Manage Multiple Google Apps Email Accounts From One Account

If you're anything like me, you own multiple websites. As you know, only a *reputable* webmaster who wants to be taken seriously will own and operate a "user@mysite.com" email address for each individual site. This is incredibly annoying and difficult to do when you have to log into a dozen different email addresses on a regular basis. What's worse is that there aren't any browser plug-ins to help you manage multiple Google Apps for Small Business email accounts. However, there is most definitely a way to get it done, thanks to Google Apps Email's advanced settings, and that's what you'll learn on this page!

For starters, you'll need a free Google Apps account, and you can get it via this form page (note that the word "standard" is in the URL, which points to the free version). Google has now made it become difficult to find the "standard" (free) version of Google Apps, and they're pushing their paid Apps for Business version. Be assured that the version in that link is 100% free, though.

This is one AWESOME service for small business owners. You get a fully functional Gmail account with Google Calendar, Docs, Chat, Sites and other free services. Best yet, you'll be able to set up your "myname@mysite.com" email account instead of having a "myname@gmail.com" like a regular Gmail account, with ALL the benefits of a regular Gmail account!

Before You Create Your First Account...
There's only one warning I have for you - be absolutely sure that the first Google Apps account you create is going to be considered your "company" email address. It should be the email address you intend to use the most. If you own a business entity like an LLC, create this first account for your LLC's domain name. The protocol for a main contact email address would be "info@" or "admin@", followed by your domain name.

What's the Catch?
There's only one catch to this entire process. You'll need a separate Google Apps account for every domain name that you intend to create a custom email address for -- there's no way around this. It is a temporary annoyance, though. Our goal is to have them all forward over to your main Google Apps Email account.

What If I Want Multiple Email Addresses For the Same Domain?
In case you stumbled upon this tutorial wanting to create multiple email addresses for one single domain (i.e., info@mysite.com, sales@mysite.com and michael@mysite.com), things are much easier for you. You'll only need one Google Apps account, and you can simply create these new addresses under Email settings » Organization & Users » Create A New User. Also, you can simply skip the rest of this entire tutorial :)

Let's get started by creating those two accounts (once again, do this at Google.com/a)

I'm Assuming You Have An Account Set Up Already!
Go ahead and get your primary account created -- I'm actually not going to include a tutorial for the setup of a Google Apps account. It's self explanatory, and Google's directions are great. They'll take you through the process step by step. If you're hosting your own website, all you'll need to do is to edit the MX Record of your domain name (this is done within cPanel » MX Entry). Otherwise, it's done on your domain host (Godaddy, etc.)

Free Edition vs. Paid Edition
Don't get scared at the step in the process where you'll have to input a payment method -- that's just for the premium edition. But, all we need is the free edition. Simply skip the payment process step for Google Apps and you'll never have to worry about it again.

If the MX Records Don't Work...
I figured I'd include this to help anyone who simply can't get the suggested MX Records from Google to work (because I couldn't). I use only these 3, and they work fine for me:

10 aspmx.l.google.com
20 alt2.aspmx.l.google.com
30 aspmx5.googlemail.com

Before Proceeding Onward In This Tutorial: Create A 2nd Account
When you're done creating your first account, go through the entire process and create a second Google Apps account for the second domain that needs a custom email account! After you have two functioning Google Apps accounts, proceed onward:

Get into your secondary email account(s) and click the "gear" icon on the right, then choose "Settings." Find the tab for "Forwarding and POP/IMAP." Enable IMAP, leave everything else defaulted, and click "Save Changes." Note that you don't have to do this for your primary email account! Just the secondary ones.

What Happens If You Don't Do This?
I found out about this IMAP setting through trial and error. Without it, your secondary Google Apps Email account will only be able to send email, and not receive it. In a sense, there will be a "miscommunication" between the primary and secondary accounts without it.

Navigate to "Settings » Accounts" in your primary Google Apps email account. Click "Add Another Email Address You Own."

A new window will open. Here, you can specify the stated "name" of the email account ("Administrator," your first name, whatever you want), and the Email Address of your secondary account (i.e., as previously stated, we used "info@redwidgets.com" which is our imaginary 2nd website).

Uncheck "Treat As An Alias"
Be sure to UNCHECK "treat as an alias." If that box is checked, Google Apps Email would treat your secondary emails as being sent by your primary one (info@mysite.com), which defeats the purpose of everything we're trying to accomplish!

Verification Process
Click "Next Step." Google Apps Email will then send a verification email to your secondary account, with a numerical code. You'll have to exit out of your primary account, log-in to your secondary account, open the email, copy the code, and then log back in to your primary account and paste the code into the verification box.

Once this is done, you'll see that secondary account appearing under
"Settings » Accounts » Send Mail As" within your primary account.

Looking at the screenshot above, you should see your secondary email address (the example "info@redwidgets.com") appearing on this screen, along with some text that says "not an alias." Great! That's half the battle.

Select "Reply From The Same Address..."
Next, look at the second red outlined area. It's a radio button that says "Reply from the same address the message was sent to." Click this one - it is not defaulted, but you'll need it to be selected. If not -- every time your secondary email account gets an email and it bounces to your primary account and you hit "reply," your default email address is the default "From" address, rather than what we really want: the secondary email address as the "From" address.

What If That Button Isn't Selected?
Just one more thing: if you don't click that radio button, you can STILL send a reply as your secondary address. When you reply to an email, you can click your "From" field, which becomes a drop-down box. From there, you can pick which of the secondary accounts you'd like to reply as. In most cases, it's an annoying additional step, and many people would forget to do this, and accidentally reply to the email from the primary account.

We're almost there. So far, we've created two Google Apps Email accounts for two domains (your primary/business domain name, and a secondary domain for another website you own), and we've configured the primary account to send email on behalf of the secondary account. Now, we need to "push" all incoming emails from the secondary account to the primary one!

In The Secondary Account...
Log in to your secondary Google Apps Email account.
Navigate to "Settings » Forwarding and POP/IMAP". Click the "Add a forwarding address" button, and type in the email address of your primary account.

...once you've gone through the process of completing this, you'll see your primary account appear in this section as the forward-to address:

Now, all emails that are sent to the Red Widgets email account will forward to your primary email account. So, when you log into your primary email account, you'll not only get the emails that normally get sent there, but you'll also get emails that were sent to Red Widgets. When you open an email sent to Red Widgets in the primary account and click "reply," you'll be replying as Red Widgets (info@redwidgets.com).

Essentially, we're done! Now's the time to test everything out to see how it works. Use an email account to send a test email to your secondary account. Log in to your primary account, and you should see that the test email should have been forwarded to it. Open the email, click "reply," and make sure the "From" address is properly set as your secondary account's address.

Send a test email to the address you originally got it from, and then verify that the reply was sent from the secondary address (even though you replied to it from the primary one). If successful -- that concludes this tutorial!