Professional email for your practice: your own domain, setup and staying out of spam

Why your own domain

• Trust. An address on your own domain tells a client you are established and that you are who you say you are.
• Portability. If you change provider, your address stays the same. A free mailbox address belongs to its provider.
• Consistency. The same domain on your cards, your page and your email builds recognition.
• Control. You can create addresses for roles and people (hello@, bookings@, anna@) and close them when needed.
• Deliverability. Mail from a properly configured domain is more likely to arrive.

If your profession handles confidential information, also check what your regulator says about email and client data. Some bodies expect encrypted channels or a specific retention policy.

What you need

1. A domain you own. See choosing a web address.
2. A mailbox provider: one of the established business email services. Compare price, storage, two-step sign-in, calendar and contacts, support, and where data is stored.
3. Access to the settings (the DNS records) where your domain is registered, to point email to the provider.
4. Half an hour, and a second device for two-step sign-in.

Choosing an address

• Use your name for a personal practice: anna@ or anna.weiss@.
• Use a role address (hello@, info@, bookings@) for a team or a shared inbox, so that it survives staff changes.
• Keep it short and easy to say over the phone. Avoid numbers and underscores.
• Avoid addresses that suggest a different business or a service you do not offer.
• Set up a catch-all or alias for common typos only if you will check it, since it also collects spam.

SPF, DKIM and DMARC in plain words

Receiving mail servers want to know whether a message claiming to be from your domain really is. Three records, set in your domain’s DNS settings, answer that. Your mail provider’s help pages give the exact text to paste in.

1. Follow your mail provider’s instructions to add the SPF and DKIM records.
2. Add a DMARC record in monitoring mode first, which collects reports without affecting delivery, then tighten it once you are sure all your legitimate mail passes.
3. If you send mail from other tools, such as a booking system or a newsletter service, add them to your SPF record and follow their instructions for DKIM, or their mail may be marked as suspicious.
4. Send a test message to a few different mailboxes and check the headers or use a free checker to confirm that all three pass.

Keep your messages out of spam

• Set up the three records above before you send in volume.
• Write like a person. Avoid all capitals, many exclamation marks, misleading subject lines and large images with little text.
• Do not send the same message to many people at once from your ordinary mailbox. Use a proper newsletter service for that, and only to people who asked.
• Reply to people who write to you. Replies are a good sign to mail systems.
• Ask important new contacts to add your address to their contacts.
• If a client says your message went to spam, ask them to mark it as not spam and reply.
• Keep your mailbox clean. A full or compromised mailbox harms delivery.

Writing professional emails

• A clear subject: “Your appointment on Tuesday 14 October” rather than “Hello”.
• Start with the answer or the next step. Keep paragraphs short.
• Reply within the time your page promises.
• Do not put confidential details in the subject line.
• Check the recipient before sending, especially with auto-complete.
• Say clearly what you need from the client and by when.

Anna Weiss
Chartered physiotherapist
Weiss Physiotherapy, 12 Example Road, Bristol
020 7946 0000 · annaweiss.example

• Keep the signature short: name, role, one phone number, your page address.
• Add a registration number or regulator wording if your profession requires it.
• Avoid large images and long legal disclaimers. A signature that is mostly an image is hard to read on a phone and may be blocked.
• Use the same name, role and details as on your page and profiles. See why AI gets your details wrong.

Security and housekeeping

• Turn on two-step sign-in for your mailbox. See keeping your website and name safe.
• Keep a backup of important mail, and understand how long your provider keeps deleted messages.
• Set up an out-of-office reply when you are away, naming a date and another way to reach you.
• Review who has access to shared mailboxes, and remove those who leave.
• Know your obligations to keep or delete client correspondence. They vary by profession and country.

Common mistakes

• A free personal mailbox next to a professional page.
• Sending from a domain with no SPF, DKIM or DMARC.
• Forgetting that a third-party tool also sends mail as you.
• Letting the domain lapse and losing the email with it.
• Sharing one mailbox login between several people.
• A long signature with images and legal text.
• Putting your address in plain text on the page where spam robots collect it. A contact form or a link avoids this.

Choosing a provider: what to compare

Avoid choosing by price alone, and avoid a provider that makes it hard to export your mail. The same person who is happy with a free mailbox today may need a professional service when a client asks for a signed contract or a medical record.

Migrating from a free address

1. Create the new address on your own domain first, and test it by sending to and from several accounts.
2. Import your old mail and contacts if the new provider allows it, or keep the old account open for read-only access.
3. Set the old account to forward new mail to the new one for at least a year.
4. Update your page, your cards, your signatures, your profiles and your directory listings.
5. Tell your regular contacts and clients with a short, plain note.
6. Change the email on your important accounts: bank, tax, registrar, platform, professional body.
7. Only close the old address when you are sure nothing important still arrives there.

Reading what a client sees

• The sender name. Use your full name and role, such as “Anna Weiss, Physiotherapist”, and not just a first name or the address.
• The subject line. It should make sense in a list on a phone, within about forty characters.
• The preview line. The first sentence shows next to the subject, so start with the point.
• The reply-to address. If a booking system sends mail for you, make sure replies come to you.
• The signature. Compare it with your page and profiles, and fix any difference.

Templates for the replies you write often

Subject: Your enquiry about physiotherapy

Hello Maria,

Thank you for getting in touch. I can see you on Tuesday at 10:00 or Thursday at 16:30 for a first appointment. It lasts 45 minutes and costs £75.

Please reply with the day that suits you and a short note of what you would like help with. If you would rather talk first, call me on 020 7946 0000.

Best wishes,
Anna Weiss

Thank you for your message. I am away until Monday 20 October and will reply when I return. For urgent matters, please contact the clinic on 020 7946 0000.

Anna Weiss

Keep your templates in a note on your phone, so you can answer from anywhere without writing from scratch. Always personalise the first line.

Where BeVisible fits

Your BeVisible page shows your email address and can send you enquiries from the optional inquiry form. Your page address is bevisible.site/yourname; using your own domain for the page is not supported yet. Email on your own domain is separate and works with any provider, so you can set it up now and put the address on your page. You can build and preview free, and publish free for 7 days with no card needed; after that one yearly plan keeps a website online, and one plan covers one website. Start from a photo or type your details.