I come across businesses all the time still using the FREE version of GMail for their business communications. So why is this a problem?

Well first of all you run a risk of losing critical business data and then there’s the whole issue of how your customers might see you professionally.

Sending emails from a free GMail account doesn’t do much for your brand image either.

Reason # 1 Data Security Issue

Gmail started off as a personal Free email service which it supports by displaying ads. As such there’s limited support from Google should your email get hacked or you lose access for any reason,

If this happens, there’s very little chance of getting it back. This means you risk losing access to valuable data not to mention the security issues involved. Your data could end up anywhere!

Remember, it’s not just YOUR data you need to protect, you also need to ensure any incoming data from others is safe. There are strict compliance laws in respect to how you handle and store your customer’s data which you as a business are obligated to comply with. Don’t risk this!

This is especially important to Healthcare businesses where you may be dealing with some pretty sensitive and confidential patient information.

Reason # 2 Professionalism and Brand Image

If you’re using the free version of gmail then your email address will look like this yourbusinessname@gmail.com or yourname@gmail com – depending on which you use for business.

Examples of this would be:

• mikeysplumbing@gmail.com or mikey@gmail.com 
• abcdental@gmail.com or drgreg@gmail.com

Not too professional hey! 🤔

As opposed to using the business version of Gmail G Suite where your gmail is set up on your own business domain.

This means these same emails would look like this.

• enquiries@mikeysplumbing.com or mikey@mikeysplumbing.com
• admin@abcdental.com or drgreg@abcdental.com

I’m sure you agree the latter email address definitely has a more professional look compared to its free Gmail counterpart, and using a custom domain name can reduce the risk of your email landing in a spam folder according to campaign monitor.

Also – customers are more  inclined to choose a company that uses a business email address compared to the ones that don’t.

Reason # 3 File Sharing & Data Storage

With the free GMail account you (as owner of the account)  don’t have full control of any files you share with others on your team or outside of your organisation.

For example – if you share a folder with someone else in Google Drive and they put something in that folder from their Gmail account they become the owner of that file, which means that they can delete that file at any time making it disappear from your Google account and then it’s gone. This as you can imagine is a serious risk! ⚠

Think of the implications too if you shared files with an employee and that employee leaves your company. What happens to any of the shared files then?

With the free account your data storage capability is only 15G which, if you’re running a business is pretty low. Withe the business version G Suite – you get 30G per user registered on your domain. 

Get G Suite Instead

As mentioned, G Suite is the professional version of free G Mail and specifically designed to business use. It has all the standard apps you use in your business every day such as:

• Google Docs – Google’s version of Word
• Google sheets – Google’s version of Excel
• Slides – Google’s version of Powerpoint and of course
• Google Calendar which is great for scheduling meetings and sending invites to your team

For the small price you pay each year per user it’s definitely worth it for all the reasons mentioned above.

How do I set up G Suite on my own domain?

While you can do it yourself with a little help from Google tutorials and guides, it’s so much easier having a licensced person do it for you. I can highly recommend IT Genius (Australia) if you don’t know where to start. I am not affiliated in any way with them however have used their services in setting up our own company G Suite Account. I found their service great.

Finally ….

Having use of free software and services is appealing to businesses … especially if you’re working on a tight budget.

However, using free GMail or your business communications not only limits the potential growth of your business but could open you up to serious data security and legal vulnerabilities that you can easily avoid with G Suite