A Business Email Address at the Internet Provider

An address that belongs to someone else

The shop's email address ends in the name of its internet provider. It came free with the connection years ago and has been printed on almost everything since.

It works. Customers write to it, suppliers send invoices to it, and the website's contact form delivers to it.

But the address is part of the internet service, not the business. It belongs to the provider, and when the service ends, the address ends with it.

Most owners discover this when they move premises or switch providers, which is the worst possible moment to find out.

What the provider's address costs

• It closes with the service, on the provider's timetable, not yours.
• It ties you to one provider even when a better offer comes along.
• It looks borrowed beside a website with your own name on it.
• It often sits under a home account in the owner's own name.
• Its mailbox limits were designed for household use.
• It is hard to share with staff without sharing the password.

The second is the quiet cost. A business that cannot change provider without losing its address tends to stay with a slower or more expensive service for years rather than face the move.

What the address says to a customer

People notice how an email address ends. One on your own domain says the business has a website and intends to be around; one at an internet provider says the email came with the modem.

A matching address also connects the two. Someone who sees your address can guess your website, and someone on your website sees an address that clearly belongs to it.

And with so much fake email about, a message from an address that matches the business name is easier to trust when it lands in an inbox.

The address you should have

Most businesses with a website already own a domain name. Email on that domain is usually available through the hosting account, or through a service such as Google Apps for Work or Office 365.

Choose addresses that outlast any one person: info@ or office@ for general mail, plus a personal address for each person who needs one.

A business with no domain should register one in its own name before anything else. A .ca domain requires a Canadian presence, which most Canadian-owned businesses meet.

Bring the old mail with you

Years of correspondence live in the old mailbox: quotes, supplier invoices, conversations with customers. Leaving them behind means losing the history of the business.

Many email services can import an old mailbox directly, or the messages can be copied across in an email program with both accounts open. Ask whoever sets up the new address to include this in the job.

Bring the address book too. The contacts are often worth more than the messages.

A worked example

A reptile store in a strip mall sells lizards, snakes and tortoises, along with tanks, lighting, heat mats and frozen and live food.

Since opening, it had used the email address that came with the shop's internet service. That address was on the care sheet given with every animal, the website, the Facebook page and every supplier account.

When the store moved to a larger unit across town, its provider did not serve the new building. The mailbox would close along with the account.

With a few weeks' notice, the owners set up addresses on the domain the website already used, copied the old mail across, and put an automatic reply on the old address giving the new one.

In one afternoon they changed the website, the Facebook page, their Google listing and the supplier accounts, and the next print run of care sheets carried the new address.

Customers holding an old care sheet got the automatic reply until the day the old address closed.

Update everywhere it appears

The address appears in more places than anyone remembers. Make the list before the switch, starting with what customers see.

The website, including where the contact form delivers. Google My Business, Facebook and any directories. Invoices, quotes, email signatures, business cards and vehicle lettering.

Then the accounts that use the address as a login: suppliers, the bank, payment processors, the domain registrar and the host. Change those one at a time, while the old inbox still works.

Send a test through the website's contact form once it points at the new address. A form still delivering to the old mailbox will keep working right up to the day it closes, then quietly lose every enquiry.

Set up every device

The new address has to be on every phone, tablet and computer that sends business email, not just the one in the office.

Make it the default for sending on each of them. Otherwise replies keep going out from the old address for weeks, and customers save the wrong one.

Copy the email signature across too, with the new address in it, so every message sent during the changeover advertises the right one.

Keep the old address alive for a while

Ask the provider how long the old address will keep working after the service changes, and whether it can be kept for a fee.

While it lasts, set an automatic reply giving the new address, and check the old inbox weekly for anything that matters.

Put the closing date in the calendar. In the weeks before it, write personally to the regular contacts still using the old address.

The counter-case

A business that is winding down, or that will never move or change provider, may reasonably leave the change for a quieter season.

The switch does take a few hours of setup and a few weeks of overlap, and it is better not started in the busiest month of the year.

But a business that intends to keep trading should own its address. Every year of delay adds more letterhead, more listings and more contacts to update later.

Before the move

1. Confirm your domain is registered and set to renew.
2. Set up mailboxes on the domain.
3. Copy the old mail and contacts across.
4. List every place the old address appears.
5. Update what customers see first.
6. Set an automatic reply on the old address.
7. Put the closing date in the calendar.

Step four decides how smooth the switch is. Every place missed is a customer, supplier or account still writing to an address that is about to stop.

Moving the website's own login and recovery addresses is covered in a website admin email at a personal Gmail account.

Frequently asked questions

West Coast Media Solutions Inc. provides web design, web development, hosting, digital marketing, and business consulting to organisations across Canada, drawing on more than twenty-five years in the field.