BIMI is an innovative email authentication standard that allows your business to showcase its brand logo directly in recipients’ inboxes. This visual branding not only enhances visibility and deliverability but also builds trust.
Our platform simplifies the implementation of the standard so your company can secure emails, enhance brand reputation, and drive customer engagement.
Ready to elevate your organization’s email strategy?
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With today’s inboxes being so crowded, standing out isn’t optional – it’s essential. Countless messages are competing for attention, and Brand Indicators for Message Identification (BIMI) offers a new way to enhance your business’s email marketing strategy. By displaying a brand logo directly in recipients’ inboxes, the standard makes your company’s emails instantly recognizable, creating trust and deeper connections with its audience.
The standard isn’t just about how emails are viewed – it serves as a powerful tool to show your organization’s commitment to email security and authenticity. It requires authentication protocols like Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting, and Conformance (DMARC), Sender Policy Framework (SPF), and DomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM). These standards ensure that emails are verified and trustworthy. This not only reduces the risk of phishing and spoofing but also tells recipients that your business’s communications are legitimate.
By adopting the standard, your company is improving email security, deliverability, and visibility while elevating its brand’s reputation. By enhancing deliverability, the protocol can significantly boost email open rates and brand recall, making it a valuable asset in building stronger customer relationships and driving engagement. To sum it up, it transforms email marketing from a potential vulnerability into a strategic advantage, blending security with brand-building.
The standard uses existing email authentication protocols like DMARC, SPF, and DKIM to verify the legitimacy of your organization’s emails. Once your business’s emails successfully pass these authentication checks, email providers that support the protocol will display its registered logo, which is stored as an SVG file, next to messages in inboxes.
This visual cue immediately confirms to recipients that the email is genuinely from your organization and hasn’t been tampered with. This ensures a secure and trustworthy email experience for customers.
At Sendmarc, we simplify the process of DMARC compliance, VMC purchasing, and DNS configuration.
Setting up a record has several key steps. Below, we’ve provided a comprehensive guide to the process.
Ensure proper DMARC configuration before implementation. The DMARC policy must be set to either p=quarantine or p=reject. This enforces email authentication and signals to providers that your company’s domain is secure.
Create a logo that meets the standard’s specifications. The logo should be simple, recognizable, and suitable for scaling. This helps ensure compatibility across devices and email clients.
Before creating your organization’s record, logo authenticity and ownership validation are needed. Get a VMC or a Certificate for Mark Authentication (CMC) from a Mark Verifying Authority (MVA) or Certificate Authority (CA).
Add a TXT record in your company’s DNS settings. This record includes the URL of your organization’s SVG logo and, optionally, the URL of its VMC or CMC file. Accurate syntax and accessible URLs are needed for proper functionality.
Use validation tools to confirm that your business’s record is correctly configured and that the logo displays as intended in supporting email clients. Testing helps identify issues before full deployment.
Regularly monitor to ensure optimal performance. Adjustments might be needed if deliverability rates change or if updates are made to your company’s logo or DMARC policy. Continuous monitoring maintains effectiveness and security.
Host | Record type | Value |
---|---|---|
default._bimi.yourdomain.com | TXT | v=BIMI1; l=logo_url; a=certification_authority; |
v:
Specifies the versionl:
Points to the URL of the SVG logoa:
Shows the URL to the VMC or CMC (optional – but highly recommended)VMC
Points of comparison
CMC
Lengthy timeframe & expensive
Shorter timeframe & simpler to get since a trademarked logo isn’t required
Trademarked
Minimum one year of logo usage
You get the verified checkmark & logo display in Gmail
No verified checkmark – only the logo is displayed
VMC
Points of comparison
CMC
Lengthy timeframe & expensive
Shorter timeframe & simpler to get since a trademarked logo isn’t required
Trademarked
Minimum one year of logo usage
You get the verified checkmark & logo display in Gmail
No verified checkmark – only the logo is displayed
The standard integrates seamlessly with DMARC, SPF, and DKIM to enhance email security and branding. DMARC defines how receiving servers should handle emails that don’t pass SPF and DKIM checks. SPF validates that the sending server is authorized to send messages on behalf of the domain, while DKIM adds a cryptographic signature to verify that email content hasn’t been modified during transit.
When these technologies work together, they provide a powerful defense against email-based threats such as phishing and spoofing. This integration also unlocks the standard’s full potential by enabling the display of a verified brand logo in recipients’ inboxes, enhancing trust and brand visibility. Implementing these protocols not only protects against malicious attacks but also improves email deliverability by signaling to providers that emails are legitimate and secure.
Find out how Sendmarc streamlines the configuration of these email authentication protocols.
Sendmarc is here to help you reap the benefits of BIMI without the hassle of worrying about its prerequisites.
Your domain/s must have a p=reject or p=quarantine policy to implement BIMI. Sendmarc’s DMARC services take a company’s domain/s to p=reject in a maximum of 90 days*. We offer a comprehensive platform and service to manage a domain’s DMARC policy.
*For customers on Sendmarc’s Premium Plan. Subject to the conditions of our Fair Usage Policy.
To enable BIMI, a company requires a VMC or CMC. To purchase a VMC, an organization’s logo must be trademarked in an approved region. Find a list of approved regions here. If your logo isn’t trademarked in an approved region, we can assist in registering it in the United States of America (U.S.) or the European Union (EU). A trademarked logo isn’t required for a CMC. Read on for more information.
Once your logo is trademarked, you can purchase a VMC for it. This VMC is a digital certificate that verifies the ownership of an organization’s logo. As of 2024, Google also supports CMCs.
A CMC allows businesses to use BIMI and display their logo next to emails in inboxes, even without a registered trademark – provided that the logo has been used for at least a year. While this is a more cost-effective alternative to a VMC, it won’t include the display of the verified checkmark that a VMC does.
Get in touch with Sendmarc today!
We’ll not only assist in the configuration and management of DMARC, SPF, DKIM, and BIMI but also help your organization get the required certification.
We work with MVAs and CAs to ensure the VMC or CMC required for implementation is issued. We then install, activate, and manage your business’s email authentication protocols.
BIMI uses a TXT DNS record that contains the URL pointing to a brand’s logo file and information about any Verified Mark Certificate (VMC) or Certificate for Mark Authentication (CMC) it might have.
A BIMI TXT record is a DNS entry that specifies the location of a brand’s logo file (in SVG format) and optional Verified Mark Certificate (VMC) or Certificate for Mark Authentication (CMC) details. It works alongside SPF, DKIM, and DMARC protocols to authenticate emails.
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