Does One Size Fit All?

For the vast majority of users there is little consideration needed when looking into whether to opt for dedicated email hosting or to plump for an all-inclusive hosting account. For the majority of websites it is fair to assume that a web hosting account that includes email accounts will be more than sufficient. However, it is important to remember that the size of a website is not necessarily indicative of the amount of email traffic an organization will receive. Instead it is important to look at the number of people in an organization and the amount of email they will receive.

Consider Your Organization, Not Your Website

Data pertaining to your organization is far more important than your website statistics. Websites can receive thousands of unique hits per day but still not require a dedicated email hosting account. You should have a reasonably good idea of just how many emails you are likely to receive in a single day. Single line emails that contain no images, or more importantly documents, also use comparatively little in the way of bandwidth.

Separate Email Hosting

Large organizations are the ones that are more likely to require the use of email hosting that is separate to their web hosting. The increased number of people within an organization means many more emails will be sent and received, which in turn means an increase in email traffic. Because shared hosting attempts to share a single server between multiple websites it is usually necessary for them to also limit the size and number of email accounts offered.

An email hosting account may also place these limitations on their customers but because you are not combining your web hosting with your email hosting it is more flexible. Using separate accounts means that you can closely manage how much space you need for your emails and upgrade your account accordingly.

The Cost Of Wanting More With A Web Hosting Package

Web hosts that offer email as part of their packages may enable you to upgrade the email accounts you have, but if you suddenly find yourself using more than allowed then it would generally be charged at a premium rate until you agree to an upgrade with your host.

Features

Email hosting may also offer improved features when compared to hosting accounts. Instead of being forced to use only a limited amount of email addresses and limited autoresponders, email forwarding, and mailing lists you should be able to find inexpensive email hosting that offers either much larger numbers of these features or even unlimited offerings.

Dedicated Email Servers

A dedicated email server offers perhaps the most features. As with a dedicated web server it can be completely configured to meet your exact needs by the host. This means that you can have any software you need installed and any software you don’t need uninstalled. Dedicated servers, though, can cost a considerable amount of money and very few organizations require this kind of power. If you have hundreds of employees that rely heavily on the receipt and transmission of data intensive emails then it could be the option for you.

Conclusion

Email hosting does not need to be done directly through your web hosting account. However, smaller organizations that employ very few people and are not reliant on sending and receiving large packages of data should find that an all-inclusive account offers ample resource. Consider the needs of your organization and your employees when making the final decision, and remember that the size of your website is basically irrelevant to your email requirements. As well as considering the number of employees and the amount of data to be sent via email consider the features that are received with each of the options.