Is Email Part of Your Brand?

As you go about your day to day business, how much thought do you give to your email?

I don’t mean how swamped you are by it, & I’m not talking about how much of your admin time is wasted attempting whip your inbox into shape by dragging your inbox count kicking and screaming back toward zero.

No, what I’m referring to is whether or not your email address is doing the necessary leg work to boost your professionalism, credibility, & branding.

Are you hello@YourBusinessName.com or are you JaneDoesBiz94@hotmail.com? See any benefits of one over another? Of course maintaining your branding by using your domain name for your email far outways the ease of using a free email account. And really, would you rather promote the hotmail or gmail brand over your own?

Let’s break this idea down before then I show you how to link your domain email & Gmail account so you can make better impressions. Finally & then we’ll talk about your email signature.

Brand Perception

jane@JaneDoesBiz.com looks infinitely more attractive than JaneDoeBiz94@gmail.com. Janes’ domain email addres looks professional, established, & more dedicated than her @Gmail counterpart. It takes zero effort or investment to create a Gmail account. You want to give the impression that you value your business more than a babysitting teenager or lad with a summer job mowing lawns.

Ownership of your Email Address

When you create an email address on your own domain, that address is yours as long as you keep the domain registration current. Compare that to a third party or internet host-provided email.

USING A FREE EMAIL SERVICE: If Hotmail/Gmail/Live gets shut down for some reason you lose everything. If they change their policies or sell & the hew provider stops allowing users to use their servers for business email – you will lose everything including the way your customers are used to contacting you. Having your own domain email address is much safer for you and your email. Liken it to having a landlord, if they decide to put up the rent or sell, you just have to wear it. If you own, you make the decisions.

USING YOUR INTERNET PROVIDER EMAIL ADDRESS: If you’re using your internet provider email account and you need to change internet carriers or move – you also lose everything. What’s more, you need to re-educate your clients immediately because there’s no wiggle room for error. (As soon as you cancel service with one provider, you lose that email account.)

What should you do if you own a domain name & have set up an email address in your hosting service but don’t know how to link it to your Gmail?

Let me help!

Log into the Gmail account you want to use with your business email.
Click the gear icon in the upper right corner of the page. Click <Settings>.
Click the Accounts tab, and find the <Check mail from other accounts (using POP3)> section of the menu.
Click <Add a POP3 mail account you own> to begin adding the account.
Enter the full email address you’ve created. This is the email address you’d like to be able to check and send from using your Gmail. Then click <Next Step>.
In the Username field, type the complete email address you’d like to use.
In the Password field, enter the password you created for that new domain email address.Select <Port 110> for a POP3 connection. For a secure email connection, use <Port 995>.
Select the checkboxes which govern how you want your domain-based email to function.
o Leave a copy of retrieved messages on the server (If you need your email to remain on your hosting service as well as on your Gmail account.)
o Always use a secure connection (SSL) when retrieving mail (This is intended to make email retrieval more secure, but Gmail has a very strict policy and checking this box can trigger errors.)
o Label incoming messages (This is useful if you want emails going to sales@YourBiz.com.au to be flagged as being sales leads or if you’re funneling your business emails into your personal account and want them marked as business messages.)
o Archive incoming messages (If you’re having messages filter to a Gmail as a back-up and will not need to read/respond to them from there, you can set them to skip your inbox and go directly to your Archive/”All Mail” folder.)
Once you’ve selected the relevant options, click <Add Account>.

Ta-da! The first part is complete. Now your business email will come into your Gmail account.

To complete the set up and be able to SEND messages from your professional account, you’ll need to set up the domain email as a custom FROM address. As soon as you click <Add Account> it should give you the option to send replies or outgoing mail using the new address – click <Yes>. The next steps are incredibly simple!

Change the SMTP server to your domain's webmail server. This is generallymail.yourwebsite.com
Change the Port to 25
Click Add Account

That’s the entire set up! To finish the process, check your business email address (which should be coming into your Gmail thanks to completing the earlier steps) and look for an email from Gmail confirming you own the address you’ve just set up.

Now What?

Now that you have a professional email account, make the most of all of your correspondence by utilizing your signature. Adding links to where you can be found online (your website, social media accounts, recent publications, etc.) can help those you contact find your other work. You can also mention offers, promotions, or link to recent features. I even have a link to my terms & conditions of service at the bottom of my signature. Here the one I use for my boutique design studio!