When you’re creating a website for your business it’s almost a given that your domain is made up of your company’s name. However, when it comes to creating a business email address many people are satisfied with generic domains such as yourcompany@gmail.com or yourcompany@outlook.com. While those domains are extremely popular and recognizable, they might not seem very professional in the eyes of potential customers. Making your company name your website and your email domain does not only look better but also brings a range of benefits for your business.
Brand Awareness
What comes after the @ sign will be an important part of what your customers remember when dealing with you and your business. Rather than promoting big email clients such as Google, Yahoo, Microsoft and Hotmail, why not let your email domain work for you and use it to advertise your business for free? After all, your email will be present on any marketing material that is published including business cards and flyers as well as being part of your signature for every outgoing email. The more potential customers see your business name, the more likely they will remember you, make a connection and have you on the forefront of their thoughts when the time comes.
Customer Relationships
Your own email domain helps customers build a trusting relationship with you as it shows that you mean serious business and are established on the market. Free email accounts are great for personal use, but when you’re trying to sell goods or services you want people to perceive you as a professional. Having your own email domain is part of a consistent marketing strategy that will significantly enhance your credibility.
Easy to remember
Imagine someone came across your business several months ago but it only needs your services now. Having an email address such as info@yourcompany.com will be far easier for potential customers to remember than yourcompany@whatdomainwasitagain.com.
Ownership
If you set up your email address with a generic internet service provider, you don’t actually own that address. Should the provider ever close down or should you want to change providers, you will lose your address and with it your address book and any potential clients. Save yourself the hassle and the lack of professionalism that comes with having to inform thousands of customers or contractors of a new email address and do it right from the start. Own your domain name and be independent.
Furthermore, if you own your email domain it’s easy to stay in control over any other account that is created from it. That comes in handy when someone leaves your company. While you wouldn’t have access to their personal email account once they are gone, you can simply redirect any emails going into their business account to whoever is replacing that person within your company. You also have ongoing access to their email history, enabling you to keep on track of business relationships or projects they worked on.
Flexibility
With your own email domain, you can create as many email addresses as you want for the various purposes of your business, such as sales, marketing or customer service. This can give the impression that your company is larger than it actually is and also well organised.
On top of that, you can customize those addresses to your liking and for instance, give each employee their own company email address. Formats such as firstname.lastname@company.com make it easy for customers to remember. With free email providers you often have to add other characters to your name because your actual name is already taken, so you might end up with something like Matt.Smith1952.yourcompany@gmail.com. Not very trustworthy, is it?
When to ignore this advice
There are a couple of reasons that you might use a different domain name for your email to your company brand.
- Impractical Company Name
Some companys have very long names or difficult to spell names. If your company is called “Gribble Horseface Vladyankovich & Associates”, you definitely don’t want that as your email address. If you can get it, a short domain such as; GHV.com would be much more practical. - Keyword Domains
There is a degree of benefit to using a keyword in your website address for search engine optimisation. If this domain name is easy to use, it may be worth using the same domain as your email address. Although it is not your company name, it is consistent. - Aligned Marketing
In the US, there has been an advertising campaign running since 1993 by the California Milk Processor Board (a marketing group funded by the dairy industry) that uses the catchphrase “got milk?”. If you or your industry use a memorable phrase in your marketing, this could be a suitable domain name for your website and your email.
For more information about how to get your own email domain contact Energise Web today.