Have you ever been in a position, perhaps in a past corporate job, where you've had an enquiry from someone who could be legitimate but you're not really sure as they have a hotmail or gmail address? You don't really have time to do the research so that's all you've got to judge.
I have. And you know what…those emails always got deleted. When you're often getting enquiries and cold emails (unsolicited sales emails), professionalism is the first thing you check for when you decide if it's worth your time.
It's tempting when you're starting out in business to save every penny, but investing in a professional email address is worth it. You don't want to get lumped in with the offshore companies who are sending illegitimate emails, and you want your emails to get taken seriously, right?
3 reasons to get that email address set up now
1. Professionalism
Creating a professional image in the eyes of your potential customer or partner is essential for growing your business and brand. If you were thinking about working with a business that exclusively used a gmail or hotmail address for their communication, would you get the impression that they are a professional company willing to invest in their business? Most likely not.
It presents a far more professional look to have an email address that matches your domain name. It's a subtle part of your brand, and there is really no excuse not to have it set up.
2. It’s easy with Google Workspace
Setting up a professional email address is simple if you use Google Workspace (formerly GSuite). Through Google Workspace, you can create an email address that includes your domain name. So instead of being ‘yourbusiness@gmail.com’, your email address could be ‘hello@yourbusiness.com’. If you own the domain name for your website, then you simply create a matching email address through Google Workspace. By doing this you will have access to:
• Your email account across all your devices, on desktop or mobile
• The full suite of Google Workspace products – this includes Google Docs, Google Sheets, Drive and all of that good stuff. This is one of my best business investments and is a major bonus for the small cost of getting a professional email address.
• Compatibility with your existing email interface, so if you prefer the way Outlook works, you can set it up so that you still use this with Gmail running the show in the background.
• You can migrate your email history across to Google Workspace so you don't lose any of that important stuff.
A big bonus with Google Workspace is the level of customer support. You most likely won't need to pay anyone for the set up as their customer support will ring you and walk you through what you need to get done. So you don't need to hire a tech company to set it up for you – big bonus!
3. Google Workspace is inexpensive
The cost of a professional email address is a tiny expense per month – it's not much more than a cup of coffee. The great thing is that it can stay with you for the life of your business. If you set it up in the beginning, you won’t need to worry about doing it when your business grows and you have more important things to think about. You also won’t have to migrate old records across, as you will already have the history there.
When you consider these three factors, the decision to get a professional email address for your business is a no brainer, and an even better decision if you're just getting started in business.
You can sign up to Google Workspace here. If you contact me here, I can give you a discount code that will give you 10% off for your first 12 months. It's a no brainer!
*I'm a Google Workspace Referral Partner, and I get a very small commission if you sign up using the links in this post. I absolutely love Google Workspace and I only recommend products I use and love.
For other online marketing tools and software that I recommend, check out the full list here.
