Do you find yourself constantly typing your name and contact information at the bottom of your emails? Do you sign your emails with the same phrase or saying? If so, would it be nice to have Mail type that part of the email for you instead of having to type it with every email? Well, it can by using the Signature feature. A signature is pretyped information that you can have appear at the bottom of every email. You can also have more than one signature for different types of emails, and they are very easy to set up!
One note
before I proceed: These directions are specifically designed around Mail in 10.5 Leopard. The process in older versions of Mail and OSX will be similar, but might vary slightly.
To create a signature you need to open the preferences for Mail. Do this by going to the “Mail” menu and choosing “Preferences.” Once here click the “Signature” icon. (figure 1)
This is where you set up the signature or signatures you want to use. (figure 2)
To start a signature click the “+” in the middle column. This will start a signature and the name of the signature will be highlighted so you can title it. Once titiled, click in the far right window and type your signature here. This can be whatever you want. (figure 3)
On the left you might have noticed a list showing the choices of the signatures and your email account or accounts. If you only have one email account, you will only see the one listed. To assign the signature you just created to your email account click “All Signatures.” You will then see a list of all of the signatures you created. Drag and drop the signature to the assigned email account name. A plus will appear when you can unclick. That signature is now assigned to that account and ready for testing by creating a new email.
Click the red circle in the top left of the window to close the preferences. If you are prompted to save changes say “Yes.” Start a new email.
On the left, make sure the “From” account is set to your email account with the signature assigned to it. (figure 4) On the right you will see the word “Signature” and a pull down menu. Click the menu and choose your signature. It will automatically appear in the email. (figure 5)
You can then click in the email screen and type your email to be sent with the signature.
You can now save yourself valuable time by not having to retype that contact information over and over again in emails.