Updated: Jan 31, 2023
“A recent survey pointed out that, 43% of UK adults agreed that a branded email address looks more professional than a generic one and a further 33% were more likely to buy from a business with an email address that is personalised to align with your own domain name.”
If you are planning on running a startup business or if you already run a small to medium sized business of any kind, then this article should be of interest to you. Of course, one of the first things that you will be wanting to do when setting up your own business is to create your own website and email accounts to approach potential customers with. So why should you use professional email instead of a generic free email account? For starters, a professional business email account comes with several perks that free email accounts simply cannot compete with, we will be looking into these perks for you below. Here are just a few of the key benefits of operating a professional business email account.
Communication:
The first thing that you need to remember is that most of your potential clients will be far more impressed with an email that includes your domain name within it, a professional header and footer section as well as the ability to include a versatile HTML branding signature facility should you so wish to do so. It is also important that your prospective leads and potential customers get the feeling that they are dealing with a professional organisation and that your business comes across as a professional organisation from the offset. Professional email accounts come with some real advantages, but these can differ depending more on the email provider rather than the account capabilities themselves. Some providers may be able to supply you with additional storage space at a drop of a hat and enable you to host videos within the email body etc, therefore, suppliers that own and run their own servers will be in a better position to manage and support you in your growth period.
Trust:
Customers, especially new customers will trust a lot more than they do free email accounts, so they are far more likely to read your emails instead of deleting them altogether or mistaking them for spam. This is mainly because professional email accounts are often associated with your domain name and so it makes a good first impression and establishes more trust. Customers are more likely to read an email received from a business account and are therefore, more than likely to react and reply to you.
Cost effective:
The common belief is that professional business email is expensive, but that could not be further from the truth. If you are currently losing business due to the use of a free email account then by choosing to adopt a professional email account you will be saving money and gaining new customers as a result. For example, taking this to the next level you could even set up various professional email accounts specifically for marketing reasons or to leave the impression of a larger and more professional company from the offset. Maybe info@, enquiries@ etc, this way you can reach out to your audience directly, listing out the key benefits of your products and services and in the process, communicate more professionally from day one. As a result of presenting your business more professionally your inbound traffic is likely to increase, bringing with it a growth in sales which is why it always pays to opt for a professional from day one over a free email account.
If you require further information on how to setup or obtain a professional email account for your business, you will need to speak to a professional hosting provider like Dorset’s award-winning SEO Flatrate, who will be able to assist you with any questions you may have and help you to setup your mail accounts. You will be able to reach SEO Flatrate on +44 (0)1202 911141.
When an idea develops into a business opportunity, this is commonly referred to as a startup business or "startup" for short.
However, there is one thing that all startups have in common; they all require an online presence in the form of a blog or website, for example, to share and promote their products and services for others to buy.
Creating a new website can be a stressful experience, many startups may even consider trying to build their own website to keep the costs down, alternatively they may decide to hire an experienced web designer or web development company to help bring their business ideas to life for them. However, web designers and developers can be very expensive and sometimes the cost of these services can be very vague or unclear, raising the risk of encountering hidden charges that may not have been taken into consideration within the initial business plan and could prove fatal to a small startup with a limited budget.
For that reason, many startups and small to medium businesses today are choosing to embrace new and more modern ways of working such as ‘Rent a website’ services. Rent a website services remove the need for risk and binding contracts, so they are ideally suited to startups and small to medium sized businesses today.
Rent a Website's provide a totally 100% scalable online service offering, removing the need for minimum term agreements and providing a clear and transparent pricing model from the offset. There are no hidden charges whatsoever with Rent a website services and they provide a tailored approach to meeting the needs of any modern-day business looking to keep running costs to a minimum whilst remaining 100% flexible in their approach. Startup businesses can also benefit from the product scalability of a Rent a website offering, as they allow businesses to upgrade their services when business is on the up and downgrade them again should times get tough.
Startups who choose to rent their website instead of going down the old-fashioned route of hiring in a web designer and/or developer will benefit as there are no hidden charges and they can rely on an expert team to carry out all the work for them on their behalf, allowing them to concentrate on running a business and not worrying about their cash flow.
Rent a Website services should include the cost of the website build, website hosting, On-page SEO, monthly updates and a time bank for any monthly changes needed, the charges vary and can start from as little as £9.99 per month depending on the level of service required. Rent a website services should also be easily upgraded to include other services such as professional email, Search Engine Optimisation, XML sitemaps and more.
Why keeping the cost of development down is so important?
Building a website for your startup business could end up costing thousands of pounds and once you add up all the additional charges for possible changes needed to complete them this can easily spiral out of control. Bear in mind, that you may need to pay additional charges for on-page SEO or hidden services charges if the service over runs, or last-minute changes are required. It is also worth bearing in mind that updates and backups can at times be very time-consuming depending on the size of the website, so when taking out such services these should always be included as part of the project.
Key benefits of a Rent a Website service:
100% transparency, just one monthly charge to cater for all your needs
100% scalable to suit your business model
No contracts or minimum term
No hidden charges for hosting, backups or on-page SEO
Expert team of professional web designers on call
Personal account manager
SEO Flatrate provides a wide range of services for all types of online businesses throughout the UK and for most English speaking countries globally. We offer bespoke consultation for startups as well as established businesses. We can assist you in securing your domain name for your new business idea. Feel free to contact us today for a free consultation and to help you get your business off the ground.
If you would like to hear more about our services please contact the SEO Flatrate team 01202 911141 or email the office, we are here Monday to Friday 9am - 5pm
A philosopher once said - ‘what’s in a name’; but when choosing the correct domain name for your business, this could be the key to your success. In this modern digital world. the "WWW" or the "World Wide Web" as we now know it, has uncountable websites and they are increasing rapidly on a day by day basis. So, if you want to help your business to the top of the search engines, you may need to be a little more selective about your business’ domain name than you had originaly thought.
Here are 5 tips you may want bear in mind:
1. It has to be short and related to your business niche - make sure you choose the closest available domain name possible.
2. Additionally, the name needs to be catchy and memorable if possible, or people won’t be able to remember it.
3. Choose the correct extension for your domain name for maximum efficiency. Example:
If you plan on starting up a car repair business, then your domain name could be carrepair.co.uk, make sure you steer away from domain-names like friendlyrepairman.org as such names can be harder to identify.
4. Furthermore, you should try to to use a related keyword in the domain name for better SEO results. Just like in the previous example: ‘car repair’ could then also become your seed keyword for the website, this will assist your online marketing for your website too and help you get found on the search engines.
5. Try to avoid hyphens or numbers in your domain, thats because they can often be misunderstood by the user or your viewer. Going back to our example, you would not want a name like www.car-repair123.com unless you have the additonal branding and marketing budget to invest in marketing it.
Significantly, choosing a domain name is like creating a brand or logo for your business. It needs to feel right. Research it, try several domain name providers, compare pricing then you may find the best domain-name first time round. You need to research and purchase the right domain name before anyone else steals it away from you, otherwise you may end up having to buy it back from an online broker and that could prove to be an expensive excercise.
Finally, when you have the right domain-name in your basket, don't waste time thinking about it as this may result in someone else securing it before you do. Buy it and let the journey begin. Remember even the longest journey always starts with the first step.
SEO Flatrate provides a wide range of services for all types of online businesses throughout the UK and for most English speaking countries globally. We offer bespoke consultation for startups as well as established businesses. We can assist you in securing your domain name for your new business idea. Feel free to contact us today for a free consultation and to help you get your business off the ground.
If you would like to hear more about our services please contact the SEO Flatrate team 01202 911141 or email the office, we are here Monday to Friday 9am - 5pm
