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3 Reasons Why Personal Email is Not for Work

Many entrepreneurs started their businesses without a lot of extra cash for expenses other than on items that are important and directly contributing to their sales on the products or services offered.

In another word, many of them did not think that they should pay for an email service for work, at least not in the beginning and this continues for years as business owners have been relying on it since the business started. A huge mistake that may cost them from catching “Big Fish” clients without even realising it.

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Here’s what we think when we see personal email addresses for work:

“If they don’t have the budget for a company email address, is their business financially healthy?”, “Are they serious about their business and brands?”,

“They’re using personal Y**oo or H**mail for work emails, do they equip themselves with the latest trend and technology? Are they outdated and stuck in the past?”

In case of confusion, let us emphasize it again, NEVER mix personal email address with work emails, your email should match your email domain. PERIOD.

If you’re one of the entrepreneurs mentioned above, here are three (3) reasons why you or your employees shouldn’t use personal email addresses for work:

1. It Appears Unprofessional & Scammy

When owners operate their business using personal email addresses, it shows that they are not serious enough with the business as they don’t allocate a small (it does not cost a fortune, really!) budget for company email addresses. How are potential clients supposed to take it seriously with an email from [email protected] or [email protected]?  

It leaves a really bad impression when clients are looking through their websites or business cards. It not only appears unprofessional but it appears scammy too. After all, if clients are going to invest their money, they want to only deal with reliable and trustworthy brands.

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2. It Shows Weak Brand Recognition

Apart from appearing unprofessional, using a personal email address for work is hurting your brand’s image. Imagine that you’re introducing yourself and what you offer via email but your clients are being hesitant as the email is sent from a random personal email address, or worse, it is filtered by the spam mailbox before reaching the recipients.

A brand is a company’s most valuable asset as it represents the company and brand recognition is crucial for every business to stand out among its competitors. It comprises name, logo, mark, and other identifying characteristics.

You may have a unique brand logo, a beautiful website, and great products but when you are using a personal email address on your “Contact Us” page, it is as if a black dot on a piece of white paper. Setting up a company email address is cost-efficient too, it only starts with RM15.60/user per month, which comes with web and mobile versions of Microsoft Office apps. Find out more about Microsoft 365 from us here!

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3. You Don’t Have Any Control Over the Email Accounts

If the first two reasons are not strong enough to convince you to change, what about security and control over personal email addresses? There is countless sensitive and confidential information related to your business and clients that are sent and received in a single day. If your employees use personal email addresses for work, it means they can access all this information and valuable data even after they have left the company and you, as the business owners, can’t terminate the email access because it is not owned by you. On the other hand, if employees use company emails, you own all the emails and can access them anytime.

You may have a personal email specifically for work but it possesses serious security risks and threats to the business as you have no way of knowing where your company data is stored or where it is been transmitted. The level of virus protection for personal email may not be the same as for company email. Microsoft 365 provides robust security and reliability as there are many built-in security features depending on the plan purchased.

Using Microsoft 365, your emails are safely encrypted and all data information can be deleted in the case of lost or stolen devices. Furthermore, Microsoft 365 comes with Advanced Threat Analytics which analyses systems for suspicious behaviour on the network and scan emails for malicious links and attachments. This prevents virus-infected email attachments that could cause damage to the computer network or data leakage to hackers.

A work email address for your business is just as important as having a brand logo. If you’re considering switching from a personal email address to a professional company email address, it just starts from RM15.60/user per month!

Contact us now and let us assist you in the process of transition without the hassles!