How to Set Up Google G Suite Using Your Domain Name

Any small business knows that a dependable business email service is an essential feature of streamlined success.

Especially in the case for eCommerce SEO websites that may solely depend on email for marketing and for communication to manage orders and maintain operations as smooth as online retail can be.

That’s where Google G Suite for business email comes in.

Before you think that using your web host’s default email service will suffice, think again. Such services are known to have spammy inboxes, missing emails or spotty service.

But, overall, it doesn’t make for good user experience.

When it comes to managing multiple users for your business email, easy access and ease of use make for the best experience for everyone.

Let’s jump into the features of Google G Suite for business to replace your @gmail, @yahoo, etc.:

Similar Interface to Gmail
Dedicated, 24/7 Customer Service
Business-grade Anti-Spam Filters
Ability to Manage Multiple Users
Easy, Convenient Login Access

Rather than having to go through your cPanel to navigate to your inbox, simply log in as you would onto Gmail.

It’s as simple as that.

The tricky part is properly configuring the G Suite setup wizard to verify your domain and adding users correctly.

It’s also pertinent to navigate cPanel for your domain to confirm that certain DNS records have been either added or removed.

Let’s start with adding your basic information:

1. Go To Google G Suite & Click on

The first step is to set up your team G Suite.

This is where you’ll be asked for information on the company you’re creating an account for.

Here, you’ll enter the following information:

Company Name
Number of Employees
Company Location
Current Email Address

2. Enter Domain Name or Choose New One

For this step, you’ll need to verify your domain name or the link to your company site.

If you have a company website, enter in that domain name, or choose a new domain name with GoDaddy if you don’t already have one.

When it comes to choosing a new domain name, be sure to keep to domain name best practices, as follows:

Keep it short (≤ 16 characters)
Include company name
Include city you’re located in or serving
Use a .com or a .net (if your domain name of choice is taken)

The problem that many businesses find is coming up with a good domain name if the one they want is already taken.

There are strategies available, like the ones found in this article, that will help you come up with a domain name that’s relevant to your brand while adhering best practice.

3. Set Up Your Own G Suite Account

After verifying your domain, it’s time to set up your own G Suite Account.

Do this by adding your first and last name, new email address, and new password for your G suite Google account.

Choose a user name, such as “sales” as the user name for the address: sales@yourdomain.com.

Save this information to, later on, log into your Google apps, including Gmail, Outlook, Google My Business, and so on.

4. Add Team Members to G Suite Account

Add each team member for your G Suite as a user to your company’s account.

Enter their name and the email address you’d like them to have on the domain. You can also set up general mailboxes, such as sales@, billing@, info@, and so on.

A suggestion would be to use, for example, Sales (First Name) and [Company Name] (Last Name).

This is advised because when you send an email from this user, the sender name will look like this: Sales – [Company Name], rather than a specific team member’s name.

These detail can be modified later on, including bulk-adding or individually adding more users to the account.

5. Verify Domain Name with Google G Suite

To complete the G Suite domain verification step, open up a new tab and sign into your web hosting server.

This is where you’d access your webmail server, edit your wp-content files, perform a server restart, and much more.

Log into your web host account in a new tab and head back to the G Suite setup wizard.

From here, we’ll navigate to where your DNS entries.

Here’s a guide on how to set up DNS MX Records to use Gmail interface.

Troubleshooting Site Verification

You’ll know when your site has been verified when you see a progress bar on the verification step on the G Suite setup wizard. If you run into an error verifying this way, then there are a few other ways to verify:

You can verify your domain name in 4 ways:

Add a meta tag to your header script.
Auto-populate MX records via domain host.
Create and add a new TXT record to domain’s cPanel.
Upload HTML file from Google to cPanel File Manager.

Add a Meta Tag to your Header Script

If the default verification method on the G suite setup wizard fails, your next easiest method is to generate a meta tag.

This tag is a verification code that Google will give you as an option upon the error message for verifying your domain name.

For WordPress users, you can copy and paste this code into the <head> section found within the <header> script. This code is pasted after the <head> section but before the <body> section of your site’s HTML file.

Next, just save your changes and check that the tag was added properly.

To do this, hit refresh (Mac: Ctrl + R / PC: F5), right-click the page > View Source > HTML. The tag should be at the top of the HTML code in the <head> section.

Return to the setup wizard for G Suite and run the verification step again. This time Google will check the meta tag in order to complete this step.

Autopopulate MX Records From Domain Host Account

Here, you can access your DNS (Domain Name System) entries where your MX (Mail Exchange) records live. These records point mail to the G Suite mail server directly from your domain.

Be sure you’re logged in and have cPanel open for your domain host account. Then, select “Create a new TXT record”.

Google will give you two values that will be used to create an entry to your DNS records:

Name / Host / Alias
Value / Answer / Destination

Now switch over to your DNS Management section on cPanel. It could be called any of the following:

DNS Management
Name Server Management
Control Panel
Advanced Settings

After you find your DNS database, select “Add new record” and choose TXT as the record type.

To begin, enter in “@” or leave blank for your Name/Host/Alias.

This is essentially your domain or subdomain your sending mail to. The entry type is MX which directs just your mail to the designated server, in this case, G Suite.

Set the TTL as default (3600 or 1hr) or leave blank. Then, add “ASPMX.GOOGL.COM” as the Data/Mail Server.

Select the “+” button next to where you the Data/Mail Server field to paste in the verification code from Google into the Value/Answer/Destination field.

Lastly, head to the MX Editor or Advanced MX Editor tool in cPanel. From here, you should see a newly added option to “Set Google MX”. This will auto-populate Google MX Records based on the information you just added.

To complete domain verification, go back to the setup wizard for G Suite and continue with the verification step again.

Manually Add TXT Record To Domain’s cPanel

If, from the selection of “Set Google MX” doesn’t work, then go to the DNS Manage tool to edit your MX records.

Also, on the G Suite setup wizard, click on “Choose a different method” again.

Then, select “Add a domain host record” and choose “TXT” from the next options.

From here, using the same verification code as for the previous method, edit your site’s HTML file by using:

Name: yourdomain.com

TTL: Use value “86400” which is the default. TTL (Time to Live) determines how often a name server will update. By setting the value to “3600”, for example, this means your name server will update every 1 hour.

TXT Data: Paste in the verification code from Google G Suite. Then, select “Add record” to finish up.

Lastly, on cPanel, go to the MX Editor tool. Here, you should see a newly added option to “Set Google MX”.

This is where you’ll need to manually delete the existing MX records (records for old webmail server).

To manually add in new MX records, refer to step 6 of this post. Also, here’s a step-by-step guide from Google.

When you’ve added all these entries, go back to G Suite. Click on “Verify Domain And Set Up Email”. If this method worked, then you’ll get a success message with a button to continue Next to complete the setup wizard.

Verify by Uploading HTML file to cPanel File Manager

Another option is to upload a new HTML file to your cPanel using the File Manager tool.

Start by logging into cPanel. Go to File Manager > public_html > .htaccess.

On the G Suite Dashboard, go to the Verification tool and click on “Download file for HTML verification”.

Then, upload this file to your File Manager by going to public_html to override the .htacess file.

To finish up, head back to the setup wizard for G Suite and proceed with the verification step.

6. Set Up MX Records for G Suite Email

To confirm that your site was verified, click on DNS on your web host account.

From your DNS (Domain Name System) account, you’ll be able to confirm your site has been verified with the addition of MX (Mail Exchange) entries in your DNS records.

You will see all DNS records from a list of entries that point traffic to a specific location from your domain or subdomain.

Your DNA Database will look similar to what’s shown below:

Now, just add the following MX entries provided by Google:

Note: If you already have MX records as one of your entries, then delete the old ones so we can add in G Suite MX records.

DNS Records Explained:

A Records: A Records (Address Records) point your domain or subdomain to a specific IP address. For example, typing in frontstreetmedia.com is translated to its designated IP address, which would look like 66.147.224.236.

MX Records: MX (Mail Exchange) sends your emails to a designated mail server, pointing directly from a domain.

TXT Files: Human-readable text files are what records point to. Meaning, they are the text file sources that provide necessary information that is external from the server database.

For mail server purposes, one thing to understand is SPF (Sender Policy Framework).

This provides the needed data to properly function a spam filter for incoming emails. DKIM allows for mail filtering by incoming sender address and message contents to ensure that they are a trusted source.

7. Customize & Tweak Additional Mail Settings

Now, you’re all set to manage your new G Suite Business account.

You can access any of Google’s apps from this management dashboard page, and you can also use apps, like Outlook or Chrome to sign in with your G suite email.

Before you check out your selection of accessible apps and features, we’ll need to configure additional settings in your domain host account.

Allow for Less Secure Apps

From the Admin Dashboard, go to your Security settings.

Under less secure apps, select “Disable access for less secure apps”.

This is a required step if you plan on setting up G Suite email on your phone.

Migrating Your Mail to G Suite?

Setting up G Suite using your domain name and migrating your email data for your domain are two separate things. To import previous mail that’s living on your old webmail server, you have to migrate that data to Google’s mail server—G Suite.

In order to access the G Suite migration tool, log into your Google Dashboard as an admin. After doing so, then go to the migration tool.

Next, you’ll need to choose the server type that your migrating mail from.

Most likely your default webmail provider uses IMAP as its connection protocol.

The next step is to input your servers IMAP Server Name or Port.

To do this, log into your site’s cPanel account and navigating to your SMTP Port. This allows G Suite access to your server. It imports all of your emails at once.

The process in migrating emails takes at least an hour to several hours, depending on how much data needs to be migrated over to Google.

After the migration is complete, log back into G Suite. From the dashboard, head to the Gmail app where you can now open all previously sent and received mail.

You can also have all your emails synced to the G Suite server using the Outlook or Apple Mail desktop or mobile app.

Setting Mail to Remote Access

Enabling “Remote Mail Exchanger” allows for mail to be handled by G Suite.

This setting tells your webmail provider to NOT handle mail, and rather, send that mail to the remote server set as G Suite, Google’s mail server.

So, for example, if you tried to access your mail using the webmail provider you’re migrating FROM, any new mail received or sent appending the completion of this step will not show up or be available.

Enabling SPF (Sender Policy Framework)

Enabling this feature allows for incoming mail to be filtered for spam by its sender and the message contents.

As mentioned, this powerful, business-grade email feature is what sets G Suite apart from any webmail provider on the market.

Find important emails without filtering through spammy messages and protect your inbox and site hosting server from hackers stealing data and sensitive information. Not to mention, avoid liability costs for stolen personal data from visitors to your site.

Send New Users Test Emails

To make sure your emails aren’t going to spam, log in into Gmail, Outlook, or whatever app you use for your mail.

Send a test email to yourself and any other users on your domain. When it comes through to your inbox, mark it as a trusted sender, or add it your contact list.

Enable DKIM on DNS Management Page

Along with enabling SPF, you’ll need to enable DKIM.

DKIM (DomainKeys Identified Mail) is similar to SPF in that it filters incoming mail for spam. It’s unique from SPF because it ensures, rather, that the message is genuinely coming from that sender, and not masked with a spammy sender address.

By enabling this feature, you’re simply adding an additional layer of security in terms of spam filtering for users on your domain.

Downgrading from Business to Basic (Optional)

By default, a Google G Suite account is created as a business level subscription, paying $6 per user on your domain.

Most businesses will downgrade to the basic version for half the monthly subscription fee at $6/month compared to $12/month.

The $12/month version is not necessary for most small businesses that sign up with G Suite. The basic features you’ll need for email service on Google’s server are included in the $6/month package:

As a subscriber to the G Suite Basic, you’ll still have Google Drive storage (30 GB per user) and all the functionality and features available for your mail service through Google.

8. Google’s G Suite Service For Your Organization

Now that you’ve verified your new or existing domain name for your company, you’ll have a working email that can be used with the Gmail interface.

In addition to business quality email service, your team has access to all of Google’s apps and functionality: Google Drive storage & Docs, Google Calendar, and so on.

Google G Suite vs Webmail Server For Your Domain

While sticking to the basic webmail server for sending and receiving emails for your domain is cheaper, it’s not the best choice for businesses.

Webmail servers like SquirrelMail and Roundcube have such low-grade spam filtering which could easily penetrate protected data that’s being hosted by your site and its users.

G Suite is also a great solution for sites hosted on WordPress, the preferred choice for website hosting amongst the options in platforms available, such as Squarespace and Wix, for example.

As G Suite may work just as well with Squarespace and Wix sites, WordPress allows for more “user experience” geared functionality, integrations, and customization when it comes to incorporating forms and other elements to your website.

Interested in migrating your mail to Google?

Give us a call today to set up your business domain name on G Suite, migrate data to the Google server, and/or sync G Suite to your phone.