Why your business needs its own email domain

Why it's worth it

• Trust: customers are more likely to open and reply to sarah@smithplumbing.ca than smithplumbing77@gmail.com.
• Control: you own the domain, so you can change email providers and add staff while keeping the same addresses.
• Staff changes: when someone leaves, their mailbox stays with the business.
• Security: with SPF, DKIM and DMARC set up, it's much harder for scammers to send email pretending to be you.

What you need

1. A domain name, like yourbusiness.ca. A .ca requires a Canadian presence, which suits local businesses.
2. Email hosting: from your web host (like BDT Hosting), Microsoft 365, or Google Workspace.
3. The DNS set up properly (MX, SPF, DKIM and DMARC records), so your email arrives reliably. See Why your emails land in spam.

Tips

• Keep it short and easy to spell over the phone.
• Register the domain in your own name, and keep the login yourself.
• Use info@ or hello@ publicly, and personal addresses for staff.

Moving from Gmail?

Your old emails can come with you, and the old address can forward for a while so nothing gets missed.