Email for Business?

[SweetErika]

My husband is looking for a new email provider for his company because their current one (through their webhost) isn't meeting their needs. Here are the requirements:

-No outbound quota (they send a bunch of legit emails with lots of CCing)
-At least 15GB per account storage
-About 15 addresses, including forward-only
-Solid uptime
-International access
-Under $1000/year total

Any suggestions? He's looked into Google for business and Microsoft Exchange Server online, but has its pros and cons.

 

[TypicalDeviant]

A client I work with seems very happy with Google as their email provider, but they do have a slightly larger budget. They're particularly fond of the shared documents and other features available.

 

[SweetErika]

A client I work with seems very happy with Google as their email provider, but they do have a slightly larger budget. They're particularly fond of the shared documents and other features available.

Thanks. I passed that on.

He said he talked to Google's sales arm today, and they said they could get him a reduced price if he decided to go with them. OTOH, Microsoft's web interface looks just like Outlook and will sync easily with that program, which lots of people in the office use.

 

[silverwhisper]

erika, it isn't difficult to connect gmail and outlook. i've done it for the 4 accounts i maintain via gmail.

ed

 

[sassylilthang]

The company I work for has gmail. We do a lot of cc'ing and doc sharing too. And we are a fairly large company.....with nearly a thousand or more email addys needed. It always works well, no problems I am aware of. And no junk mail! Which I love!

 

[nicoleniki]

The company I work for has gmail. We do a lot of cc'ing and doc sharing too. And we are a fairly large company.....with nearly a thousand or more email addys needed. It always works well, no problems I am aware of. And no junk mail! Which I love!

We use gmail too, we like it. Have had it for 2 years, without any problems.

 

[IrisAlthea]

One more vote for Google.
You get much more than just the e-mail, with shared documents, calendars, presentations, sites etc.
It´s easy to learn and works well together with outlook if that is necessary.

 

[Gangrif]

Let me say before I post my comments that I do like Google, and the products they offer. They seem to be the least evil game in town. I love how they provide seemingly expensive services free to users, and charge reasonably for others.

But.

Before you jump feet first into Google's mail hosting, take a few things into consideration.

First, have a look at a blog I wrote on the subject. http://www.undrground.org/node/101
There's a link in there to a story about Google accidentally losing a ton after users data.

Second, consider what might happen if you ever decide to leave Gmail. In the past Google has not offered any tools to make this easy. I actually heard a story from another college that they tried to get their data back from Google, and had to fight tooth and nail.

This isn't to say that Google offers a crap service, just things to know before you jump in.

I'm an email administrator myself. I work at a college, otherwise I'd offer our services to you. I do run my own personal mail server as well, but I can't guarantee its uptime like the bug boys can. Its pretty good, but not somethig I'd feel right charging for.

Anyway, feel free to ask if you have any questions about perspective email hosts. Ill help you out if I can.

 

[TBKahuna123]

He might also look into companies that offer hosted exchange services. Then it would be just like they have their own email server without the need to worry about quotas and such.

I don't know a otn about these guys, but I hear their commercials on XM all the time: AppRiver

 

[thirty]

We use gmail too, we like it. Have had it for 2 years, without any problems.

The domain is gmail? I mean your email addresses are xxx@gmail.com?

Here in China, those small businesses can pay to a service provider and get email accounts with their comany names as domain.

 

[silverwhisper]

thirty: no, gmail offers a paid service where the domains are branded, usually with the business's website domain.

ed

 

[Netkeys]

Actually even the free version of Gmail for business offers customer branding. I have customers on it and it's linked to there domain name. example name@domain.com

The only problem is sending bulk email such as a news letter, My customer has over 2500 clients and is unable to do a single mailing to that number.

 

[SweetErika]

Actually even the free version of Gmail for business offers customer branding. I have customers on it and it's linked to there domain name. example name@domain.com

The only problem is sending bulk email such as a news letter, My customer has over 2500 clients and is unable to do a single mailing to that number.

Yes, my husband needs to retain their domain email addys.

It's a B2B that doesn't send newsletters or anything, so that's not a concern. The only thing they do is send and receive a ton of email within short periods because all of the employees and customers tend to CC everyone the email might be relevant to within the company. That ends up looking like spam to some hosts, like their current one (Dreamhost), even though it's totally not. Dreamhost only allows each address to send something like 100 emails per hour, and several of the employees reach that limit quickly when they're CCing 10 or 20 people at a time.

My husband also has issues because a few of the employees don't delete their email. Many of them need to be saved for legit reasons, like creating a paper trail in case there's a dispute, but some of the people there are just plain lazy and can't be bothered to keep their inboxes tidy.

And then email is their primary form of communication, so reliability is a necessity.

 

[Gangrif]

Most hosts, Gmail included, will have provisions for retaining your email domain.

Limiting X messages per hour is a low-tech way to limit outbound spam, outbound filtering is a better one.

Look for a host that will do email archiving, that'll get you the legal coverage for paper trails, the end users wont even need to give it any thought. Email is retained outside of their inbox, without any effort on their part.

 

[about_average]

Since he has his own domain he could set up, or hire someone to set up, a Linux box running Sendmail, then use a free POP3 client like Thunderbird or something.
Total cost, not counting having to pay someone to do it if he or an employee can't set it up, would probably be under $300 as it wouldn't require a fancy machine. All the needed software is free.