Came up with an email adresses philosophy
Even though my startup is a company of one, I learned that having email communication through multiple email addresses on the company domain is crucial.

Before that I was using a one-fit-for-all email address zlatko@domain.com. It was a big mistake, as it negativelly affected my email deliverability for my promotional and transactional messages. So, I decided to come up with the following philosophy.


Account-level email addresses


general@domain.xyz
Do use it only for registrations at various online services.
Don‘t use it to communicate with customers.

hi@domain.xyz
Do use it to receive general inquiries.
Do use it to reply to the same inquiries.

letter@domain.xyz
Do use it only for email marketing and promotional emails.
Don‘t use it to communicate with customers.
Note: This is an alias that redirects to hi@domain.xyz

info@domain.xyz
Do use it only for transactional emails.
Don‘t use it to communicate with customers.
Note: This is an alias that redirects to hi@domain.xyz


Person-specific emails


name@domain.xyz
Do use it for more specific communication with customers expect a reply from that specific person.
Don‘t use it for promotional or transactional emails.

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In general, most email communication between the startup and the startup would happen in hi@domain.xyz, while the others will serve for specific needs, and since they are aliases, will redirect the email traffic to hi@domain.xyz.

I‘ve realised that even though you are a one-person startup, you need multiple email addresses. And here is why:

1. Your members can set up specific filters for your emails. For example, they might want to receive your newsletter in their Promotional tab on Gmail but want their direct communication with you to arrive in their inbox.

2. Reserving different emails for promotional and transactional communication will help you with email deliverability. For example, if your promotional emails (newsletter) are mainly delivered to the Promotions tab, you don‘t want your transactional email (reset password, etc) to arrive in the same place. You want to make sure it hits the inbox.

3. You might want to have a separate email for registering for various services your community/startup needs. That‘s where most of the newsletters from those services will end up.

4. And lastly, reserving different emails for different types of communication with your community diversifies your risk in case one of your email addresses hits a certain amount of spam complaints.

That‘s all I learned thus far. Of course, there is much more to it, so I‘m happy to stir discussions on this topic, as it‘s not something often discussed, but can make or break your community if you heavily rely on email communication as part of your engagement strategy.