We try and push our clients to use Google Apps or Office365 for email – some just don’t want to pay for email though and think it should be included in the hosting.
There are 2 issues with hosting email, the first is support – luckily I come from an enterprise back ground and I am well versed in setting up Outlook and Mac Mail with email accounts.
The second, the bigger of the 2 issues is dealing with spam. We could run a spam filter service in house but that would mean more servers and/or more resources; more software to secure, manage and backup and we would have to allow for all email being addresssed to a domain to be received – including spam emails and emails to users that don’t even exist. We would also need to store flagged emails just in case the email was a false positive and the client needed/wanted it.
We need a 3rd party filtering solution. A few basic requirements need to be met:
- It has to be easy to use so our clients could add and remove email accounts without having to configure another service
- It has to integrate with Plesk, we wanted the client to be able to control everything from Plesk
- It has to a offer a subscription model
The answer in Spam Experts and of course their Plesk add-on.
Using their cloud based email filtering solution met all our requirements and provided the following benefits:
- We could lock down incoming mail connections to the filtering service – better security
- We know that all email traffic to the server is legitimate – less traffic
- No need to run a backup mail server – lower TCO
- No need to run a spam filter service locally – no wasted resources
- Users could access email even if the server was offline.
There is a cost involved in using Spam Experts, but for around £100.00 per month for 250 domains with inbound and outbound filtering we felt that this was a more cost effective solution than managing it in house and/or dealing with users complaining about spam. Their support is fantastic too.
Installation is simple, once you have signed up for an account there is one command that needs to be executed on the server to get spam filtering up and running – you can even white label it if you wish.
Once installed configure your DNS templates so that the SpamExperts MX records and SPF are set correctly for every new domain you setup.
You will also need to configure your outbound email so all email sent from your server will be filtered by SpamExperts. There are excellent guides on the SpamExperts website to assist in setting up almost all type of email servers.
We include Spam Experts in all our server builds. Does your current provider? If not then why not give us a try? Click below to find out about our current offers:
Or why not call us on +44 1622 320340 or click below to find out how to contact us:
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