Your domain and business email: a setup guide that prevents the 3 am panic
A lapsed domain takes your website and your email down at the same moment. It happens to small businesses every week, and almost always for the same few reasons.
Domains are cheap and easy to buy, which is part of the problem. They are often registered years ago by a nephew, a former employee or a long gone web designer, under an email address nobody checks. Then the card on file expires.
Make sure you own it
- Look up who the registrant is. It should be your business, not a person who no longer works with you.
- Check that the contact email on the domain is one you read every day.
- Turn on auto renewal and keep a valid card on file, ideally a company card.
- Renew for several years at once if you can. It removes one yearly risk.
Email on your own name
An address at your own domain looks more trustworthy and stays with the business when staff change. Use role addresses such as orders@ and info@ that forward to the right people, so a resignation never cuts off customers.
The three records that keep mail out of spam
- SPF lists the servers allowed to send mail for your domain.
- DKIM signs each message so receivers can check it was not altered.
- DMARC tells receivers what to do when the first two fail, and sends you reports.
Once a year
Put a yearly reminder in the calendar: check the domain owner and expiry date, confirm the card on file, and remove mailboxes for people who left. It takes fifteen minutes and prevents the worst kind of Monday morning.
The people who design, host and maintain small business websites at Silicon Data Corp in San Jose. About us
