Should You Run Your Own Business Email, or Have It Managed?
You can set up and run business email yourself, or have it managed for you. Here is an honest look at what each one really takes, and who should pick which.
Every growing business hits this question eventually: do we set up and run our own business email, or pay someone to manage it? Both are legitimate choices. Here is the honest trade-off, minus the sales pitch.
Doing it yourself
On paper, this is the cheaper path. You buy the licenses directly and set everything up. The catch is that "everything" is more than it looks. You become the email administrator: creating accounts, configuring the behind-the-scenes security records so mail delivers and nobody can spoof you, migrating people's mail when they join or leave, and troubleshooting the day something starts landing in spam. If you have the technical comfort and the time, it is doable.
Having it managed
Here, someone else does all of that. Setup, migration, the security records, ongoing support, one bill. You trade a little money for a lot of time and the confidence that it is done right. For a team without in-house IT, that trade is usually a bargain, because the hours you would spend wrestling with mail servers are hours you are not spending running your business.
The honest tiebreaker
- Small, technical, and you enjoy tinkering? Running it yourself can absolutely work.
- Growing, no dedicated IT person, and you just need email to work? Managed is almost certainly worth it.
Where we land
Squish does managed Microsoft 365. The license costs the same as buying it straight from Microsoft, and we handle the setup, the migration, the security records, and the support. When something is off, you reach a human who knows your account, or you sort it yourself with Faber if you would rather. Your email, without the second job.