Webmail Pros and Cons

We are often asked what are the webmail Pros and Cons.

Webmail is used by many web agencies when they set up a clients website because it is “free” and simple / quick to set up.  Effectively it means having your business email on the same server as your website.

As above this is quick, simple and free to set up. Although free it does use space on your web server and so has a discreet cost

However, we usually advise against webmail as it is less robust and complicates future changes to your domain or website hosting and management.

We usually therefore advise that you keep the 3 main important assets of your business separate from each other. That way if you move either one of the 3 assets it is simpler and less prone to going wrong.

The main online assets are:

  1. Your business Domain
  2. Your Website
  3. Your Business email

Ideally you should own and manage your own domain in a standalone account away from your website or mail.

Moving web hosts.

One of the reasons we say keep separate is that with an external web mail service if you move your website you don’t need to change your email set up. This keeps life simple and avoids the pain of changing all your phone and laptop mail settings and avoids the risk of lost emails during a move.

You should then point your domain to a separate web server that hosts your website and then…

Set up your domain to point to an independent mail exchange service. For small local / family businesses we often refer people to Zoho mail.  Zoho Mail Pricing  is very cost effective and simple to set up and maintain. It also a very good email system to integrate in WordPress websites as they provide a plugin to connect your email to the website. You can use Outlook and other mail programs to view and manage your emails. Lastly Zoho does have an excellent, cost effective CRM system that of course integrates into Zoho Mail.

For businesses that plan to grow we also suggest you look at Microsoft Exchange and compare that to Zoho mail / Zoho CRM services and choosing the right mail/CRM system for your business needs now and in the long term. Microsoft Exchange costs a little more and is more complicated to set up and maintain. However, as a business grows, adds employees etc, you will find MS mail exchange more flexible and also integrates better than Zoho into other Microsoft products.