Never Use Personal Emails For Business
Personal Email
I saw a post today that addressed the fact that many people still feel its ok to use their personal emails for business purposes. I couldn’t agree more that this is a huge problem, and if you fall into this category, read on.
Many business owners that start out small or on Ebay started their business using emails like businessname@aol.com, businessname@yahoo.com or something similar. Reasons they started out like this range from not having a budget for a domain and hosting to just not knowing any better.
HOWEVER, I still see business owners that have websites, and in some cases nice websites, that for some reason, stay attached to their old hotmail, yahoo or aol email accounts. Why they would do this is beyond me, but here are the problems.
Professionalism
If you were your customer, would you want your sales or customer service questions answered by happytimehats@yahoo.com? Think about it. You place an order on Target’s online store, and you get emails from order@target.com. People shop with big online retailers all the time, so if you want to hang with the big boys, you should present yourself like one. Using CoolDude98@hotmail.com as your email address in a business setting isn’t going to accomplish that.
Delivery Problems
We see it all the time, where we try to send an email to one of our clients (or vice verse) and our servers will not communicate with Yahoo, Gmail, Hotmail or so on, because they block other email providers at the wholesale level. Meaning these “free” email providers are forced to do STUPID things to their email servers to prevent abuse, making you, their account holder look like a tool. Think about it, your customer places an order and their email address is TomJones@hotmail.com. Your using your AwsomeBusiness@Yahoo.com email address to send their shipment tracking number, but unknown by you, your customers ISP, Hotmail, dumps it into their SPAM box, and they never receive it. Your customer then gets cold feet because they haven’t heard back, and tries to cancel their order, or even worse does a chargeback. Awsome scenario eh? The same thing goes the other way around as well. You’d be surprised how many leads or follow up emails you’re missing because Yahoo dumps EVERYTHING into the SPAM folder.
A dirty little secret: guilt by association
Here's something that most free email providers will never admit: because their services are often abused by spammers, you may find that some ISPs (Internet Service Providers -- companies providing web access) have taken to automatically blocking mail coming from some free email domains. You may well find that your messages will never get to certain people, no matter how many times you send them out; that's because their ISP is filtering the mail before they get a chance to see it!
This is one of the reasons why free email addresses are fine for individual use, but not a good idea if your business depends on people getting through to you.
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I could go on, but won’t waste my breath. DON’T use personal or free email services to send business emails, especially if you run an online store. Get over the fact that you’ve had that Yahoo account for 5 years now, and you’ve used it on Ebay for the last 4. Get yourself a domain name, hosting account and use a true business-like email address.
Thanks to Bruce for bringing up this topic.
Just The FACTS!
Here I will add random things about using an email address for your business. They are for what it is worth, but you will see a real pattern form as to why it is a really bad practice to use free email services like Yahoo and Hotmail to represent your business.
Advertising Yahoo!
Who are you advertising? Your company or Yahoo or Hotmail
99% Criminals!
When you set up an email server with your own domain name on the right side of the @ - it takes time. A good professional can sometimes do this in four days. It is registered and leaves paths that courts and police can use to track criminal activity. Free email accounts like Yahoo and Hotmail are not this way and they are the favorites of scam artist and criminals. Many professionals recommend not to do business with businesses who use free email.
Out of Site? Out of Mind?
Many Philippine businessmen would like to do business with people in other countries. Some of this is also involved in the service industry, including things like custom garments or even medical tourism. We are aware of a medical doctor who is successfully treating chronic prostatitis with a 30-45 day treatment program. If you were a man in America where people usually do not do business with businesses using free email address, would you want to trust your prostate gland to ahappyprostatedoctor@yahoo.com? Remember, you must arrange airline tickets, hotels, transportation, to see ahappyprostitatedoctor@hotmail.com! You would be out of your mind to trust a site like that!
SPAM Sandwich!
SPAM is still a growing problem. In fact, websites are going online with free email address offering many free things. How to get six-pack abs - free report. How to avoid breast cancer. How to lose weight without eating. All you need to do is send them an email and they will send it to you by return mail. When you send your email - wham - they sell your email address to SPAM lists! People have learned to not email free address used by alleged businesses - it is likely a scam. Don't send email to business or professional websites that have a Yahoo or AOL free email account.
BRANDING!
Perhaps the most compelling reasons is simple branding. Your custom email has your domain name in it. Assume you have just five associates, each has their own email address with your website as part of their email address. One dies or retires. Someone has his email address - the email is dead, but the domain name and website are still active. Just type in what is on the right side of the @ and your customer will be in contact with you again!
Bye Bye Business
In the beginning, one of the biggest free email providers was USA.NET. They had a ton of clients with lots of businesses. They made a discussion that by charging for email they would make more money. It was fatal for both USA.NET and for the business there. You had a choice - pay them or lose your valuable email address that everyone knew you at. Now consider if your email host goes down with me@example.net (your domain name) - you just move your domain name to another host and you are back in business with the same email address. There no assurance that Yahoo or Hotmail will not do the same as USA.NET? Bye-Bye Business - Your Business! In fact Yahoo has discussed this and Yahoo has removed their free email forwarding service! You must now pay Yahoo US$19.95/yr for what was before Free!
