Good email hosting provider for small business?

[XiZiT]

Our small business would like to setup email account for about 50 employees. We are converting everyone from Lotus to Outlook 2003. We will not be using an Exchange server but instead need an email host that has a static IP, provides atleast 100 email accounts, a lot of storage, and able to provide POP (so we can set everyone up with Outlook 2003).

Currently, MS OfficeLive is no good because they provide their email service through Hotmail, which some of you may know, is not a static IP and thus creates red flag issues with spam because each time an email is sent through their servers, the IP is different and that sometimes causes our users to be blocked or reported as spammers.

What is a good email solution for our small business?

 

[getoffb]

Have you looked into google's hosted email service? It's still a closed beta right now, but at least worth a look.

https://www.google.com/hosted

 

[DaiShan]

You could just rent a colo box from some place like servermatrix.com. $99 a month and you can host as many as you like I don't know your budget or technical expertise though.

 

[XiZiT]

Google's email hosting looks very promising. I signed up for beta testing, however, I think I might experience the same issues as with Microsoft Office Live. MOL uses hotmail, which uses dynamic IPs in their email servers, which puts up red flags from spam blocks, which in turn, makes Hotmail/OfficeLive verify some of our users to constantly validate themselves as non-spammers. This is totally unacceptable for a business.

Are there any other email hosting companies that are suitable for a small business? Network Solutions offers a great service but they limit it to only 40 email accounts

 

[azev]

I agree with DaiShan, a colo box or a dedicated server would be the best solution.
If you're on a tight budget, most web hosting provider service provide pop/smtp even with their lowest/cheapest offering.

 

[Nothinman]

Have you looked into google's hosted email service? It's still a closed beta right now, but at least worth a look.

I wouldn't put important mail on any of Google's servers, they're pretty much guaranteed to scan and index all of your messages.

 

[XiZiT]

I agree with DaiShan, a colo box or a dedicated server would be the best solution.

I briefly checked DaiShan's suggestion on the box and it seems like they're offering servers to setup a mail server (like Exchange?). This is not a good solution for a small company because a) it can get quite expensive for setup and maintenance and b) from experience, one bug/problem can cripple our entire email. I would rather rely on a reputable company to manage our email system and just pay a monthly fee.

 

[azev]

whats your budget like ??

 

[XiZiT]

The budget is not that big of an issue (when it comes to email hosting). I would take pricing options as high as $30/month per account if necessary. But again, I need atleast 50 email accounts, ability to use Online and POP for Outlook 2003, Static IP (so that spam wouldnt be an issue) and enough storage to meet space and attachment requirements (atleast 20MB for attachments).

 

[azev]

well if budget is not really a concern, I would recomend getting a managed dedicated server from these guys, www.swiftco.net, they are one of the biggest bandwidth reseller up here in the northwest and I hang out with a couple of their engineer.
Just by looking at their website, a dedicated managed server is about $400/mo. You can have them install cpanel so you can manage the user account yourself.
This way you have your own server, pleatiful of bandwidth, and unlimited email size and traffic (well, till your drive is full).
With managed server I think they do all the maintenance to the server if needed.

 

[Tsaico]

http://www.webmail.us/
I have worked with these guys before, and things worked well. I eventually moved off, but still use them as my back up for the new inhouse exchange. For the couple of months, it worked well for my clients. Oh, they had a pretty easy setup to hook in things like Treo's and Smart phones.

 

[RebateMonger]

Originally posted by: XiZiT
The budget is not that big of an issue (when it comes to email hosting). I would take pricing options as high as $30/month per account if necessary.

You can get hosted Exchange accounts for $6 to $20 per month per account. That way you don't have to deal with POP and can take advantage of all of Outlook and Exchange's information sharing features. Two reputable Exchange-hosting firms are Intermedia.net and ownwebnow.com. These are run by professionals. Ownwebnow also offers extensive anti-spam options.

Frankly, though, for 50x$30=$1500 a month, you could have a REALLY well-maintained Exchange Server of your own. LOL. Typical MS-certified consultant maintenance fees for an SBS 2003 Server (including Exchange) are around $150-$250 a month.

 

[kevnich2]

My vote is also for exchange. The best move our company made was switching to exchange. Outlook's integration and sharing features for communicatino are priceless. Worth every penny.

 

[TG2]

With that many users, hosted Exchange gets expensive, small business server can do up to 75 users I believe, and its all in 1 box and easy to setup as long as you follow the wizards.

 

[RebateMonger]

Originally posted by: kevnich2
My vote is also for exchange. The best move our company made was switching to exchange. Outlook's integration and sharing features for communication are priceless. Worth every penny.

Yeah. And I forgot to mention Exchange's integration with PDA-Phones and SmartPhones. You can get that with most hosted Exchange mailboxes, and, of course, you get it with your own Exchange Server, too. For $15 or $20 a month extra on your cell phone bill, you get unlimited Internet access and continuously updated Outlook email, contacts, calendar, and tasks.

It's miles ahead of a POP mailbox.

 

[Askalon]

Where is your company's website? had you looked into thier service? If you hosts your own, where is your register? If you have nothing, check out www.ipowerweb.com. $200 for 2 yrs, you get your domain for free and around 10,000 email accounts. On the bonus side, your pop server is your domain name.

Otherwise, I would host it yourself with exchange if you have a static ip.

 

[thirdlegstump]

With 50 users you should not be outsourcing your email, especially not with POP accounts. I would definitely look into Exchange if you're running Windows.

 

[XiZiT]

Thank you for all the advice. I've written down and taken into consideration all the websites listed here. I think the majority consensus is that we should go with Exchange server but definately hosted to avoid config and maintenance issues. Just wondering what's wrong with POP, since a reliable host would be able to forward us all the emails as would an Exchange server? I dont have a problem with setting up each PC manually in Outlook 2003 for POP.

 

[RebateMonger]

Originally posted by: XiZiT
.... what's wrong with POP, since a reliable host would be able to forward us all the emails as would an Exchange server?

Exchange =
Shared Contacts, shared Calendars, shared Tasks, and shareable mailboxes
Automatically synchronized informaition from anywhere you log in
Works with PDAs and SmartPhones and Laptops
Automatic retention and recovery of accidentally deleted items
Data stored securely on central Server

POP =
No way to share information
No synchronized calendars, contacts, and tasks
Email only available from one computer
Doesn't work with PDAs or SmartPhones
Deleted email gone forever
Data stored on vulnerable client PC, subject to hard drive failure and other mishaps

 

[XiZiT]

Your point is well taken and we are definately going with Exchange. I am shopping around for prices and reputable companies. It seems they all offer about the same pricing for 50 users, 1 gb of storage --- ~$10/mo per email, ~$500-$1000 for server maintenance/mo ... is this a fair assumption?

Thanks in advance.

 

[DaiShan]

Originally posted by: XiZiT
Your point is well taken and we are definately going with Exchange. I am shopping around for prices and reputable companies. It seems they all offer about the same pricing for 50 users, 1 gb of storage --- ~$10/mo per email, ~$500-$1000 for server maintenance/mo ... is this a fair assumption?

Thanks in advance.

For point of reference, my users go through about a gig a year in email storage, so you would have to see about adding more space per mailbox with the hosting provider at that point. We use IMAP so a copy is always stored on the server. It's purely a mail protocol though, and Outlook has some quirks when dealing with IMAP. I still think that you should consider working with a local business for maintenance and hosting the box yourself for that many users. For 5 or 10 users or maybe even 25 mail hosting might be the best option, but 50 users is a lot.

 

[XiZiT]

Originally posted by: DaiShan
For point of reference, my users go through about a gig a year in email storage, so you would have to see about adding more space per mailbox with the hosting provider at that point. We use IMAP so a copy is always stored on the server. It's purely a mail protocol though, and Outlook has some quirks when dealing with IMAP. I still think that you should consider working with a local business for maintenance and hosting the box yourself for that many users. For 5 or 10 users or maybe even 25 mail hosting might be the best option, but 50 users is a lot.

It just seems that it will cost too much. I figure an Exchange host will cost about $10x50 users + $500-600/mo = 1000-$1200 monthly whereas having it in house is going to cost about $12k - $20k off the bat plus everytime there will be an issue we have to pay for more tech support hours. It's 50 users but, I doubt half would even use there email frequently.

 

[DaiShan]

Originally posted by: XiZiT

Originally posted by: DaiShan
For point of reference, my users go through about a gig a year in email storage, so you would have to see about adding more space per mailbox with the hosting provider at that point. We use IMAP so a copy is always stored on the server. It's purely a mail protocol though, and Outlook has some quirks when dealing with IMAP. I still think that you should consider working with a local business for maintenance and hosting the box yourself for that many users. For 5 or 10 users or maybe even 25 mail hosting might be the best option, but 50 users is a lot.

It just seems that it will cost too much. I figure an Exchange host will cost about $10x50 users + $500-600/mo = 1000-$1200 monthly whereas having it in house is going to cost about $12k - $20k off the bat plus everytime there will be an issue we have to pay for more tech support hours. It's 50 users but, I doubt half would even use there email frequently.

Where did you come up with $12k? We bought a dual xeon with 4 gigs of RAM from dell and u320 raid 5 for ~4k, that is more than enough system to be an exchange server. Also, what do you currently use for email? Is this your company or are you the tech or? I try to evaluate my client's current needs and work to anticipate future ones, so I would suggest that you first determine how heavily utilized your current system is. Without knowing your current usage, any plan that you make will be a shot in the dark. I don't want you to think that you can't or shouldn't use an email host, it might be exactly what you need, but at least give all options a fair look.

 

[Tsaico]

For $12k I will come out and see you and setup the server myself... PM me the addy and a deposit for aire fare...

 

[XiZiT]

Small company, maximum amount of users will be 50, and of the current employees maybe half will use the email server to its full advantage. I decided to go with 1 of the big 5 exchange hosts (I just googled in "exchange server host" or something like that). Basically getting 60gb of data and email storage, 30 user accounts and all the bells and whistles that come with a hosted exchange server. It's going to be about $650/mo.