What Is The Best Email Hosting For A Small Business?

Email is a vital tool for businesses of all sizes, including startups and small companies. It provides a convenient way for people to contact you and enables you to stay in touch with clients. But for this communication to be effective, you’ll need to choose the best email hosting for small businesses.

To do that, you’ll first need to understand why email hosting is important, and how it benefits your business. This way, you’ll know what to look for when choosing an email provider, and you’ll be able to make a more informed decision. Some of these factors include email hosting cost, storage space, easy web access, and more.

In this post, we’ll take a closer look at email hosting and why it’s essential for small and medium businesses. We’ll also discuss the factors and features to look out for and recommend the best host for all your email needs. Let’s get started!

What Email Hosting Is (And Why Your Small Business Needs It)

First, let’s briefly explain what email hosting is, so you can better understand why your business needs it.

Email hosting is a service that enables businesses to manage their email accounts using their own domain name, such as [email protected], instead of relying on free email services. 

While free email services like Gmail and Outlook offer basic email functionalities, they lack the advanced features and professionalism that dedicated email hosting services provide.

For instance, a custom domain can help project a professional image and enhance brand recognition. Meanwhile, free services use generic domains that can undermine credibility. 

Moreover, email hosting providers typically offer robust security features, such as encryption and advanced spam filtering. These are crucial for protecting sensitive business information.

Although they’re also secure, free services may not provide the same level of protection and customization options.

The Benefits of Email Hosting for Your Small Businesses

As we have seen, email hosting enables you to use a custom domain like [email protected] over a generic one like [email protected]. 

This helps you build trust and credibility with your customers. It also shows people that you’re a serious business. 

While there’s nothing inherently wrong with using free email services like Gmail or Yahoo Mail, doing so can make your business appear unprofessional. 

Here are some other reasons why email hosting is crucial for small businesses:

Security and Privacy

Most email hosting services provide enhanced security features, including spam filters, virus protection, and data encryption.

This ensures that your business communications are protected against cyber threats and unauthorized access from malicious users. 

Storage and Reliability

With email hosting, you’ll get more storage space than you would with free services. Some may even offer unlimited storage.

If you opt for a reputable provider, you should also expect high reliability, ensuring your emails are always accessible and backed up.

Plus, if you have a large budget, you’ll likely be able to get your own email server. This will give you more resources and help boost your deliverability rates.

Customer Support

Email hosting services typically offer customer support to help resolve any issues quickly. This support could be invaluable for small businesses that do not have IT professionals on their team. 

For example, some of the best email hosting providers offer real-time team chat. This gives you instant access to support.

Scalability

As your business grows, your email hosting needs may change. Professional email hosting services can easily scale with your business, offering more storage, additional accounts, and enhanced features.

For instance, your email hosting provider may let you create email addresses for different departments, like support and sales.

You might also be able to host multiple domains on the same account. This is especially possible if you choose a web hosting provider for your email needs.

If you’re expecting your business to grow, then getting an email hosting account shouldn’t be debatable. It will help protect your communications and customer data.

Additionally, you’ll be able to send transactional and marketing emails without having to worry about storage limitations. 

What to Consider When Choosing Your Email Host

Selecting the best email hosting service for your small business can be difficult. After all, there are several companies, like web hosts, that let you create custom domain email addresses.

However, a good email service should provide a lot more than just custom domains. To help you out, here are some important factors and features to consider when looking for the best email hosting provider:

1. Cost. Since budget can be a critical factor for many small businesses, it’s important to weigh the cost against the features and benefits provided. You’ll want to look for a service that offers a good balance between affordability and functionality.
2. User-Friendliness. The email hosting service should have an intuitive interface that is easy to navigate. This is particularly important if you or your staff are not tech-savvy.
3. Reliability and Uptime. It’s important that your provider boasts a high uptime (preferably 99.9 percent or higher). This will help avoid disruptions to your business communications, and enable you to maintain consistent and professional contact with customers. Therefore, you’ll want to research the reputation of an email hosting provider and read reviews from other small businesses regarding the company’s reliability (and other factors mentioned on the list). 
4. Security. Strong security measures like encryption, two-factor authentication (2FA), and advanced spam filters will protect your business data and communications.
5. Customer Support. Responsive customer support can help you resolve any issues that arise in a timely manner. Check to see if the provider offers 24/7 support and through which channels (e.g., phone, email, live chat, etc).
6. Scalability. Another important factor is scalability – you’ll want to choose a service that can grow with your business. It should enable you to add more custom domain addresses, increase storage per user, and access advanced features as your needs evolve.

It’s also a good idea to think about features that are essential for your marketing needs and business operations. 

For instance, if you make appointments or schedule calls via email, you’ll want to prioritize integrations with other business tools like calendars and contact management systems.

Meanwhile, if you plan to send regular newsletters and promotional emails, you’ll need an email hosting service that offers large storage capacities.

It should also integrate with your preferred email marketing tool, as well as team collaboration tools like Google Workspace, Google Docs (for collaborative document editing), and Microsoft Office apps.

Why NameHero Is the Best Email Hosting for Small Businesses

While there are plenty of options for email hosting, at NameHero we provide solutions that are designed to help small businesses grow:

Our email product, HeroicMail, enables you to access your emails from anywhere in the world, using an internet browser.

This means you can be in constant communication with your colleagues and customers, even if you’re using mobile devices. Plus, we offer a user-friendly interface that easily lets you set up an email account that matches your business domain.

All of our email hosting plans include the following:

• At least 50 GB of storage
• Spam protection and other measures for a secure business email
• An integrated calendar
• Internet message access protocol (IMAP) and POP3, which enable you to connect your business email to your preferred email client on your computer, like Microsoft Outlook
• Simple mail transfer protocol (SMTP)
• 24/7 support via email, chat, and phone

Additionally, our email hosting service is scalable.

If you have a startup, you might opt for the Starter Email plan which gives you two email accounts and 50 GB of storage. This costs just $3.95 per month, so it’s an affordable option for beginners. 

As your business grows, you can upgrade to the Plus Email plan for five email accounts and 75 GB.

Higher-tier plans include 10-20 email accounts and 100-150 GB:

We also perform daily backups on our email server. This way, if anything happens to your inbox, we’ll be able to restore your content. 

Plus, our email hosting packages use dedicated IP addresses to help ensure that your emails don’t end up in spam folders. Reliable email hosting and a high deliverability rate can boost the conversions of your email marketing campaigns.

Plus, to make things easier for you, we help you register your domain through our domain search feature:

Don’t worry if you already have a domain registered elsewhere – you can still use it for the email hosting account that you create with NameHero.

It’s also worth mentioning that NameHero offers web hosting services:

This means you can purchase web hosting for your site along with an email hosting service.

Conclusion

If you have a small business, you’ll want to get an email hosting account. This will help you project a more professional image, run email campaigns without storage limitations, secure your communications, and more. 

The best email hosting for small business will offer security features like spam protection, scalable plans, and 24/7 support. If you schedule calls or appointments, you might look for additional features like integrated calendars.

NameHero’s email hosting service includes all of the above and more. Plans start at just $3.95 per month and are ideal for startups and small businesses. Learn more about our email hosting platform!