When you decide to move your company online, you will be faced with a number of crucial choices, one of the most significant of which is selecting email and web hosting services.
There are many hosting services available, catering to customers of varying needs and financial means. Some companies prefer to use the same hosting provider for their website as well as their email, while others choose to utilize separate hosting providers for each of these services. When it comes to selecting your host, there is no right or wrong answer; nonetheless, the size of your company, as well as the money that it has available, will often dictate which choice you go with.
If you are unsure what a web host and email host have to offer, or if you are debating whether or not to use the same website and email host, it is in your best interest to familiarise yourself with the benefits and drawbacks of shared hosting so that you can make the choice that will be most beneficial to you and your company.
What’s the difference between hosting your website and your email?
Understanding the distinction between web hosting and email hosting may be challenging due to the wide variety of hosting services that are now accessible and the fact that some hosting companies provide mixed plans. In order to help you make an informed decision, here is a brief rundown of the features shared by both services:
Website hosting – In a word, a web host is a service that enables a company, organization, or person to put their website online and make it available to everyone on the Internet. After receiving a business space on the webserver to store their website’s files from a web host, a company’s website may then become operational and be accessed over the internet.
Email hosting- It refers to a service that a provider makes available for usage by end-users email servers that are rented out on a temporary basis. By using an email host, companies are able to make use of their own domain name inside their emails and have their incoming and outgoing emails controlled by a dedicated mail server. In addition, email hosts allow businesses to save money.
Do you need to use both?
Hosting a website and hosting email accounts are two distinct services that may function independently of one another. You are able to use an email host even if you do not have a website, and vice versa, you are also able to create a website even if you do not have an email host.
Even though email hosting isn’t required for a website, it may be of tremendous use to your company and can be simply connected to your domain name. This is true regardless of whether or not your website is hosted by the same provider as your email hosting.
Using a paid email hosting service rather than a free email provider comes with a number of benefits. Hosting your email via a third party not only protects your inbox but also assures that you may read your messages from any location as long as you have access to the internet. You have the ability to choose your own email domain name when you use a hosting service. This means that you may lend an air of professionalism to your correspondence by using your company name in your email address.
Using the same web and email hosting: Yes, or no?
An email is a critical tool for small business owners, and it may have a significant impact on your company’s growth, revenue, and client loyalty. Many organizations, both large and small, use an email host to optimize their business emails, while others utilize the same website and email server (also known as “bundled hosting”), which is a common practice.
Although it’s the most frequent practice for a company to utilize the same web and email hosting provider, this does not imply that this is the only choice. The ideal solution will vary from company to business, based on what you intend to gain out of the service and if you should utilize the same website and email hosting provider.
Here’s a complete analysis of the benefits and drawbacks of utilizing the same web and email hosting:
Advantages of shared hosting
- It’s simple to set up since you can use the same hosting provider for both your website and your email, saving you time and familiarising you with the host’s operations.
- It is far less expensive to utilize a web server that includes email hosting in a package offer than it is to use two separate providers.
- Using an email host has many of the same benefits.
- Most of the benefits of utilizing an independent email provider such as a domain name and email accessibility are still available to you if you utilize a web hosting service for your email.
- Some shared hosting firms offer the ability to host many tiny email accounts for one set fee as part of their web and email package.
- Shared websites and email hosting are a realistic choice for small enterprises since they have a smaller staff and a smaller budget to divide the services between two providers.
Disadvantages of shared hosting
- If your website and email are hosted on the same server, every email you send and receive, as well as any attachments, will take up space and bandwidth that might be used to serve your website.
- Using the same email and website host puts you at risk of a full blackout if the service goes down. Clients will be unable to reach you through your website or email if all servers go down, which is exceedingly improbable.
- Most shared hosting bundles can’t handle large businesses because they demand too much database support and server setup, which is beyond the capabilities of the majority of shared hosting plans.
- In order to relocate your website to a new server, you’ll have to go through a lengthy email migration if you’re still utilizing the same email provider. Email migration, on the other hand, may be quite difficult and time-consuming for individuals who aren’t familiar with the process.
Shared web and email hosting: the verdict
A company may save money and time by using the same website and email service. If you stay with the same host, you may take advantage of a slew of special package offers, and shared hosting can even be handled by a third party to take some of the burdens off your shoulders.
This is especially true if you’re searching for a more high-tech email service and have the resources and staff in place to handle it effectively.
In the end, a shared host bundle is an excellent choice if you’re searching for a low-cost, simple-to-use email service. It’s worth it to invest in a dedicated email server if your company needs an email service that can handle a large database while still providing excellent functionality.
Why do businesses still use the same website and email host?
However, despite the advantages of employing distinct servers, many organizations continue to utilize the same web host for their website as well as their email service provider.
Even for small companies, many still choose to utilize the same website and email server since they are unfamiliar with the world of hosting and want all of their data to be available in one location.
As a result, many of the companies that use shared hosting have a limited budget. In the past, a small firm couldn’t afford to operate two distinct email services since it needed IT professionals and additional labor to maintain in-house mail servers.
Even while cloud services have reduced the number of employees needed to manage email, they haven’t eliminated the need for small firms to use their own dedicated servers.
When starting out, many new and small companies choose to utilize shared hosting since it is less expensive than purchasing a dedicated email server.
How to configure email on a different host
Sharing hosting plans may be a good option for some people, but they may later realize that it’s not for them. Using a separate host for your email means you’re not tied to your website’s host; if your preferences change, you can easily switch hosts.
One of the biggest reasons company owners delay separating their hosting services is the perceived difficulty of utilizing a separate email server from your website host.
You’ll need to get your domain’s DNS records before you can switch email providers. In your domain’s DNS records, or by contacting your domain registrar, you should find these. You should be able to get two sets of information from your records:
“A” records, sometimes called address records, specify which IP addresses belong to a domain name.
Your domain’s mail server is specified by the MX record, which is also known as a mail exchanger record.
It’s now time to sign up for an independent email provider and arrange your MX records so that you may redirect all of your domain’s email (and hence all of its traffic) to your new server.
There are several registrars that let you change and amend DNS records directly from their user interface. By replacing your current email server’s DNS data with the data for your new email host, you may remove, amend, or create a new MX record and redirect your emails to a different host on your own.
You may need to contact other registrars in order to change your domain’s A record. It’s a good idea to review your current host’s specs to see if there are any instructions on how to achieve this.
In order to make the best hosting decisions,
Making the appropriate choice of web hosting is essential when starting a company online. When hiring a web host, think of them as an employee you’re interviewing for a position.
It’s probable that the size and budget of your company will be decisive factors when it comes to email hosting solutions. When starting off, it’s preferable for small companies to stick with the same web host and email provider. In order to ensure the best possible performance, larger firms with more resources and staff would opt for different hosts.
