Professionalism wrt email domains
April 19, 2022 10:04 AM Subscribe
I'd prefer to use my own domains for my email addresses, especially in a professional context (e.g. on LinkedIn, applications, my resume, etc.). But they're cheap, cute, silly domains, and not related to my work, any sort of personal "brand" (shudder), let alone an actual business or public-facing website that I maintain. Think something like bananafrosting.com [not actually one of my domains], when what I do has nothing to do with bananas, cake, frosting, baking, or food.
In a perfect world I know this wouldn't matter, but I have a strong impression people still have all sorts of weird retrograde ideas about which email domains are relatively more or less suitable for use in a "professional" context, e.g. the old gmail vs sbcglobal/yahoo canard. I mean, I'm involved in the hiring process, and I've literally witnessed people dunking on "cheap," "unclassy," "unprofessional" or "boomer" email addresses. That said, in most cases it's the gestalt impression, involving both the username and the domain, but still.
So, is it worth paying a bit of money to get an email on a "nondescript" domain, like Protonmail (actually, wait, do people think Protonmail is suspect) or Fastmail? If so, is there a provider you can recommend? Alternately, if I'm using my own domain, are there any guidelines I should keep in mind?
In a perfect world I know this wouldn't matter, but I have a strong impression people still have all sorts of weird retrograde ideas about which email domains are relatively more or less suitable for use in a "professional" context, e.g. the old gmail vs sbcglobal/yahoo canard. I mean, I'm involved in the hiring process, and I've literally witnessed people dunking on "cheap," "unclassy," "unprofessional" or "boomer" email addresses. That said, in most cases it's the gestalt impression, involving both the username and the domain, but still.
So, is it worth paying a bit of money to get an email on a "nondescript" domain, like Protonmail (actually, wait, do people think Protonmail is suspect) or Fastmail? If so, is there a provider you can recommend? Alternately, if I'm using my own domain, are there any guidelines I should keep in mind?
I think this depends on context and audience entirely. I have worked in industries where a bananafrosting.com email address would not even register as odd, but in other industries where it would garner a severe side eye.
The biggest criteria for me in email addresses in general is "is this audible over the phone?" I had a personal email address a few years ago that was functionally HeyThere.FurnaceHeart@email.com and it was goddamn impossible to relay over a phone line because of how some of the consonants were laid out. A's S's Th's and F's are all very hard to hear correctly over a phone.
posted by furnace.heart at 10:41 AM on April 19, 2022 [2 favorites]
The biggest criteria for me in email addresses in general is "is this audible over the phone?" I had a personal email address a few years ago that was functionally HeyThere.FurnaceHeart@email.com and it was goddamn impossible to relay over a phone line because of how some of the consonants were laid out. A's S's Th's and F's are all very hard to hear correctly over a phone.
posted by furnace.heart at 10:41 AM on April 19, 2022 [2 favorites]
Response by poster: A couple of notes: My name is common enough that there aren't domains available at any price, though I'm stalking several. It might never happen, though. I actually do have a pun/variation on my name registered but I'm even more reluctant to use that than the others.
Also, I guess I should have come right out with it: this is at least partially an attempt to free myself from Gmail and other big webmail services. I've had firstname.lastname@gmail.com since 2004, and in extremity I could set up forwarding so I can continue using it for this sort of thing, but I'd prefer not to.
Also, for what it's worth, hey.com is a hard pass.
posted by pullayup at 10:42 AM on April 19, 2022
Also, I guess I should have come right out with it: this is at least partially an attempt to free myself from Gmail and other big webmail services. I've had firstname.lastname@gmail.com since 2004, and in extremity I could set up forwarding so I can continue using it for this sort of thing, but I'd prefer not to.
Also, for what it's worth, hey.com is a hard pass.
posted by pullayup at 10:42 AM on April 19, 2022
I've got a super common name and I'm firstlastcity@gmail
I just shared my own thought about this a couple weeks ago. Unless you're specifically trying to get hired in a field that rewards individual quirkiness, there's really nothing better than a nice boring gmail address. (And generally, unless you're going to work at someplace quite small, the people who will be looking specifically at your email address aren't decision makers.)
posted by phunniemee at 10:48 AM on April 19, 2022 [1 favorite]
I just shared my own thought about this a couple weeks ago. Unless you're specifically trying to get hired in a field that rewards individual quirkiness, there's really nothing better than a nice boring gmail address. (And generally, unless you're going to work at someplace quite small, the people who will be looking specifically at your email address aren't decision makers.)
posted by phunniemee at 10:48 AM on April 19, 2022 [1 favorite]
I have definitely given the side-eye to email address, but more the username than the domain. I don't care if you've got a yahoo.com or a netzero.com email, but in my print shop, I had definitely sent quotes to people who gave their contact akin to "partygirl69@hotmail.com" or "stevexxx420blazeit@yahoo.com" and at that point I'm like... really?
I prefer to keep my own domain(s), and the hosting packages I use (barebones to mid-level business class) provide not only some degree of site hosting, but also complete email customization. On my main domain, every time I have to sign up for something, it gets its own alias forwarded to my main email. So, netflix@mydomain.com, amazon@mydomain.com, linkedin@mydomain.com, etc. They all get auto-forwarded to my main email, so I don't have to check hundreds of inboxes, but if someone sells me out to a spam list, I not only know exactly who it was, it also gives me a pain-free way to close that spam pipe. I just set up a new alias, say netflix1@mydomain.com, log into my Netflix and change the email there, and then turn off the old forwarder. Bam, spam pipe closed. It also gives me the opportunity to set up temporary emails, either as a simple forwarder or as its own mailbox, for projects, job interviews, whatever. When that email is no longer needed, I just shut it down. Been doing this for years, and my main inbox is so clean!
posted by xedrik at 10:52 AM on April 19, 2022 [6 favorites]
I prefer to keep my own domain(s), and the hosting packages I use (barebones to mid-level business class) provide not only some degree of site hosting, but also complete email customization. On my main domain, every time I have to sign up for something, it gets its own alias forwarded to my main email. So, netflix@mydomain.com, amazon@mydomain.com, linkedin@mydomain.com, etc. They all get auto-forwarded to my main email, so I don't have to check hundreds of inboxes, but if someone sells me out to a spam list, I not only know exactly who it was, it also gives me a pain-free way to close that spam pipe. I just set up a new alias, say netflix1@mydomain.com, log into my Netflix and change the email there, and then turn off the old forwarder. Bam, spam pipe closed. It also gives me the opportunity to set up temporary emails, either as a simple forwarder or as its own mailbox, for projects, job interviews, whatever. When that email is no longer needed, I just shut it down. Been doing this for years, and my main inbox is so clean!
posted by xedrik at 10:52 AM on April 19, 2022 [6 favorites]
I guess it depends on the audience. If you're tech-adjacent, I could see having your own domain as a positive - it shows you know at least a little about hosting and stuff. Accounting less so.
Your comment on your personal brand makes me think that "puyallupspersonalbrand.com" would be a pretty incredible domain name for a job application email. I would probably hire you just because of that. Maybe that's why no one has ever given me hiring authority.
I guess you could think of it similarly to dating profile photos, where doing certain things would probably reduce your audience, but the ones you lose are probably ones who wouldn't appreciate you anyway.
posted by kevinbelt at 11:06 AM on April 19, 2022
Your comment on your personal brand makes me think that "puyallupspersonalbrand.com" would be a pretty incredible domain name for a job application email. I would probably hire you just because of that. Maybe that's why no one has ever given me hiring authority.
I guess you could think of it similarly to dating profile photos, where doing certain things would probably reduce your audience, but the ones you lose are probably ones who wouldn't appreciate you anyway.
posted by kevinbelt at 11:06 AM on April 19, 2022
OP, one thing I have to caution you about.
I have a vanity email domain hosted at Rackspace. I'm in software on the west coast so I'm not super concerned about people judging me based on my saucetrough@saucetrough.pro email address and I even got old-school points once from an oldbeard on a job interview.
HOWEVER
Once, when I was interviewing at a very security-conscious company, I found that my emails from my vanity domain were not being received by the company's recruiters.
I didn't get bounce messages (hell are those even still a thing?) so I can't say exactly why the email was silently roundholed, only the mail admins at that company can say, and there's no way I was going to work through the recruiter to diagnose mail weirdness like that.
My weird email behavior made me look like a total flake and very nearly scuttled a job I really really needed, so next time my resume goes out it will have a bog standard name.firstname@gmail on it.
posted by Sauce Trough at 12:13 PM on April 19, 2022 [3 favorites]
I have a vanity email domain hosted at Rackspace. I'm in software on the west coast so I'm not super concerned about people judging me based on my saucetrough@saucetrough.pro email address and I even got old-school points once from an oldbeard on a job interview.
HOWEVER
Once, when I was interviewing at a very security-conscious company, I found that my emails from my vanity domain were not being received by the company's recruiters.
I didn't get bounce messages (hell are those even still a thing?) so I can't say exactly why the email was silently roundholed, only the mail admins at that company can say, and there's no way I was going to work through the recruiter to diagnose mail weirdness like that.
My weird email behavior made me look like a total flake and very nearly scuttled a job I really really needed, so next time my resume goes out it will have a bog standard name.firstname@gmail on it.
posted by Sauce Trough at 12:13 PM on April 19, 2022 [3 favorites]
Think something like bananafrosting.com [not actually one of my domains], when what I do has nothing to do with bananas, cake, frosting, baking, or food.I think the right way to think about this may be less 'bananafrosting.com is an intrinsically unprofessional email address' and more 'employers may visit the website bananafrosting.com out of curiosity - what will they see there?'
posted by kickingtheground at 12:22 PM on April 19, 2022
Response by poster: Sauce Trough, if I can dig in a little more--was this a roll-your-own postfix/dovecot/spamassassin mailserver (or a "kit" like Mailcow or Mail-in-a-Box), or were you pointing your domain's MX records at a "professional" mail host?
I've tried the former and saw the same kind of trouble, and probably wouldn't do so again. I suspect self-hosted mail servers just look too potentially malicious to be 100% reliable. I haven't (yet) run into the same problems with Migadu, though.
posted by pullayup at 12:35 PM on April 19, 2022
I've tried the former and saw the same kind of trouble, and probably wouldn't do so again. I suspect self-hosted mail servers just look too potentially malicious to be 100% reliable. I haven't (yet) run into the same problems with Migadu, though.
posted by pullayup at 12:35 PM on April 19, 2022
I work in tech. We don't give a crap what your email address is. The last guy we hired refers to himself as a Jedi, and asks that we call him "Jedi Jack". His email is jack@jedijack.com (he really does think he's a jedi, though his name isn't Jack.). I guess what I mean to say is let your freak flag fly, and don't worry about your email. You'll be using a work email at work soon enough.
posted by Geckwoistmeinauto at 1:02 PM on April 19, 2022
posted by Geckwoistmeinauto at 1:02 PM on April 19, 2022
It's a weird mix. The MX is pointed to rackspace, but once I fetchmail it from rackspace's IMAP, it goes into my own dovecot / maildir server so I can do procmail on it (I have lots of aliases too!) and then serve it to all my devices with IMAP.
This made sense when I set it up in 200x sometime but it makes less and less sense nowadays. Inertia is a hell of a drug.
My outbound mail goes straight to the rackspace sendmail server and it's typically text/plain, no MIME funny business, which might be a weird signal all its own to mail filtration bots.
posted by Sauce Trough at 1:20 PM on April 19, 2022
This made sense when I set it up in 200x sometime but it makes less and less sense nowadays. Inertia is a hell of a drug.
My outbound mail goes straight to the rackspace sendmail server and it's typically text/plain, no MIME funny business, which might be a weird signal all its own to mail filtration bots.
posted by Sauce Trough at 1:20 PM on April 19, 2022
Could you keep the gmail with your name only for job seeking? And forward it to your name at bananafrosting but where it responds as gmail?
As an alternative: my alma mater let us set up an email name@alumni.schoolname.edu. I have used that in professional contexts.
In the bigger picture, I think it depends on your field. I wouldn't think more of protonmail or fastmail than bananafrosting.
posted by bluedaisy at 1:28 PM on April 19, 2022 [1 favorite]
As an alternative: my alma mater let us set up an email name@alumni.schoolname.edu. I have used that in professional contexts.
In the bigger picture, I think it depends on your field. I wouldn't think more of protonmail or fastmail than bananafrosting.
posted by bluedaisy at 1:28 PM on April 19, 2022 [1 favorite]
I have an email address on techie.com, which is hosted by mail.com. They also have 200 decently professional domains like consultant.com. Maybe look into them? It's NOT free though, but they only do mail and seems to do a good job. I usually go through it with my Gmail interface and never access it directly.
posted by kschang at 1:55 PM on April 19, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by kschang at 1:55 PM on April 19, 2022 [1 favorite]
I agree that it depends on the field, and I can imagine many cases in which the email address does no harm but might actually be a nice conversation piece. For that to happen though, you'd have to really feel comfortable owning it and have a good story ready to go.
posted by Salamandrous at 5:45 PM on April 19, 2022
posted by Salamandrous at 5:45 PM on April 19, 2022
I have an email address on my own domain, using OpalStack, and it's gotten me routed to some people's spam folders.
posted by one for the books at 9:28 PM on April 19, 2022
posted by one for the books at 9:28 PM on April 19, 2022
This thread is closed to new comments.
For example, I'd never use something like bananafrosting.com, not because I don't like it but because I dread the idea of having to explain why I use that domain. Having a visible "personality" works on some fields so YMMV.
Best solution would be to register your own name (or a variation) as a domain (with fastmail, migadu, google apps, etc as provider) and use that in professional contexts, even if you never use it as a personal brand thing/website.
posted by simmering octagon at 10:37 AM on April 19, 2022 [3 favorites]