Using third-party services to strengthen your web hosting
Outsource your email hosting
The primary goal of this tutorial is to free your email service from the same fate as your webs server, which means you need a different provider for your email. You can use any company for this, including setting up a new web hosting account (with a distinct company) exclusively for email, but I am very happy with, and strongly recommend Google Apps. (as in Applications)
The difference between Google Apps and standard GMail
The purpose of Google Apps is to package together Google’s most popular services (Mail, Calendar, Docs, and a couple others) for the corporate and professional market. It is made to be used by companies large and small, but works just as well for the individual wanting a professional service.
If you’ve tried using your own domain with a regular GMail account, you may have noticed it is sometimes sent From: you@yourdomain.com on behalf of user@gmail.com, which looks rather un-professional. I want to emphasize that properly setting up Google Apps means that your email will be sent directly from you@yordomain.com, with no mention of Google or GMail.
If you’ve heard of Google Apps you probably also heard that it costs $50 bucks per user, annually. I was under the same understanding, but it wasn’t until after I signed up on their “free trail” that I realized they offer a “standard” version at no cost. The only noticeable difference is that there ads showing when you’re checking your mail. (no ads are sent in your messages) That doesn’t bother me, so I stuck with the free version.
Sign up for Google Apps Standard
Go to the Sign Up For Google Apps page to get started. Using this link avoids all the unnecessary “free trial” stuff and signs you for the standard edition right from the start. The process should be fairly straight-forward so I’ll let you go through the sign-up process on your own. Just be sure to enter the same domain name that we’ve been using for the DNS set-up.
After that’s done and you’re looking at your Google Apps, you will see that Email is marked as Inactive. Click the links to get that started. It will ask you about DNS set-up, and you can click the button to say that’s already been done. Back at the Dashboard page, it will say that the Email service is unable to activate (or verify) but that is correct at this stage in the game. Leave it like that, and that will be resolved when we “flick the switch” at the end.
On the next page, we’ll go back to your web host and tidy up some loose ends before putting the new system into action.
