Should I Use My Personal Email for My Small Business?

by | Apr 6, 2017

In a Word… No. Get a Professional Business Email Address Instead.

Using your personal email to conduct business is not going to help you make the best first impression with clients or potential customers. You want to establish your business as a legitimate enterprise so we strongly urge you not to use your personal hotmail, gmail, or AOL email accounts for your business. Here’s what we suggest instead: A good rule of thumb is to keep all business-related communications separate for many reasons.

  • It’s more professional
  • It’s the law
  • Better control of branding
  • It’s a powerful marketing tool

When you have your own website, there will be an opportunity to connect an email that is linked to your domain name, or URL through your web host.

Put Your Most Professional Foot Forward

Having a business email signals that you have a focused mechanism for handling business matters. Simply put, it’s more professional. Having a unique email address linked to your website gives your business credibility in the eyes of your clients and prospective customers. Once you have an email account set up with your URL, you can begin to connect with customers through a strategic email marketing campaign.

Don’t Be a Spammer

There are also laws in place to protect consumers from receiving unwanted emails (aka SPAM). When you use your personal email account, the consumer has no way to “unsubscribe” from you, should they wish to stop hearing from you. A business email, on the other hand, provides for the recipient to “opt in” or “opt out” of your communications. Read more about SPAM Laws here. By using a unique email address linked to your website URL you increase the chances of your email being opened and read.

Branding Across Platforms

A business email also allows you to maintain your branding by maintaining design elements from your website and/or product line. By personalizing your signature with business address, phone number, social media links and product or service information you take advantage of an additional opportunity to connect with a potential client or sale.

Powerful Marketing Tool

Email is only second to social media marketing in effectively reaching your customers. As we mentioned above, collecting email addresses for the purposes of marketing is a smart way to build your customer communication base. You can send newsletters, tailored offers, personalized greetings and more through your business email account and be on par with other professional businesses in your industry.

Avoid Risk

Finally, don’t risk sharing personal information accidentally by using a personal email for your business dealings. Trust us, it will save you headaches in the future!

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