Recently, Google announced that they are closing new signups for the free version of Google Apps suite, which had Google Apps with Gmail on custom domain names. A lot of our users asked if there was a free alternative. Outlook.com is a free email service launched by Microsoft which you can use with your own domain name. Combining Outlook.com with Microsoft Skydrive’s free personal storage, Outlook.com can be very useful for professionals and website owners. In this article, we will show you how to set up your own professional branded email address with Outlook.com
What is a Professional Email?
A professional email is the one that has your business name in it. For example support@yourdomain.com is a professional email rather having yourdomain@yahoo.com. There are many ways you can setup a professional email. You can use the built-in mail server that comes with most WordPress web hosting providers. But that does not nearly match up to the features you get with Gmail.
Step by Step Guide to Setting up Outlook.com on a Custom Domain Name
In order to use Outlook on your own custom domain, you need to configure your domain’s MX and TXT Records. MX records tell domain name servers that you are using Microsoft mail servers, and TXT records will be used to verify your ownership of the domain.
Step 1: Signing up for a Custom Domain Mail Service
Go to Windows Live Admin Center and click on Get Started to start setting up your domain on Outlook.com.
Enter your domain name on the next page:
The next screen will give you a choice to either use an existing Microsoft account to administer this domain or create a new Microsoft account on your own domain name, e.g. yourname@yourdomain.com. Make sure that you give an active email address as Microsoft will send a verification email to verify your ownership of the email address.
If you opted to use an existing Microsoft account then you will be asked to sign in, otherwise you will have to fill a form to set up a new account on your custom domain. Once you fill out the form, you will receive a verification email at the email address you provided. Click the link in the email to verify your ownership of the email account.
The next page will ask you to confirm your request and accept Microsoft’s terms of service. Once you accept, you have finished the first step of setting up an administrator email account to manage your domain on Outlook.com
Step 2: Setting up DNS MX Records to use Outlook.com
After the registration, you will reach Windows Live Admin Center’s domain control page and it will be showing MX and TXT record strings which you need to add to your DNS settings.
Many WordPress hosting providers use cpanel for account management. It is likely that your web host may be using a different control panel with a slightly different interface. Don’t worry just look around for Domain Settings page, and you will find a link to edit the DNS settings or enter MX records. If you can’t find DNS or MX records settings in your control panel, then ask your web host. In this tutorial we will be using cpanel to demonstrate how to add MX records.
Log in to cpanel and click on MX Entry icon under Mail:
Select a domain name:
After this you need to select email routing method. Choose “Automatically detect configuration”.
Add the MX record string provided by Outlook.com. Leave priority as it is and add the record in the Destination field.
To protect email originating from your domain and landing into junk or spam, you need to configure sender ID by adding a TXT record with this value:
v=spf1 include:hotmail.com ~all
If you want users to use mail.yourdomain.com to sign in for email address, then you can create a CNAME record in your domain’s custom DNS settings or in cpanel’s Simple DNS Editor. Enter Mail in the Name field, and enter subdomain in CNAME field, e.g. mail.example.com.
You will have to wait for DNS settings to propagate which can take 30 minutes to 48 hours. You can refresh Windows Live Admin center’s domain settings page to see when the changes are live and ready.
Step 3: Creating Custom Domain Name Email Accounts
Go to Windows Live Admin Center and click on your active domain. On the left sidebar you will find options to manage accounts on your domain. You can choose Open Membership, so that people on your site can signup for an email account with your domain name. The other option is where you manually create email accounts for your staff, family members, friends or community members. You have the power to suspend or delete any email account on your domain at any time.
Microsoft’s new Outlook.com email service looks very promising, and it is a great option for those who are searching for a free alternative to Gogole Apps. Let us know if you have any questions and concerns regarding this Outlook.com setup.
I already have an email account on Google Apps, if I were to move to Outlook, what would happen to emails that I already have in my existing accounts on changing the MX record ? Do I have to transfer my emails from google apps to outlook?
Thank you. I have successfully setup my professional email.
But can I go to mail.mydomain.com to check mail or must I go to outlook.com every time?
Hi,
I followed the steps and everything went fine. But when I started using the email, I can send emails, but not receive them. Any idea what can be the issues?
Thanks!
I have the exact same problem. help
Hi Ana,
Have you got the solution, did your mail work fine on both send & receive ways!
If you got the solution pls let me know.
Thanks
Hi! I finally finally got to the last part.. I had to login using my old @live.com account, I never saw the DNS options when trying to signup using just my domain name http://hempconnection.net
Anyways I was able to create an info@ email for my domain, but now where do I go to login? I tried mail.mydomain.net and I just see the last page I was on showing the emails I created, but not able to actually access my new email
Screw this, Outlook and Microsoft sucks… I’ve been trying for 3 hours.. this is freaking ridiculous
Me too, I’ve been trying for 3 days using chrome, maybe I should try using I.E.
Hi Syed,
I have my website already set up at windows live admin center and the emails are already in use by users.
But now i planned to migrating my domain from godaddy to a Blue Host (i came to know about the cheapest and best service of this host by reading your site), what should i do so the emails will not be deleted and users can continue using the same mails.
Pls give me clarification thru email or on you blog. It will be very helpful for me and all others.
Thanks in advance
Janarthanan
In your bluehost account setup the MX records. Then do the transfer, and it will work.
Hi Buddy, Thanks for the info. But i’ve a doubt, before transfering a domain from Godaddy how can i setup MX records in Bluehost for the same domain. PLs explain as i was a newbie on this field.
Thanks
In the DNS settings in your Bluehost cPanel, you can specify MX records. Bluehost support will be able to help you with this.
Hi Syed,
Thanks for your info, i followed your tuts, also as per your comment i get details from Blue Host too. Now i successfully transferred my domain. And all my emails associated to it (functions on outlook.com) work fine.
Thanks once again for your great tuts.
Janarthanan
Guys,
Be careful when trying to create a “professional” email account that uses your domain; particularly when using Microsoft Outlook/Live/Hotmail…. It will send your email to the recipient, on receipt of your email the recipient will see “hotmail [a random number]@live.com ON BEHALF OF yourname@yourdomain,com”. This is not professional at all. Its actually less embarrassing than using a regular free @hotmail.com.
O, and Microsoft has no plans to correct this! I’ve tried several forums and made multiple requests.
All the best.
This isn’t true as far as I can tell. I have a couple of domains that use Outlook.com and all of them send as the actual sender. No ‘On Behalf Of’ appears anywhere – either in From: or even hidden in the message headers.
Now that Google isn’t offering a free version of Google Apps, Outlook.com is still your best bet for setting up a free, non-pop, e-mail system that can use your own domain.
Ed
Are u sure about this, does yourname@yourdomain.com not appear in the recipient mail?
Thanks for posting this Mohamed. There is no way I plan on using this now.
If you follow the directions and confirm that your DNS is configured properly and you are not sending your email through your live account as an alias of your professional domain, then this does not happen. I have mine setup and it works just fine. I have seen similar issues on Google Apps as well, but it is always due to mis-configuration.
I need a catch all alias to be sure to receive all the email adressess i used in the past…. How do i setup a catch-all with live domains? Can’t find it.
When switching from a paid hosted version with godaddy is there a way to save or move emails from the godaddy service to this free outlook.com setup?
Not entirely sure about that. Perhaps asking Godaddy would be best. Usually it is hard.
I have my website already set up at domains.live.com and the emails are already in use by users. Currently i’m migrating my domain to a new host, what should i do so the emails will not be have to be deleted and users can continue using the same mails?
If i add the mx records on the new host i can continue to use the mails on the same domains.live.com account I had?
Pls reply its important
Thanks
Hi, I am following the instructions but when i get to the screen that will give you a choice to either use an existing Microsoft account to administer this domain or create a new Microsoft account on your own domain name, e.g. yourname@yourdomain.com.
I do not get this option, it automatically goes to a regular live sign in page?
any tips?
Thanks you so much buddy.
Your article resolve my biggest problem.
God Bless You
Hi, is it possible to have more than one administrator for one domain?
Thanks
Hi,
Thanks much for the tutorial, and I’ve set up the service successfully. However, for some reason, the interface is the old version of hotmail, which is very ugly. In case you wonder what the old interface looks like, here it is http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-kDpSR53bY5U/UBnXmDiySfI/AAAAAAAAAlo/PwjJaZhdAFA/s1600/2-hotmail.jpg
Is this the interface everyone sees? How do I change it to the better interface?
Thanks.
They said they are slowly moving users over.
on the right side drop down click on upgrade to outlook or something similar
Thank you! Outlook’s support is slooooow, you’ve helped me set up my email accounts, and in the comments above I learned that I could delete and recreate an email account.
Great tutorial!!!!!!! Worked like a charm. Using Joomla CMS though & Hostgator
Thank you so much! We were using the free <10 google apps accounts and have been looking for a replacement for awhile now.
Im being asked to verify my account. Outlook is sending the verification email to the same account Im trying to access. Do you know a way around that or if I can contact Outlook?
Also, can I just remove the domain email and just start over?
Yes you can do that.
I followed the steps above and after clicking refresh Windows Live Admin Center says the service has been suspended. Any ideas how to get this corrected?
Thank you! These instructions are much better than on the Live Admin site. Thank you, thank you!
Thanks for the awesome post. Google apps for personal use was an amazing toolset, I have been forced to create forwarders to my personal gmail account which works ok for a small site, but an organization needs something bigger. I will check out outlook’s pro mail choice.
Anyone know why I’d be getting this error message for any domain I’m entering in:
“This domain name can’t be used because it contains a protected word or inappropriate language. Please contact support if you feel this is not the case.”
I get the following error :
This domain name can’t be used because it contains a protected word or inappropriate language. Please contact support if you feel this is not the case.
Not sure why that is. We would suggest that you contact their support like the error ask you to do.
I had the same thing! I searched in their forums and there were few people who had the same issue.
I have a created email address in Microsoft using my domain and
How to Manage the user account in my admin panel in Microsoft account. Is there any option to reset the user password and read the user inbox mail for admin.
thanks
Bikash
My problem is this:
Step 2: Setting up DNS MX Records to use Outlook.com
After the registration, you will reach Windows Live Admin Center’s domain control page and it will be showing MX and TXT record strings which you need to add to your DNS settings.
After the registration, it did not take me to any such page.
@Scott: you can find those strings by going to Your domains click on YourDomain.com and then click on Domain Settings link in the left sidebar.
If that doesn’t work, check the email you provided during registration for an activation email.
OK. Now I was working with the support people on hostgator to try and figure out this tutorial between the two of us. The support person at hostgator showed me where to put all the codelines from the Windows Live Admin Center. Their chat support allowed him to tell me exactly where to copy and paste the lines of code, and where to paste them.
So…….On to step 3. According to your tutorial, The Windows Live Admin Center should say, “Your service is active” after 48 hours. I obligingly waited the 48 hours, logged in again, and it still was inactive, so I saw that the Windows support says it can take 72 hours. Now a week later I log in, and all it says is: “Your service is Suspended. Please make the required DNS changes.” I was never able to get the thing to the point where it says, “Your service is active.”
So, please kindly tell me what’s going on.
When I click on mydomain.com in the YourDomains area, I’m just brought back to the YourDomains area again. It doesn’t go to a page that gives me the settings, etc.
Syed,
This is a great article and one work really investigating. I was disappointed to see Google do away with the free version of their Google Apps for Business. I had not yet really looked into Outlook.com, but will certainly have to try this out so I can best recommend options to my clients. Thanks for bringing this to light!
Ed
I take a simpler method – just set up a forwarder in the hosting control panel. In my client’s existing free email account (Yahoo/Gmail/Hotmail) I add the new account I want to send email as. This sends a verification email which, due to the forwarder, arrives in the existing inbox.
An advantage of Yahoo/Gmail/Hotmail is that they are built in account types in iOS. You can select the From address on your iOS device. I will admit that you are not using your hosting company email servers.
That is one way of doing it, and we have already shown that method a long time ago. Sometimes, when using that it ends up revealing your “real email” that you were sending it from. Even though you can mask it so it can be sent from yourname@domain.com, it will show sent from you@gmail.com
Hello,
I have tried to follow these steps but there is no Get Started button anywhere, I do get a Login button but it only sends me to Live Login Page. The address I am visiting is: domains.live.com
Any help I will appreciate.
Best regards,
Carlos
@Carlos: It is right above the sign in button. You can also click here to get started.
@Haseeb Ahmad Ayazi : Outlook allows you to create up to 500 accounts on one domain name. However, if you reach that limit and you need more free email accounts on your domain then you can contact support to extend your free accounts limit.
@Raheem Khan: I would recommend that you stick with Google Apps and try outlook.com separately by creating a yourname@outlook.com account. That way you can decide which one you like better.
You! There must be a comparison. How much accounts are allowed in free version?
Now there should be a compartision between Google Apps and Outlook Professional Emails. And do tell us which one is better. Currently I’m using Google apps.