipients to recognize your brand. With BIMI, your actual brand logo appears next to your email, making your brand more noticeable.
Logo requirements:
- The logo should be in SVG Tiny 1.2 format, square, and centered.
- It must be a trademarked logo.
- The logo should have a solid background color and not exceed 32KB in file size.
- It should be hosted online over HTTPS that will be queried by the email receivers.
- The logo must be certified with a VMC (Verified Mark Certificate).
How Does BIMI Work?
BIMI works with the outbound email authentication protocols like DMARC, SPF, and DKIM. When an email is received by a mailbox provider, the provider first authenticates the message. If the email passes the authentication checks (DMARC, SPF, DKIM), the provider then looks up the DNS for a BIMI record. If a BIMI record is found, the provider will display the brand’s logo alongside the email in the inbox.
Note: Each mailbox provider has its own rules for when a domain’s BIMI logo will be shown.
What is required for BIMI?
- Set the DMARC policy of the domain to either “quarantine” with a pct of 100 or “reject.”
- Ensure the logo is trademarked.
- The logo is certified with a VMC (Verified Mark Certificate).
What is VMC or Verified Mark Certificate?
A Verified Mark Certificate (VMC) is a digital certificate that confirms the authenticity of a brand’s logo for BIMI use. As a result, it guarantees that the logo shown in emails is both genuine and approved by the brand owners.
How Does BIMI Boost Brand Value?
BIMI enhances your brand identity by displaying your logo in recipients’ inboxes. This fosters trust, improves recognition, and creates positive associations with your brand. Additionally, it helps set your emails apart from spoofing attempts, therefore safeguarding your brand’s reputation.
Can BIMI Enhance Email Deliverability?
This is one of the FAQs about BIMI record. BIMI doesn’t directly affect deliverability, but it can indirectly boost it by building trust and decreasing spam complaints. This increased trust may lead email clients to view your emails more positively, improving the likelihood that they will reach recipients’ inboxes.
Is it Mandatory to Implement BIMI?
No, BIMI is not mandatory at present. Nonetheless, as email security and brand protection become more vital, businesses increasingly need to adopt BIMI. Moreover, implementing BIMI can further enhance your brand’s visibility and trustworthiness.
Which Mailbox Providers and Email Clients Support BIMI?
- Yahoo
- Apple Mail
- Cloudmark by Proofpoint
- Gmail
- La Poste
- Fastmail
- Zone Webmail
Why is My BIMI Logo Not Appearing in Emails?
If your BIMI logo isn’t showing up in emails, several factors might be at play:
1. Authentication Issues: Ensure you have correctly authenticated your domain with SPF, DKIM, and DMARC records. Since BIMI requires these authentication protocols to display logos, it’s crucial to verify their proper setup.
2. DMARC Policy: Ensure that you have set the DMARC policy to enforcement mode (p=quarantine or p=reject). BIMI logos generally appear only for domains with enforced DMARC policies. Therefore, set your DMARC policy to enforcement mode. Then, configure your BIMI record.
3. Configuration Errors: Check that you have correctly configured your BIMI record in DNS. Confirm that the URL for your SVG logo and VMC file (.pem) is accurate and accessible. For Gmail and other providers that require a VMC, make sure your VMC is valid. For Yahoo! and similar providers that don’t require a VMC, ensure your domain has a good reputation. You may also reach out to their support teams for assistance; additionally, they can provide further guidance.
4. Logo Specifications: Verify that your logo meets BIMI’s requirements regarding size, format (SVG), and resolution.
5. Email Client Support: Not all email clients support BIMI yet. Check whether the email clients your recipients use are compatible with BIMI.
Do subdomains inherit the BIMI record from the organization domain?
