Pay for using e-mail? Why? Surely it is included by default with a hosting AND in addition you have several ways to request a free email through Gmail, Hotmail, etc? So why would you start paying? Well, I thought the same way but since a few weeks I switched anyway, namely to G Suite (formerly Google Apps).
Just a bit of background information – I have both a business and private email address. Privately I am with Gmail and through a POP3 account I had my business email linked to it. I really like the way Gmail works, have been using this for years, so I liked being able to access everything within 1 account . I did not have to log in again to get in and answer both my business and private mail. Everything went – in my opinion – flawlessly. Until I noticed that a lot of mail was not coming in or if I was emailing with a client, that it took some time before I could receive the response in my mailbox. It regularly happened that when I emailed a customer and he or she responded right back, it would then sometimes take half an hour or longer for me to receive this email. This was because my business mail address was redirected through my hosting to my linked POP3 account in Gmail. You then have to deal with when the server processes the mail (in this case from both the hosting and Gmail) and that’s why it took so long.
An email that doesn’t work well not only creates a negative image of my company Deliciae Design (because I just don’t respond!) but as a result, I also lose income. Time to change this.
What is G Suite?
I must honestly admit – when I received the email that Google Apps was going to change its name to G Suite I had to get used to it. I think it’s a distinct name and when you read it like that you don’t really expect it to be e-mail, do you?
Other than the name, nothing else has changed. If you are familiar with Google then you know there are extensions such as Gmail, Drive, Hangout, Calendar, Documents, Spreadsheets, etc. G Suite is an umbrella name for all these tools and allows you to use them for your business. You work in the cloud making all data accessible from anywhere. Ideal for entrepreneurs who are on the road a lot or for people who like convenience. You work online and everything is saved automatically.
If you have a Gmail address then you also have access to all these great tools, only you will be using jouwnaam@gmail.com. Doesn’t look very professional, does it? With a business account you can use jouwnaam@jouwbedrijf.nl as well as have access to all the tools such as Drive, Hangout, Documents, etc, so you can sit nicely in the cloud and continue working on the go, whether on computer, tablet or phone.
What can I do with G Suite?
I can tell you from personal experience that my mail has been working super since the switch. I can send and receive mail without problems. Don’t suffer from error messages and also don’t constantly end up in the spam folder of (potential) customers. Gmail also has SPAM filters which reduces the enormously and you can very easily check and unsubscribe unwanted mail so you are no longer bothered by it. In addition, you also have this:
- A nice business email address as“jouwnaam@jouwbedrijf.nl.”
- No ads are displayed (does happen if you have a free account).
- An inbox with 30GB of storage. This is also expandable.
- Be able to read offline messages or draft messages.
- Set default answers (ideal!)
- Always support – 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
- Chat function + Hangouts – right away the ability to call someone from the mail or host or attend a video conference.
- Gmail works on either computer, tablet or phone (you have to download the Apps).
- Gmail is 99.9% available and has 0% outages. So you can count on Google’s exceptionally reliable servers 24/7/365. (I need this!)
- Your business data is protected with automatic backups.
- Very good spam protection.
- Leading security measures.
- Many add-ons that make work easier.
- And much more!
What does G Suite cost?
All those features with so many possibilities – you’d think it would be a pricey subscription. But nothing could be further from the truth. For €4 per month per user, you have access to G Suite. That’s even cheaper than a Chai Latte from Starbucks.
Why do I need to use G Suite?
Nothing has to, of course. But do you, like me before, use your web host’s mail and had regular problems with that? Like mail not arriving sent or received? That you regularly end up in SPAM from others or that it takes a long time to receive an email? And by the way, do you know that if your website is offline, your mail won’t work either and incoming mail will be lost at that time? Then G Suite would be a godsend because the mail is sent and received through another server, so not through the server your website is hosted on. Thus, you are ALWAYS accessible.
I would like to have a reliable mail server and no longer be bothered by (minor) glitches. With G Suite, my mail just keeps working even if my website were temporarily offline for a while. In addition, I always have a backup, I can easily work in the cloud, I no longer have to use the Office package and everything just works seamlessly together. Ideal.
Now this is mostly about G Suite but there are plenty of other options you can use for your mailbox. Point is more that it is better not to use your hosting provider’s mailbox because there is no guarantee of mail traffic and no backups. If you have lost all your mail, there is little chance of recovering it all.
[clickToTweet tweet=”Gebruik je web host niet als e-mail host. ” quote=”Gebruik je web host niet als e-mail host. ” theme=”style3″]
How do I set up G Suite?
So you want to give G Suite a try? Nice! Setup is very easy and you can get a free trial for the first 14 days.
Go to the G Suite website and click the green button: Start Now.
You will be asked to fill out some personal information.
Now you will be asked if you use your own domain or want to purchase one. If you already have a website with http://www.jouwdomein.nl you can use it.
You will need to provide a valid domain name. Click next.
On the 3rd page, you can create a G Suite account. Enter a username (this will be your email address), a password and proof that you are not a robot. Click accept and register.
Your account has now been created and it is now time to verify the domain and add additional mail addresses.
Unfortunately, I don’t have screenshots of this and unfortunately I can’t reverse this process, but the next steps are clearly described through the G Suite installation process.
Add user
You will see the option to “add users to G Suite.” For each user you add, it costs an additional €4. So you don’t need to add multiple users. Well you can add email aliases, this means that 1 user (i.e. you) can also send mail with an alias, for example I created info and press. Info I use as my default mail address and press for newsletters so that my mailbox remains somewhat separate.
Domain Verify
Once you have created a mail address you will need to verify your domain. There are 3 ways to do this:
- Add a record to your domain settings. (TXT or CNAME)
- Upload an HTML file to your website. (I chose the easiest way this time and opted for this step)
- Add a <meta> tag to your website.
Choose the way you feel most comfortable and follow the steps indicated by G Suite.
MX records customization
Because the mail will go through a different server, namely G Suite, it means that you have to change the mail settings. If you purchase hosting through Antagonist, you can activate or deactivate G Suite (still listed as Google Apps) in My Antagonist via product. This step changes the DNS records automatically and you don’t have to change them manually.
Via DirectAdmin
If you don’t have Antagonist or the ability to adjust DNS records automatically, you will have to adjust them manually. Login to your domain’s web hosting server or DirectAdmin and go to MX records. Try taking a screenshot (as a backup) of the data found there so you can always go back to the old settings.
From G Suite you have received a number of records, all of which you need to complete.
The MX records in your DirectAdmin will then look like this.
Once all MX records of G Suite are added (you can delete all others) then let’s see if everything worked out. During the installation process of G Suite click on verify. If the MX records are correct then you will get a notification that the verification was successful.
That’s it! It seems quite complicated but it is not so bad. Should you get stuck with the MX records, it is always possible to contact your hosting provider. They can then help you further. As of now, you can log in through Gmail with jouwnaam@jouwdomein.nl and send and receive mail. It can take about 48 hours for the data to be processed, but experience shows that it is often effective within minutes.
Would you like to try a free trial of G Suite *? Then register now. If you want to receive 20% off the first year of G Suite use 1 of the following codes:74KC9X4VMQHEMTD orN3N9AW4VA99NJQK
If the codes no longer work you may contact me and I will provide a personal code so you can receive the 20% discount.
What do you use for your (business) e-mail?
[clickToTweet tweet=”Voorkom problemen met jouw e-mail en maak gebruik van G Suite. Lees hoe je dit kan instellen.” quote=”Voorkom problemen met jouw mail en maak gebruik van G Suite. Leer hoe je dit kan instellen.” theme=”style3″]
* This article contains affiliate links. See my disclaimer for more information.
