Using the Outlook add-in only

Footer365 can add signatures in two ways. You choose between them in step 2 of the setup wizard, Choose how Footer365 adds signatures, and a Super Admin can change the choice later from Getting started in the portal. This guide compares the two, and explains what using the Outlook add-in only means day to day.

Footer365 makes the Coverage page available to organisations gradually, so it may not be in your portal yet. See Early access pages and features.

The two ways

The approval in step 1 is the same either way. Microsoft's permissions screen still lists the Exchange permission Exchange.ManageAsApp, because one approval covers every permission the Footer365 app has. With the Outlook add-in only it is never used: without the Exchange Administrator role it can change nothing in Exchange. Permissions Footer365 asks for, and why

How a message is signed with the add-in only

The add-in puts the signature in as soon as someone starts writing, so they see it, and it is in their Sent Items too. Exchange Online then sends the message as normal. Footer365 has no connector or rule in your Exchange, so it never sees the message, or any mail written anywhere else. For the path a message takes with mail flow, see How mail flows through Footer365.

Choosing it

1. In the setup wizard, grant directory access in step 1. Connecting Microsoft 365
2. In step 2, Choose how Footer365 adds signatures, select Outlook add-in only, then Continue.
3. Steps 3 and 4 then show Not needed for add-in only, and step 5, Deploy the Outlook add-in, opens. Deploy the add-in to All users unless some people should send without a Footer365 signature. Deploying the Outlook add-in

The wizard shows You're all set once you confirm the add-in is deployed. It can take a few hours for the add-in to reach everyone's Outlook, and until it does, their mail is sent without a signature.

The choice is made by a Super Admin of your Footer365 portal or a Global Administrator of your Microsoft 365 organisation. Anyone else is refused. Step 2 stays locked until directory access is granted and, if your organisation was added by a reseller or by Footer365, until a Global Administrator has accepted the agreements in step 3. Once the choice is made the wizard does not ask again: a Super Admin changes it from Getting started, as described below.

If a reseller added your organisation, it may have suggested the Outlook add-in only. Step 2 then opens with that option selected and names the reseller, but the choice is yours.

What the add-in only does not sign

Anything not written in Outlook with the add-in goes without a Footer365 signature:

• Mail sent from phones. The add-in is not currently offered on Outlook for iOS and Android, and phones' own mail apps, such as Mail on an iPhone, cannot run it. People can add their signature to their phone themselves: their own My signature page offers a copy for a phone. Add your signature to other mail apps
• Mail from other programs and devices that send through your mailboxes, such as a scanner, a printer or a business application.
• Outlook without the add-in: anyone the add-in is not deployed to, and versions of Outlook too old to run it, such as Outlook 2016 and Outlook 2019 bought outright. Outlook client support and the add-in
• Apple Mail on a Mac, which cannot run Outlook add-ins. Like Outlook 2016 or 2019, it signs mail only if people add the signature to it themselves, using Copy for a computer on their own My signature page. Add your signature to other mail apps

These features need mail flow, so with the Outlook add-in only they do nothing. Their pages in the portal say so, and a setting chosen there takes effect if mail flow is added:

• Plain-text email conversion, which gives a plain-text message from iPhone Mail the full signature.
• Mail app sign-offs, which takes out lines such as "Sent from my iPhone".
• Bcc signature matching.
• Long conversations, which takes your organisation's own earlier campaign banners, and if you choose its earlier signatures, out of the quoted part of a reply.
• Your own reply and forward words, on the Replies and forwards card in Account > Settings. The add-in does not need them: Outlook tells it whether a message is a reply or a forward. Add your own reply and forward words
• The sending alarm, which tells your contacts when one person sends an unusual amount of mail in a short time. The relay counts the mail, and with the add-in only none passes through it. Its card in Account > Settings keeps your settings for when mail flow is added. The sending alarm

A few other things work differently:

• Send As and Send on Behalf. Footer365 reads who may send for whom from Exchange only with mail flow. With the add-in only, the add-in goes on using any rights read while you had mail flow. With none read, a message from a shared mailbox gets your Send As choice, and someone writing from another person's own mailbox gets their own signature. Delegates, Send As and Send on Behalf
• New people. Mail flow looks up a sender it has not seen before as the message passes through. The add-in does not, so a new person gets a signature once the directory sync has brought them in. How directory sync works
• Message keywords. The add-in takes a keyword such as #nosig out of the subject as the message is sent. Where Outlook does not let it change the subject in time, or Footer365 does not answer in time, the keyword is delivered as typed. Message keywords
• SPF. No mail passes through Footer365's servers, so your SPF record needs no change, and the portal does not ask for one.
• People's own Outlook signatures stay on unless you turn them off yourself, as described below.

When the add-in sends a message without a signature

With mail flow, the add-in leaves the first three of these, and the last, to Footer365's mail relay, which signs them as they leave. With the add-in only nothing does, so each is sent without a signature. The person writing is told in Outlook, except when they deleted the signature themselves, and the Coverage page gives the reason:

• Too large for the add-in. The signature is over the 30,000 characters Outlook lets an add-in insert, even after the add-in has left out the campaign banner and linked the images rather than including them. Two or three stacked campaign banners are never cut down to fewer, so a stack that does not fit leaves the message unsigned too. Outlook says "Footer365: your signature is too large for Outlook to add, so this message will be sent without one. Ask your administrator to make it smaller." Logos, images and photos
• Needs mail flow to choose. A signature rule or disclaimer that could apply names a single recipient address, or a recipient list that holds any whole address, under Only when recipients include or Except when recipients include, or a rule has a Subject or Message text condition. The add-in sends Footer365 only the recipients' domains, and does not use the subject or the text of the message to choose a signature, so it cannot choose. Outlook says "Footer365: your signature depends on details the add-in does not read, so this message will be sent without one." Rules for particular recipients
• Deleted before sending. The person deleted the add-in's signature before sending, and nothing adds it back.
• Signatures paused. Signatures are paused for an outstanding payment. Outlook says "Footer365: signatures are paused for your organisation, so none is added to this message." Signatures are paused
• Waiting for approval. The person is a new starter waiting for approval before they are signed. Outlook says "Footer365: your signature is waiting for your administrator to approve you as a new starter, so none is added to this message." With mail flow too, nothing signs their mail until they are approved. How directory sync works
• Outside the sync scope. Your sync scope leaves the person out. For the 30 days Footer365 still holds them after they leave it, Outlook says "Footer365: your organisation does not add a signature for your account, so none is added to this message." With mail flow too, their mail is never signed. How directory sync works
• Automatic signature off. Add the signature automatically is off for the person on Add-in settings, and they did not choose a signature in the pane. Outlook says "Footer365: your organisation adds no signature while you write. Choose one in Footer365 Signatures, or this message is sent without one." The page will not save settings that leave anyone with neither automatic signature nor the signature picker. Choose how the Outlook add-in behaves for your people

Apart from a stack of banners too large to fit, a campaign never leaves a message unsigned. One that names a single address, or a recipient list that holds addresses, in its own recipient boxes is left off, and the signature goes without banners. One placed Above the message that this version of Outlook cannot add is left out, and the signature goes without it. One that offers recipients a way to stop banners (its Opt-out link is on) goes out on no message, because who has opted out is checked as each message is sent, and the signature goes without that banner. See Letting recipients stop banners.

A signature that shows the time sent or the recipient's name or domain never leaves a message unsigned either. Those fields are worked out by the mail relay as the message is sent, and the add-in cannot read them while the message is being written, so with the add-in only the lines that use them are left out of the signature, and Outlook says "Footer365: this signature shows details of the message that the add-in cannot read, so those lines are left out of it." A disclaimer that shows the time sent is left out for the same reason. Merge fields and empty fields

Turning people's own Outlook signatures off yourself

With mail flow, Footer365 can turn off the signature feature built into Outlook for you. With the Outlook add-in only it does not. Step 6 of the setup wizard, Everyone's own Outlook signatures, is then marked Optional: leave people their own signatures, and both theirs and the Footer365 signature are added, or turn them off yourself in Exchange PowerShell. The steps are under Turn them off with Exchange PowerShell in that step, and here.

1. Connect to Exchange Online PowerShell as an Exchange Administrator or a Global Administrator:

   Connect-ExchangeOnline
   

2. Turn off roaming signatures, which keep each person's Outlook signatures in Microsoft 365:

   Set-OrganizationConfig -PostponeRoamingSignaturesUntilLater $true
   

3. Turn off signatures in Outlook on the web and the new Outlook:

   Set-OwaMailboxPolicy -Identity OwaMailboxPolicy-Default -SignaturesEnabled $false
   

   If some mailboxes use another Outlook on the web mailbox policy, run this for that policy as well.

To check afterwards, run these. The first should show True and the second False:

Get-OrganizationConfig | Format-List PostponeRoamingSignaturesUntilLater
Get-OwaMailboxPolicy -Identity OwaMailboxPolicy-Default | Format-List SignaturesEnabled

To give people their own signatures back, run the two commands again with $false and $true the other way round. Classic Outlook for Windows keeps its own signatures either way: that is a device policy your organisation sets.

On Getting started, step 6 shows Optional with a Show the PowerShell steps button, and the dashboard's Their own Outlook signatures line shows Optional with a Steps link. Both open the setup wizard at step 6. Keeping or turning off people's own Outlook signatures

Two Exchange settings the add-in needs

The add-in's events only fire if your organisation allows event-based add-ins, and the add-in can only sign people in with modern authentication. When mail flow is set up, Footer365 checks both and switches them on if they are off. With the Outlook add-in only it does not, so if the add-in does nothing in anyone's Outlook, check them in Exchange Online PowerShell. DisableEventBasedActivationAddIns should be False and OAuth2ClientProfileEnabled should be True:

Get-OrganizationConfig | Format-List DisableEventBasedActivationAddIns,OAuth2ClientProfileEnabled

To change them:

Set-OrganizationConfig -DisableEventBasedActivationAddIns $false
Set-OrganizationConfig -OAuth2ClientProfileEnabled $true

Changing your mind later

The How signatures are added card on Getting started shows which way your organisation uses, with the button to change it. Only a Super Admin can change it. Anyone else sees A Super Admin can add mail flow. or A Super Admin can change this. The Getting started page

Adding mail flow

1. On Getting started, select Add mail flow. A box headed Add mail flow? says what happens next.
2. Select Open the connect wizard. The setup wizard opens at step 3, Grant the Exchange Administrator role.
3. A Global Administrator grants the role, and Footer365 creates the two connectors and two transport rules, exactly as for a new customer. From then on, mail from every device is signed. Granting the Exchange Administrator role

If the role is still assigned from an earlier time your organisation used mail flow, Footer365 finds it within seconds and starts setting mail flow up straight away.

Removing mail flow

1. On Getting started, select Remove mail flow. A box headed Remove mail flow and use the add-in only? says what happens.
2. Tick I understand some mail will no longer be signed, then select Remove mail flow.

Footer365 removes its transport rules, then its connectors, each confirmed gone in Exchange, as at the end of a subscription, and turns your people's own Outlook signatures back on. Your subscription and the add-in carry on as before. From then on, mail from phones' own mail apps and other programs is sent without a signature.

While this runs, the card's Mail flow line shows Being taken out of Exchange, which usually takes a few minutes. A step Exchange does not confirm is tried again every day, and the line shows Some of it is still in Exchange until it is. If Footer365 can no longer reach your Exchange, the line shows To be removed by hand, and the card names what to remove in the Exchange admin centre. Removing Footer365 gives the order to remove them in.

Neither change can be made while Footer365's access to your Microsoft 365 needs granting again, or while signatures are switched off for your organisation. Remove mail flow also waits while mail flow is still being set up, and Add mail flow while it is still being taken out. The portal says why. Each change is recorded in your audit log, if your account has one.

Coverage with the add-in only

The Coverage page under Insights counts differently, because Footer365 only knows about mail the add-in handled. It opens with a note beginning Add-in only:, and shows two figures in place of four:

• Signed by the add-in: how many people had at least one email signed by the add-in in the period.
• Nothing signed: how many mailboxes in your directory had nothing signed by the add-in, whether they sent nothing the add-in handled or everything it handled went without.

The How signatures were added bar is left out. Not sending lists mailboxes the add-in handled no mail for in the period: they may still have sent mail from elsewhere, unsigned. The Unsigned column gives the reasons listed above, and Removed counts signatures deleted before sending, which nothing adds back. Coverage: who sends with their signature

Good to know

• The add-in never stops a message being sent. If it cannot reach Footer365 while the message is being written, the message is sent without a signature.
• The dashboard's Microsoft 365 connection card shows Not needed for add-in only against Exchange connectors, and Needs mail flow against Plain-text email and Mail app sign-offs. The dashboard
• When your subscription ends, Footer365 has nothing in your Exchange Online to remove, unless something is left from an earlier spell of mail flow, and the add-in stops adding signatures. Cancel your subscription

Related

• Connecting Microsoft 365
• Deploying the Outlook add-in
• The Getting started page
• I cannot see my signature while writing
• Permissions Footer365 asks for, and why