Many email service providers pride themselves with 99.99999% uptime, but what’s the point in that if they can’t resolve a customer’s email problem? Recently, one of our customers told us that ‘his email was slow.’ Most email providers will just tell the customer that it’s an Internet issue and suggest that they complain to TM. They won’t even bother to check or provide an on-site review.

While it can be written off as an Internet issue, to a customer, it’s frustrating to experience problems in downloading emails. At 1.com.my, we take into consideration the ‘overall email experience’ in our email services. If an Internet interruption affects the so-called ‘email experience’, we’ll fix it. If a faulty or misconfigured Outlook creates issues, we’ll fix it.

We listen, make an on-site visit, suggest solutions and strive to create the ‘best email experience’ for our customers.

All built-in Junk/Spam filtering by your email clients (Outlook, Windows Mail, Mac OS X Mail) are NOT RELIABLE. They cause false alarm, marking legitimate email as Spam and throw them to the Junk folder.

To add, many antivirus softwares intergrate with your email clients such as Outlook to provide additional protection. THIS IS BAD TOO! This unseen layer of protection causes missing email and attachment.

To turn off Junk filters in your email client:

1) Outlook and Windows Mail > Junk Email Options. Choose No automatic filtering.

2) Mac OS X Mail > Preferences > Junk Mail > Disable

To turn off third party virus integration with Outlook

1) Symantec Endpoint Protection > Change Settings > Antivirus… > Disable Outlook Auto-Protection

Thanks to Steve Jobs of Apple Inc., we now have even more i-devices, like the iPad, iPhone and Macbook to fill our already busy lives. Now, we can all have access to emails, even when we’re cycling in the middle of the woods of Fraser’s Hill.

But, have you ever wished that you could send an email from your iPhone and have it shown directly in your Outlook? Or, would you like to mark a message as read in your Mac’s Mail and have it automatically marked as read in your Android as well? How about fine-tuning your email tools to boost your email managing efficiency, like AMG adding HorsePower to the Mercedes-Benz?

We understand your needs and plan to come up with a guide, but since each email user is different, we think it would be better if we could spend some time with you to review each case and propose an improvement. With such advancements in email technology, the old POP3 way to access your email has become obsolete, and it has now been replaced with smarter methods where you can manage all emails in all devices while keeping everything you’ve done in sync.

This exercise may take a couple of weeks, so let’s not waste time and kick start it now!

1. Switching to IMAP
2. Fine-tuning email tools
3. 10 bad email habits

Playing catch up with Facebook’s Like button, Google has launched +1, a platform that allows users to say that they like certain ads and search results. Obviously, this isn’t something new, at least in Malaysia. Last year, 1Malaysia was launched a year ahead of schedule and it has now expanded to include 1Radio, 1Tv, 1Clinic, 1Email, etc (let us to come clean, everything except – 1.my).

And just when we thought that the “1″ fever was losing steam, “Cloud” becomes one of the most hyped terms today. Of course, the Cloud we’re talking about here isn’t the “visible mass of water droplets or frozen ice crystals suspended in the atmosphere above the surface of the Earth or another planetary body.” We’re talking Cloud computing.

You could say that Cloud reached a climax when iCloud was finally revealed at Apple’s recent Worldwide Developers Conference 2011. Then, all of a sudden, books, music, files and photos are all on Cloud. Fortunately, Malaysia isn’t far behind when it comes to technology. After all, we have the tallest building in the Clouds and we can even have roti canai above the Clouds.

So, what is Cloud?

Steve Jobs says don’t even need to know what Cloud is, because you never interact with it – your apps do.

End users shouldn’t worry, however, because the moment you upload a picture on Facebook, navigate KL using Google Maps or play Angry Bird on Google Chrome, you are in fact, in a transition to Cloud. To you, it is a matter of experience which makes sharing faster. It also makes life easier and fun! So don’t crack your head trying to understand Cloud, it exists in the background. Think of it this way, you don’t need to know how a car works in order to drive a car, and remember Web 2.0? Who gives a hoot about it now?

It’s wise for businesses to make the change, however. You can be a mover and shaker by helping your customers make the transition to Cloud. Ask yourself these questions – Is your website hosted on Cloud? Does your product require an additional hardware to run? Think again and check out Cloud Computing, as well as this article.

Pin

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Pin is the founder of 1.com.my. He hosts email and websites for his customers on Cloud. He has written two books on Online Business and Linux, and he also founded a Web Developer Group that has over 100 friends. To learn more, please visit his website, or join his Facebook page.

To further strengthen the branding of Khind Mistral Group, we’ve helped them put their logo onto their webmail. Personalised webmail is nothing new, but it’s our dedication and prompt response to make it perfect that counts. What matters is the satisfaction of our customers. When the job was done, Loke of Khind Mistral emailed us to say, “Really a great job! Didn’t u say u need 2 days?”

Khinds' new webmail

See? Pin is a living, breathing human being!

Tech geeks will talk about how our SMTP mail server has maintained a 99.993% uptime since May 2006, and that we test our servers every 15 minutes, but what sets Pin and his team apart from other support teams is the fact that they’re willing to explain things to you in layman terms. Basically, if you tried to send an email every 15 minutes since May 2006, out of 129,600 emails sent, only 10 won’t be delivered, which is pretty phenomenal. There’s no doubt that our email servers are reliable, but we’re always searching for and discovering new ways to improve your email experience each day.

Customers who outsource their email services to us expect a fully integrated solution, which means we must ensure that our email servers are always up and running, and that we’ll make the extra effort to help solve issues arising from Internet Service Providers, email clients like Outlook, Outlook Express and even teaching clients how to retrieve emails from mobile devices.

We’ve dealt with over 500 customers, and this allow us to have a better understanding of the various user requirements out there. The experience has also exposed us to issues that have, in return, equipped us with the know-how to solve all kinds of email problems, including missing or duplicate emails, Spam, backup and restoration, and much more.

To all our loyal clients, thank you for giving us the chance to serve you, and for sharing with us your email issues. Apart from finding ways around email problems, it has also helped us to compile tips and tricks that can help others in the future.

Pin

Everyone's afraid of jumping from the frying pan into the fire

One of our customers, a medical equipment supplier, had encountered a lot of issues with their email. It’s a long story, really, but it started out with them hosting their email internally in the past. Then, six months ago, they decided to outsource their email to a local email service provider that promised higher uptimes, better Spam control and improved support, but their hopes were soon dashed!

The MSC Status company claims that it is ‘committed to the most innovative, effective, and sound solutions possible for our clients,’ but things started to go wrong right after the client signed up for their services! In one occasion, customer was told that their email services will be migrated to a new server. In the end, the migration had to be cancelled last minute and the client was left hanging and stuck!

“We don’t believe in solving email problems without truly understanding the customer’s needs,” said Pin, 1.my

When we were called in to help sort things out, we made it clear that we don’t believe in solving email problems without truly understanding the customer’s needs. We sat down with their staff and interviewed them in detail. They needed us to work out a perfect plan for everyone, but it also had to cater to each person’s own preference in handling emails. It was a tough task, but we tried our best to help and suggest new methods to improve their job efficiency and reduce work load.

The customer was paranoid, and who can blame them for being that way? They were given lots of empty promises by the previous email host who even claimed that they had the best uptime in town. As the saying goes, “Once bitten, twice shy,” and when we meet the managing director of the medical equipment supplier company face-to-face, he asked why they should trust and choose us, as they were cautious about jumping from the frying pan into the fire. We confidently told them that we were there to help them solve all their email problems, and that they have our word on that.

With more than a hundred email users and branches all over malaysia, their email migration had to be well planned. We worked closely with their technical support and everything was done smoothly. To play it safe, we have sent out our technical staff to their office for the first week after the migration. We helped them set up new email configurations and ran from desk to desk to ensure that everyone was comfortable with the new email system.

We also drafted email tips and tricks that was sent out to all email users, so that they knew how to manage their emails more effectively. We’ve always believed that email services are about experience, so we are constantly trying to ensure that our email users like us not just because of our uptime, but also because we care enough to share tips on how to improve their email experience.

We’re proud to say that the email migration was a success, and we even managed to solve a glitch so that their fax machine now works correctly and can send faxes to email addresses. We also solved missing email issues that occured because some users were still on the old setting.

It’s been our pleasure to work with their technical team, and we recently received feedback that they’re very pleased with their new email system. They simply told us, “They like the new email!” which is short, but sweet, and it’s music to our ears! We’re happy to have once again come to a customer’s rescue by solving their email woes.

Get Cloud Email Services
Uptime Review
Talk to Pin

Sending emails has become second nature to most of us these days, but there are always new things one can learn to make the process even more efficient. Among the things one should learn to do is how to: compose emails faster, manage your spam, get free mail back up, use a faster web browser, access your emails from your mobile phone, and attach signatures to the end of emails. If you don’t already know how to do these things, just check out these PDFs, and do share it with your family and friends!

New Comer Tricks
Auto Insert Signature

We at 1.com.my, are happy to provide a range of services, in order to meet your every email hosting, web hosting and domain name need. Since they are all renewable services, we’re happy to report that many of our customers have chosen to stay with us year after year, some for up to 10 years!

To all our loyal customers, we wish you the heartiest of thanks, and we invite all of you to tell us why you’ve decided to stay with us all these years.

My reason to stay is…

Are you one of our existing email hosting customers? We’ve just published our latest uptime and performance report for all our email services, do check it out!

Email services uptime report

Download full report (May 2006 – Jun 2011)
Download full report (May 2006 – Oct 2010)

We know that you have a lot of questions about our services and the way we work, so we’ve put together these downloadable documents that will tell you all you need to know:

1) Switch on guide
Are you swtiched on? Let us explain what that means in this helpful guide which will tell you about the many benefits of outsourcing.

2) Security services
Learn all about our security features and measures, and set your mind at ease.

3) All-day support
Our dedicated team is here for you 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Find out how and why we do it and learn all about our five elements of all day support.

4) Honouring the promise
If you’re unhappy with our services for some reason, we’d like for you to bring it up with us, find out how.

5) Acceptable use policy (AUP)
Your security and the prevention of internet abuse is important to us, find out what’s not allowed on the 1.com.my network.

6) General terms
We understand your concern about legal matters, so allow us to address matters concerning hosting agreements, obligations , terms of services, intellectual property and much more.

7) Mail terms
Here are additional terms and conditions on our mail services.

Download all documents

iPhone 4 for business

Well, firstly, the built-in mail program allows you to work on your emails a lot quicker, because it’s one of the easiest email clients for mobile phones. But, you’ll have to learn the art of writing emails that are only three lines long, otherwise, you’ll start cursing that tiny little keypad!

Also, with the iPhone 4, taking a picture and sharing it on Facebook, cannot get any easier. The Facebook App is free, and it’s real easy to use. This means you can manage your Page and keep it alive, with just your iPhone.

The Safari web browser on the iPhone 4 rivals the functionality of a full web browser, except it can’t show Flash content. It’ll display most websites without alignment problems though, and you can manage all your favaurite web applications while you’re on the move.

iPhone 4 Sign Up Tips

In case you’re wondering, it’s perfectly safe to go with the 1GB a month package. Don’t worry, you won’t run out, especially since you can tab on WIFI most of the time, instead of 3G. Plus, you only need 16GB of space, and if you need a lot more, just get a pen drive!

Sign up Cloud Email and sync your contact with your iPhone
Join iPhone 4 Malaysia Fan Page

This could be another X-File

“This could be another X-File,” said a customer jokingly, as we reviewed an email problem at his office. While most email problems can be solved online or through a phone call, sometimes, on-site reviews are a must. Yesterday, for example, we visited a customer who had a case of missing attachments.

Apparently, the problem only occurs in emails received from a particular sender, who sends out attachments to other email users using Outlook Express. To diagnose the problem, we ran a few tests with help from their technical team.

In this scenario, usually it is the recipient who’ll make the complaint, rather than the sender, because it’s the recipient who’ll notice the missing attachment. Some recipients choose to switch to Outlook, and then the problem goes away. But, we weren’t satisfied with that shortcut solution. No, we had to get to the root of the problem, and trace it back to the beginning.

After hours of reviewing and testing, we managed to determine that the issue originated in the Sender’s computer. We’ve thought up a solution and we’ll be working hand-in-hand with their technical team to make sure that the problem will be resolved completely.

This turned out to be… not another X-file :)

Migration team provides on-site assistance for agents

Oriental Realty is one of the top real estate agencies in Malaysia, and we’re thrilled that they turned to us to plan their email upgrade. After all, we’re reliable yet cost effective!

As they have over 150 agents on the move, we’ve decided to integrate their email services with Google Apps. Each agent will get about 7GB of email space and they can access their emails anytime, anywhere.

The new email upgrade will also provide them with better mobility support, as it works well for both iPhone and Blackberry users.