Ask HN: Email for Startups?

2 points by dstorrs 16y ago ↗ HN

We are setting up our Linode as a required step for launch; the DNS A records are propagating now, but I'm staring at the MX records thinking "crap...I don't want to manage a mail server."

I could use GMail For Business (or whatever they call it), but my experience with that is poor. As per standard, they use headers like this:

From: joe@company-name.com\nSender: joe@gmail.com

Unfortunately, the most common email client on the planet, Outlook, will display the Sender field in preference to the From field, so you look pretty unprofessional to Outlook users.

Are there particular hosted providers that people recommend? Or are we really stuck dealing with it ourselves?

6 comments

[ 4.6 ms ] story [ 29.4 ms ] thread

zaph0d 16y ago ↗

Not at all, for Google Apps, Google doesn't set any Sender header in emails. We use it in our startup, try it out - http://www.google.com/apps/intl/en/group/index.html

percept 16y ago ↗

I think another consideration with Gmail (Apps) is you can't set the "From" address unless it's another Gmail address you own (somebody please correct me if there's a way to do this).

So I wasn't able to emulate Craigslist, for example.

mbrubeck 16y ago ↗

Try "Settings: Accounts and Import: Send Mail As" to set a list of allowed "From" addresses. (They don't need to be GMail addresses.)

dawie 16y ago ↗

I use gmail for my domain to. It's great! My web app is even set up to send emails from it.

dstorrs 16y ago ↗

Thanks, everyone. Based on your advice I went ahead and signed up for Google. We'll see how it works out.

Scott_MacGregor 16y ago ↗

If Gmail turns out to be not what you wanted, GoDaddy is pretty good for e-mail too. The interface is easy to use, and the help files are also very good.

I'm using GoDaddy right now for the startup e-mail accounts and am very happy with them. No complaints whatsoever.