New domain and Outlook email

Fleabite

Hello


Could you please tell me how to buy a domain name and then set up an email address using Outlook.


I need to do this in order to show a business profile to research suppliers before I set up a fully fledged website.


Thank you


FB

esuhl

Buying a domain name is pretty straightforward. Just go to a (reputable) domain registrar and register your chose domain.

You then need an email host. You could (in theory) run your own mail server, or use the email hosting service that your domain registrar (or any other third party) provides.

If you just need a single email address, though, the cheapest/easiest thing to do would be to sign up for a free address (with someone like GMX, or maybe you have a free outlook.com address?), then log in to your domain settings and set up email forwarding to the free address.

You then need to set up your email client to collect mails (using IMAP) from the free account, but you'll need to change the sender's email address to your new domain-based one.

So, by using email forwarding, everyone emails info@mydomain.co.uk, you pick up the messages from your user123@outlook.com address, but when you reply they appear to come from info@mydomain.co.uk. Essentially, you're using the free account, but anyone emailing you only sees your professional-looking domain.

One issue you may have is in setting up an SMTP server in your mail client. SMTP is used only for sending mail (it gets collected via IMAP or POP3). If you can receive mail, but can't send any, your SMTP server may be rejecting your authentication request because it doesn't recognise the "from" email address with your own domain name. (Changing the "from" field is a trick that spammers often use, so SMTP servers often restrict this.)

To resolve the issue, you just need to inform your SMTP server providers that you wish to be able to send messages using your new domain address. Even though I never use my ISP's email service, I had to log in and add my domain name as an alias in their webmail. That then meant that the SMTP recognised my domain. Alternatively you may have to phone the SMTP server provider and ask them to manually add your domain to the whitelist.