Setup Your Business Emails Using Google Apps

Something very common new business owners overlook when starting an e-commerce business is not having a professional e-mail address. I have had people give me a business card and the first thing I notice is an email address that says “motorcyclestore@gmail.com”. Using free services like Google, Hotmail or Yahoo is not a smart option and I highly recommend moving away from this. In this post I will show you how to set up your own business email address that will cost you nothing going from “motorcyclestore@gmail.com” to “info@motorcyclestore.com”. If you know how to setup a Google Mail (GMail) account already, this will be a breeze for you and no one will know that you use Google Mail to send your emails.

Have A Professional Email Address

Here are the reasons why it is important to have a business email address when you are running an e-commerce website:

• A business email address makes your business look professional whether you are the sole operator or a company with 100+ employees.
• You keep all your business correspondence separate to your personal emails.
• You can have multiple email addresses for different departments such as sales, support or orders.
• The business email address can always be transferred without having to notify contacts.

The next question most commonly asked is what email addresses should we setup?

What Business Emails Do You Need?

Once you have your e-commerce website and your domain name registered, you need to look at your systems and decide who will receive what emails. For a typical e-commerce business I look at having the following:

Sales: sales@<your-domain>.com – these emails should only refer to sales enquires and potential leads
Orders: orders@<your-domain>.com – if a customer would like to find out where their order is, this email is for that
Support: support@<your-domain>.com – any technical issues about the products or services. warranty and repairs can also be handled here as well.

Other emails you can have as well, are your personal names, such as tyrone@<your-domain>.com or tim@<your-domain>.com. These email accounts may be setup for the sole reason to receive emails within your company from your employees and should only be given out selectively. Keep these emails private if possible because you will want most of your customer’s emails to be handled by your support staff.

Use Google Apps For Your Email Server

If you have an existing hosting account which provides you with emails already you may be happy to stay with them. Alternatively I would recommend considering Google Apps. Here are the reasons why I use them in my own e-commerce business:

• Google Apps is an extremely reliable service that not only offers email hosting, but other extra features
• It is separate to my hosting company and if their service goes down, my emails still come through
• Google Apps is free to use and offers lots of storage space
• Using Google’s search feature your email is easily found

Now that you understand why I recommend Google Apps and that you should switch over, I’ll show you how easy it is to set up and start using today.

How To Setup Google Apps Email?

Setting up Google Apps for your e-commerce business is very easy. Simply follow the steps below and you will be on your way to using Google’s free email servers to run your business emails.

1. Sign up to Google Apps and simply follow the 3 step process.
2. After completing the registration process you will need to verify your domain name. Complete this first.
3. To setup your email click on Activate Email.
   
4. At the new screen it will ask you to add the MX records. If you don’t know what this is, you will need to contact your hosting provider and get them to change this for you. Most hosting services allow you to change this yourself in your Cpanel and if you are not sure I would suggest contacting your hosting support team.
5. Click on I have completed these steps button when you changed the MX records.
6. You will return to the control panel after this. Click on Email.
7. In the Email screen you will see Change URL, click on this.
8. Change your address to the second option. Therefore it will read “mail.<your-domain>.com”
9. Follow the rest of the instructions on the next screen. You will also need to contact your hosting support to change the CNAMES as well.
10. Wait for a couple hours and your emails we be accessible via “http://mail.<your-domain>.com”

Make sure you save the following web address to access your Google Apps panel in future: “http://www.google.com/a/cpanel/<your-domain>.com”

There Is No Excuse To Not Have A Business Email

After you follow the steps I have shown above there is no excuse for you not to have a professional business email address. It does not cost you anything and Google is constantly increasing the amount of free storage space available for use.

Take the time to set this up for your e-commerce business and this will be another system you will not have to worry for a long time.

Tyrone Shum
Email Business Professional