Where most businesses go wrong is in how they set it up.
The Mistake Most Businesses Make
When you register a domain, your registrar — GoDaddy, Namecheap, Google Domains, or whoever you used — will usually offer to host your email as well. It’s convenient, it’s cheap, and it’s almost always the wrong choice for a business.
Domain registrars are in the business of selling domain names. Email hosting is typically an afterthought: limited storage, basic webmail interfaces, poor reliability, minimal spam filtering, and little to no support when something goes wrong. If your email goes down, you’re on your own.
Professional email deserves a dedicated platform built for the job.
The Two Main Options
For most small businesses, the choice comes down to two platforms:
Microsoft 365
Microsoft 365 (formerly Office 365) gives you business email hosted on Exchange Online, plus the full Office suite — Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Teams, OneDrive, and SharePoint — depending on the plan.
It’s the dominant choice for businesses already in the Microsoft ecosystem, and for good reason: Exchange Online is reliable, well-supported, and integrates tightly with the rest of the Microsoft stack.
Business Basic starts at a low monthly cost per user and includes email, Teams, and web versions of the Office apps. Business Standard adds the full desktop applications.
Google Workspace
Google Workspace (formerly G Suite) gives you Gmail — with your own domain — plus Google Drive, Docs, Sheets, Meet, and the rest of the Google productivity suite.
If your team already lives in Google’s tools, Workspace is a natural fit. The interface is familiar, the collaboration features are strong, and the mobile experience is excellent.
We compare the two platforms in more depth in a separate post in this series.
What to Look for in a Business Email Platform
Reliability. Both Microsoft and Google offer enterprise-grade uptime with published SLAs. This is not something you get from a registrar’s bundled email.
Storage. Each user needs enough mailbox storage to work without constantly archiving or deleting. Microsoft 365 Business plans include 50 GB per user; Google Workspace starts at 30 GB pooled across your organisation.
Spam and malware filtering. A good platform filters aggressively before messages reach your inbox. Both Microsoft and Google include this by default.
Mobile and desktop client support. Your email should work properly with Outlook, Apple Mail, and mobile clients. Both platforms support standard protocols (IMAP, Exchange ActiveSync) alongside their own apps.
Admin controls. You need to be able to add and remove users, reset passwords, and manage settings without calling support. Both platforms provide a management console for this.
Support. When something goes wrong, you want a support channel with a real answer at the other end.
Setting It Up: The Key Steps
1. Choose your platform and sign up
Go directly to Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace and create an account. You’ll be asked to verify that you own your domain — this is done by adding a TXT record to your domain’s DNS settings, which your registrar’s control panel will let you do.
2. Add your DNS records
Once your account is verified, the platform will give you a set of DNS records to add:
- MX records — tell the internet where to deliver email for your domain
- SPF record — helps receiving mail servers verify that your email is legitimate
- DKIM record — adds a cryptographic signature to outgoing mail
- DMARC record — sets a policy for how receiving servers should handle mail that fails SPF or DKIM checks
SPF, DKIM, and DMARC are email authentication standards that protect your domain from being spoofed and improve deliverability. We cover them in detail in a later post in this series — but set them up from the start, not as an afterthought.
3. Create your user accounts
Add email addresses for each member of your team. Decide on a naming convention now — firstname@, firstname.lastname@, or f.lastname@ — and apply it consistently. Changing it later is more disruptive than it sounds.
4. Migrate any existing email
If you have existing email on your registrar’s hosting or another provider, both Microsoft and Google provide migration tools to move it across. For small mailboxes, this is straightforward. For larger migrations, professional assistance is worth considering.
5. Configure your email clients
Set up Outlook, Apple Mail, or your preferred client using the settings provided by your platform. Both Microsoft and Google provide step-by-step instructions for all major clients.
A Note on Shared Mailboxes
Most businesses need at least one shared mailbox (info@, support@, or accounts@) that multiple staff can access. Both Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace support shared mailboxes, but the implementation differs. Plan for these when you set up your account rather than adding them as an afterthought.