Why Your Business Needs Premium Email Hosting
Social media and a slew of other online tools have added many communication channels, but for businesses, email remains king. It’s how you, as a business owner, communicate with suppliers, customers, employees, and any other stakeholders. While you can use a free email provider for a business, it’s always worth it to invest in premium business hosting; here’s why.
Better Security
Cybercrime has grown into a trillion-dollar industry, and businesses are their prime targets. In most successful attacks, the first point of contact, and usually how malware is transferred to your system, will be through an email. A reliable service like IONOS email hosting knows the threat facing business owners and they implement top-of-the-line security measures. These include having effective spam filters, firewalls, antivirus scanners, and malware detectors. This creates a strong first line of defence between you and hackers. Most will also insist on strong passwords and multi-factor authentication to protect your address from being taken over by cybercriminals. Free email services also offer security features but they aren’t as robust as what you’ll get with a premium email service.
Increased Professionalism
Your email address communicates a lot to the stakeholders you contact. When you get premium email hosting, you have the option of using your domain name for your email. For example, if your website domain name is ‘xyz.com,’ your email can be ‘[email protected].’ This immediately lends credibility to your email address. Anybody can create a free Gmail or Yahoo email address with your brand name, but if your email uses your domain, then it is more trusted. If you are in a sensitive industry such as health or personal finance, a professional email address is a must-have. Also, a premium email address is a sign of professionalism as no established corporation uses a free email.
Additional Features
There’s a big difference between a business’s and a private person’s email needs. Most free email services have very stripped-down features that work for personal email accounts. But communication is a vital component of any business strategy, and premium email hosting comes with the features you need to communicate effectively with all stakeholders. One of the most obvious benefits of premium email hosting is expanded inbox storage. Some businesses receive thousands (or even tens of thousands) of emails daily, a free email provider can never keep up with this volume. Other features include advanced contact management, calendar integration, task management tools, and an increased level of customization.
Third-Party Tools
There are countless third-party tools developed by individuals or large corporations that, when integrated with your email service, can boost your operational capacity. These include tools for managing a mailing list, running email marketing campaigns, and bulk email management tools. Free email services don’t provide a platform for integrating these tools, but most popular premium email hosting services do. If you can’t access these tools, then you are operating from a competitive disadvantage, as your competitors are probably enjoying their benefits.
Conclusion
Premium email hosting does cost more than a free email account, but the benefits it offers make the investment worth it. You get a more robust security infrastructure with premium email hosting which protects you from cyberattacks. Having a custom email address also adds much-needed professionalism to your official correspondence. Also, you get access to additional features and third-party tool integration which elevates your operational capacity.