Back in February 2023, Gmail rolled out a major update to their Annotations code. The Single Image Preview was finally removed from the site (even though it had been deprecated sometime in 2021/22), and the Product Carousel was added. This seems to have happened about the same time that auto-generated Annotations started showing up for 100% of Gmail users, as there was a large reporting uptick of email geeks seeing these in the wild.
While many email geeks jumped into testing, right off the bat something seemed off. The Gmail team has provided some additional details which help clarify what is going on:
All auto-generated and code-based Annotations will only show up for sending domains on an internal allow list Gmail has. Contact p-Promo-outreach@google.com to be added.
Product Carousels have launched to all Gmail users except to those in the European Union, which will come later (originally reported as 2023, but seems more like 2024).
The testing accounts with the format promotabtesting will not display Product Carousels.
While we were thrilled about this re-launch, it seems too restrictive to warrant using code-based Annotations at this point, as there is no way to get a live preview and you have to be pre-approved on Gmail’s allow list.
More worrisome, as Gmail now auto-generates Annotations, is that there is no way to A/B test whether adding Annotations improves performance because, sometimes, even if you don’t include Annotations, Gmail will add them.
While Deal Annotations returned in late-2023, there is no way to track those yet.
Where does this leave PeakInbox?
PeakInbox is the only tool ever developed to provide Annotation analytics. PeakInbox is the only tool to ever have live A/B Annotation testing. PeakInbox is the only tool to ever have live previews of Annotations. We hope someday to get back to that level of product, but we must await Gmail’s program development and final rollout.
And PeakInbox might be more than just about Gmail Annotations someday. There are services from other mailbox providers, such as View Time Optimization (VTO) from Yahoo! that are catching our attention. We also have some exciting ideas around making Product Carousels analytics even better in PeakInbox.
Also, at some point – the Gmail team has told us – we might see single image previews come back: which link into the email, not directly to your website like Product Carousels do.
2/20/2023 UPDATE: Gmail has published the new version of Annotations. New blog post coming soon with all the details, and updates for PeakInbox to support the new code
If you have been wondering why you haven’t heard much about Annotations from PeakInbox for the better part of 2022, it is because they have been pretty quiet over there at Gmail.
For the time being, Gmail is not displaying Annotation images that senders set using the Annotations code.
We have been using Annotation images since November 2019 – seeing 10-20k Annotations image views per send for some clients. Today we are not seeing any Annotations being displayed at all – this is so consistent that we no longer include an Annotation image on our end.
So, we checked in with Gmail to see what was happening. Gmail confirmed that . . .
“[Images have] been disabled for the time being due to some upcoming format changes in the Promo Tab … this feature will return with a more common image format/size.”
Starting in mid-2022 we began to see what is likely a test of the new “more common” image format that Gmail mentioned. In all the emails we were able to review, there was no Annotation code. So it is safe to assume that Gmail is auto parsing the images. Here are some examples:
This one from @ on Twitter is really interesting as it slides:
One other note, in late 2021 we posted on Twitter about Product Cards (https://twitter.com/bsisolak/status/1375182056263544832). The code for that specific format was removed from the official Gmail Annotations site in late-2021. We don’t have any update on the potential future of Product Cards.
While it is clear the Gmail is still evolving their approach to Annotations, PeakInbox will continue to keep tabs on what is happening and be ready so that when they return, email marketers will have a go-to tool for Annotation analytics, A/B testing, and Inbox Previews.
For now, all other components of Annotations still work: description, discountCode, availabilityStarts/Ends, logo and subjectLine. While we wait, we encourage senders to continue to use those elements as they do provide a value add.
PeakInbox is excited to announce Inbox Previews for Gmail Annotations. We’re not talking about mock-ups, but LIVE screenshots verified on a real Android phone (iOS coming soon!). And, you can now review your Annotation in both light and dark modes before sending!
One of the largest frustrations email marketers have with Gmail Annotations is the inability to get a real preview of images. This makes it hard to share with other departments, run through your QA-process, or get final approvals. While other tools have provided mock-ups, PeakInbox has cracked that nut, and is the only tool with verified screenshots that we call Inbox Previews.
Check out this example from our Early Access client RAC, who has been using the feature for several months:
We also streamlined the QA process for you by adding external sharing for Inbox Previews that lets you send to your client or approval team directly so there is no more guessing how your Annotations will render.
Next up for PeakInbox are iOS previews. Though the Android preview works well for iOS, we have noticed minor differences between Android and the iOS Gmail app, so we want to create a validation step for both instances.
Current clients will find that Inbox Previews have been added to all accounts! Along with our code validation, you can now send email with confidence that every time your Annotation will appear as expected. New to PeakInbox? Check us out here!
As email developers, the most exciting moments for us are when new technologies emerge and invite us to imagine the future of email.
After more than two decades of experiencing the cycle of curiosity, excitement, and eventual disappointment (Hotmail Active View, anyone?), we are truly excited about Gmail Annotations. It’s different, and we hope it’s here to stay.
How does Gmail decide who sees Annotations? How can we test their impact? Do they have any impact at all?
Days of solving problems like these are the ones we love most, and Annotations promises many more of them ahead.
As developers, we regularly put our brains to work breaking, rebuilding, and taming technology. We began this journey with Annotations in November 2018 and, as time went on, we started to wonder what else we could do with it.
That’s when it struck us to do live real-time A/B/n testing using our own analytics and testing tool, PeakInbox.
PeakInbox is the result of months of solid, thoughtful development. While Gmail has been working on deploying Annotations to Gmail web, we have had time, ahead of even a soft launch, to refine the tool.
Now, we’re ready to share PeakInbox with the world. Starting today, anyone can try PeakInbox for free as a part of our Early Access program.
PeakInbox is the only tool that can perform analytics and testing of Gmail Annotations. It tells you exactly how many of your email recipients saw the Annotation image and then opened your email, giving you insights you can use to refine your Annotations and drive more engagement.
Once Gmail brings Annotations to the web interface, you can run a basic lift test (segment your @gmail.com email addresses and send to 50% with an Annotation and 50% without) to assess the impact of your Annotations.
Having used PeakInbox for a few months now, we’ve seen large variations in when Gmail shows the Annotation and when it doesn’t — even for the same sender. If Gmail doesn’t show your Annotation (and you don’t use PeakInbox), data from your basic lift test might look like this:
Audience
Sent
Unique Opens
50% @gmail.com – Control
300,000
60,000
50% @gmail.com – w/Annotation
300,000
60,000
You would conclude that Annotations isn’t helping your email marketing program — but it’s possible that, in your test cohort, the Annotation never actually showed up for anyone. In other words, you didn’t actually test anything.
This is where PeakInbox comes in. It tells you exactly how many of your email recipients saw the Annotation image (“Annotation Impressions”) and then opened your email. Your test results with PeakInbox might look something like this:
Audience
Sent
Annotation Impressions
Annotation Opens
Unique Opens
Control
300,000
n/a
n/a
60,000
w/Annotation
300,000
25,000
18,000
68,000
Will Annotations work for everyone? We doubt it. But you have to test for yourself. Join our free Early Access program today at peakinbox.com/earlyaccess to get started.
Welcome to the PeakInbox blog! While we wait for annotations to be released to the Gmail web, we wanted to start sharing some of the tips and tricks we have learned while building the only tool for Annotation analytics and real-time A/B/n testing. Want to get in on Early Access? Read our blog post for more details and sign up today – it’s totally free!
10% increase in open rates, based on one small change
When a brand logo is displayed in the inbox, recipients are “10% more likely to actually open the email, because they see which brand it is from, and they are more likely to trust it,” according to Marcel Becker, Director of Product Management at Verizon Media Group (Yahoo! Mail and AOL).
As of early 2022, Microsoft appers to have stopped the Bing Pages program. There appers to be no way at this time to add a logo to Outlook.
This is the first hard data I’ve come across directly linking brand logos to email performance. Testing is ineffective, as logos are always either on or off, not conducive to a 50/50 split test. But based on Becker’s statement, I’m even more inclined to recommend adding logos to all emails. It’s not easy (Yahoo! Mail, Outlook, and Gmail all require different setups), but it’s not impossible.
Setting up a brand logo in Outlook is simpler than setting one up in Gmail. Before you begin, know that you’re required to have “at least 100 followers on at least one of your social media platforms and have made a post on one of the accounts in the past 30 days.”
The basic process is:
Link your Twitter account to a new Bing Page
Contact Microsoft and provide the from email addresses that you want to display your logo
After following this process — which I outline in more detail below — your Twitter profile photo will become your brand logo in the Outlook.com email client (what some of us still call HoTMaiL) and on the Outlook mobile app when using an Outlook.com address.
A couple of important caveats:
Logo setup is part of Microsoft’s Bing Page beta, and this process could change at any time.
Log in with a Bing account (if you do not have one you will have to create it). This is a relatively new part of the process and is still evolving. You cannot sign in with an O365 account; it must be a personal Microsoft account of the person who will manage the Bing Page).
Build out your Bing Page by adding your brand’s other social media accounts. (See screenshot)
The Bing team will review your request within three business days and contact you with an approval at the personal Bing account used in step #3.
Link Bing Page to brand@company.com
Once you receive an email from bingpages@microsoft.com, reply with the following request:
Please link this Bing Page to our brand card and populate in Outlook.com for the following email addresses:
[LIST UP TO FIVE EMAIL ADDRESSES] brand@company.com
And that’s it! Microsoft will set you up. Again, Bing Pages are in beta, so this is subject to change at any time. This blog post will be updated as changes occur.
Welcome to the PeakInbox blog! While we wait for annotations to be released to the Gmail web, we wanted to start sharing some of the tips and tricks we have learned while building the only tool for Annotation analytics and real-time A/B/n testing. Want to get in on Early Access? Read our blog post for more details and sign up today – it’s totally free!
10% increase in open rates, based on one small change
When a brand logo is displayed in the inbox, recipients are “10% more likely to actually open the email, because they see which brand it is from, and they are more likely to trust it,” according to Marcel Becker, Director of Product Management at Verizon Media Group (Yahoo! Mail and AOL).
This is the first hard data I’ve come across directly linking brand logos to email performance. Testing is ineffective, as logos are always either on or off, not conducive to a 50/50 split test. But based on Becker’s statement, I’m inclined to recommend adding logos to all emails. It’s not easy (Yahoo! Mail, Outlook, and Gmail all require different setups), but it’s not impossible.
Without senders taking the time to set their avatars, their logos are just a generic circle with the first letter of the from name on a random background color in the Gmail mobile apps. On Gmail web it’s just a generic person logo. Apart from Google+ icons (RIP 2019), there has been no clear way to place logos across Gmail interfaces.
Luckily, we now have the chance to place your logo in various places within Gmail to improve the brand experience!
Like with many things about email, getting this right takes a multifaceted approach. To place your logo across all instances of the Gmail mobile and web interfaces requires implementing logos in two separate ways, setting up a Google Profile, and using annotations.
Let’s use brand@company.com for our examples, you will need real-time access to the inbox that receives email for brand@company.com.
Create a logo file that is 250 x 250 with a solid background (GIF or PNG). The logo will display rounded, so the corners will be cut off. (See screenshot)
In order for your logo to appear in the Primary Tab Teaser, you must use annotations. With annotations you can add a description, image, deadlines and much more. Or, you can simply add a logo by using either the script or microdata version of the annotation code block. Note that your annotation-based logo will also override the profile logo in the Top Bundle section. (Find out more from the offical Gmail annotations site. Much more to come on this from PeakInbox in the coming months.)
Confirm by sending an email from your ESP from brand@company.com to a Gmail (or Google Workspace) account, you will see your logo right away in Gmail web and mobile apps (officially, there is a 24-hour delay in the mobile app, but in our testing, it’s always instantaneous). Your logo will time travel…when you update the Google profile image, it will time travel and appear on all past emails in the Gmail app and web interfaces.
Using Google Workspace?
If the email brand@company.com is set up as its own account in your Google Workspace account, then this is super simple. Just login to that account and go to https://myaccount.google.com/personal-info.
If when you try to update the logo you see this message:
This means your Google Workspace admin has locked this functionality. If a Google Workspace admin sets the profile image for brand@company.com in the Google Admin portal – it will not show up as the logo Gmail! It will show up for on your internal Google Workspace accounts, which is very confusing. You have to have your Google Admin unlock this feature and then set the logo for brand@company.com at https://myaccount.google.com/personal-info.
Using an alternative domain with Google Workspace?
If your sending domain is a different domain — either a different root domain (ex. brand@mycompanybrand.com,) — or a different sub-domain (ex. brand@email.company.com, and you login with brand@company.com), this is totally doable.
Have your Google Workspace admin go to(https://admin.google.com/ac/domains/manage) and all the other root or sub-domain. Your Google Workspace admin will then need to click Activate Gmail next to the alternative domain:
As this email is already flowing to your ESP, select Skip MX record setup and then I USE ANOTHER MAIL SERVER. Then go to https://myaccount.google.com/personal-info and update the photo for brand@company.com, Gmail figures out the rest.
Using groups with Google Workspace?
Some senders might use a third-party ticketing system so need emails to brand@company.com forwarded outside of their Google Workspace account. This is done either by setting up a Group or by your Google Workspace admin in user-level routing.
This is the bad news section of this post… sorry. If your sending email address is used on a Group or as user-level routing, you cannot set the logo. Talk to your Google Workspace admin and see if you can get that setup as an Account with forwarding rules instead.
More than one email address?
Once you have your Google account setup (without Google Workspace), just head over to your Account (https://myaccount.google.com) and add alternative addresses (https://myaccount.google.com/alternateemail). The same logo will show for all emails listed as alternatives. You will need to verify ownership of each address by plugging in a new six-digit verification code.
If you are on Google Workspace, your Google Workspace administrator will have to add alternative addresses in the administrator console.
Animated logos? 😊
You can make your profile image an animated GIF and it will animate in the Gmail mobile app!
Drawbacks? ☹
By setting up a Google Profile, there is one drawback I’ve discovered. If you are already a Google Workspace user, this is already happening.
In the Gmail web interface, when your subscriber hovers over your logo, they will get the option to start a Google Chat or Hangout with you. If the user clicks the Chat icon an error will appear. If they start a Hangout, it will open but do nothing.
If the user clicks the Chat icon, they will get the following error message:
Given the advantages, this is a small price to pay. (Have you figured out how to get Chat and Hangout disabled? Leave a comment below and we’ll update this post.)
Wait, isn’t Gmail using BIMI?
On July 21, 2020 Gmail announced the pilot for Brand Indicators for Message Identification (BIMI) with only a “limited number of senders”. So as of right now there is no way to use BIMI to get your logo into Gmail. More importantly, there is no need as using a Google Profile + Annotations provides 100% logo coverage.
When this changes, I’ll update this post.
Lastly, in helping other set this up the logos do not always display without a clear reason why.Have you run into an issue not listed above, or is it just not working right? You can find me at brians@peakinbox.com, or on @EmailGeeks Slack channel DM me @Brian Sisolak.
