Knowledge Base/Official Insight Help/Domain names, DNS and Email

Setting Up Email

Justin Ruffell-Ward - Insight Support
posted this on December 13, 2010 11:53

We don't provide email hosting because there are now providers of free email accounts who offer excellent email hosting services which you can use. This enables us to focus our time on what we do best - the Insight product.

Gmail Logo
We suggest using the Free Standard edition of Corporate GMail as your email hosting solution. 

Key features of the GMail Standard Edition service

  • Send email from your own domain name, not "gmail.com". This enables you to retain pure branding of your organisation in all communications.
  • Up to 10 email accounts. These addresses may be created individually or via a bulk upload.
  • Administrators will have access to a dashboard to manage all aspects of the email accounts, including seeing the last time there were logins and the amount of space used.
  • Pop3 and IMAP are available for users wishing to use a desktop mail client e.g.Outlook. Webmail users can enjoy the generous 7GB per account allowance.
  • Excellent Spam protection and reliable service.

If you need more from your email service there's a Premier Edition Google Apps service available.

In an attempt to make the GMail set up process easier for you we've provided a detailed guide below. For users with existing email accounts with us we're happy to talk you through any difficulties you have migrating to GMail.

We are however not liable for any matters relating to GMail or it's activities and will not provide support for it's email service. GMail though is a highly reliable service and has it's own helpful guides.

Easy Setup Instructions

Please follow our easy set up instructions below to create email accounts with GMail and migrate your existing email accounts.

 

Step 1 - Sign-up with Google Apps

  
You will need authorization rights from your organization to use your existing domain name (make sure you have permission to do this) and identify who the account administrator will be. Next visit http://www.google.com/a/cpanel/domain/new to create your Google Apps administrator account. When signing up make sure you do the following:
  • Under 'I want to use an existing domain' select 'Administrator: I own or control this domain'
  • On the registration form there's an option labelled 'I understand that if I cannot alter DNS records for my domain, I may impact my organization's ability to use Google Apps.' Check this box, if you have access to alter your DNS records or if you know we control your DNS, as we will make the appropriate changes for you.
  • When creating the administrator account enter the username that you wish to be used as the alias of your email account, this would often be firstname.lastname e.g.pablo.picasso. You can enter additional aliases later e.g.pablo.
When you've created your administrator account you'll be sent to the Google Apps dashboard. Please move to Step 2 for instructions on verifying your domain.

SignUp

Step 2 - Verify Domain Ownership

  
Verifying domain ownership is a very simple process that is required for you to utilize your email. Although Google indicates that it may take up to 48 hours to verify, don't be surprised if it's completed in just under 10 minutes. Watch our verify domain ownership video below to see how to do this.

Step 3 - Create Email accounts, test and inform users

  

Next you'll need to create the email accounts you require; you should include all the current email accounts you have to minimise the disruption to any email accounts. View our  video below to see a demonstration on how to create GMail accounts.

 

Once you've created the email accounts required you can test them by sending an email from and to your Google account (use the temporary google address when sending to your GMail account). See Google's instructions on testing GMail accounts for more details, although their auto-forwarding testing instructions do over complicate this though, you can simply email the temporary address directly instead.

You should also send your email account holders instructions on how they can access their GMail account i.e.go to http://google.com/a/yourdomainname and provide them with their login details. This should be done before moving to Step 4 otherwise their email will start being delivered to their GMail account which they don't have access to.

  

Step 4 - Change the MX records

  
If we are controlling your DNS then you can call Endis Technical Support on 0844 736 5298 ext2 to let us know you are ready for us to make the changes to your MX records. Note:If you have existing active email accounts some emails that are sent to you between us changing the MX records and the activation of your email accounts may be undelivered and returned to the sender.

If you have additional domain names that function with the same email accounts on your primary domain name then you should read Google's Domain Aliases Help for instructions on how to add these to your account. You should also let us know so we can also repoint the MX records of these additional domains to Google's servers.

 
Step 5- Activate your email accounts

  

After we've confirmated that the MX records have been changed, log back into Google Apps as an administrator. Then just follow the instructions on the video below to activate your GMail accounts. Once this is complete email will begin to be delivered to the GMail accounts. Users should also access their previous email accounts to check for email delivered before the switch was made.

 

Step 6 - Accessing your email account

  
GMail offers various ways to access your email accounts including POP3 and IMAP. We recommend using IMAP. For details on the access options available and how to configure your desired option see GMail access choices. 

Import Email: Interested in importing your existing email addresses and contacts into your new account?  Just use the Google Email Uploader. Alternatively if you only wish to upload your contacts then see Google's importing contacts by CSV instructions.
 

Comments

User photo
John Dunne

I found this useful, however the option to upload an HTML file did not work as shown in the video in Step 2. The URL Redirection was set correctly, but the site would not display the page content, automatically adding its own redirect... to the home page! This could be because of the header content, including images, on every page of the site, but Google couldn't find the content i had added. Eventually I worked out that I could use the alternative 'meta tag' route without having to enter programming code into the site (as suggested by Google) by going to Settings ... General ... Page Titles & Meta Tags and copying the <title> and <random character-string> into the Name and Content boxes under 'Add new meta tag'. If going down this route, you copy the text inside the <> but not the <> characters. It would have been useful to have had this option explained in the video as it was easy once I worked out where to look to add a meta tag for the whole site. (Other meta tags can be added to individual documents/pages using the 'Properties' tab when editing.)

Step 4 was, for me, the most efficient. Endis created the MX records to point emails to Google in under 30 minutes from the start of my call. Thanks Technical Support!

January 24, 2012 16:10
Add a comment