Two email problems with the same root cause
Most businesses pay twice for email. They pay Google or Microsoft for business email: receiving and sending day-to-day communications. And they pay Mailchimp, ActiveCampaign, Brevo, or a similar platform for marketing email: campaigns, newsletters, and outreach to their list.
Both costs share the same structure: you pay per user for business email, and you pay per subscriber for marketing email. Both costs grow as your business grows. Neither gives you ownership of the infrastructure you depend on.
At 30 people on Google Workspace Business Standard plus a 20,000-subscriber Mailchimp list, you're paying over $6,000 per year in email costs alone. A $30/month server handles that infrastructure comfortably.
Business email — deployed correctly
We deploy a complete self-hosted mail server covering incoming and outgoing email, spam filtering, webmail access, and mobile client support. The software we use depends on your team size and requirements. We use Mailcow for most teams, Postfix with Dovecot for more customised setups, iRedMail or Mailu for specific multi-domain configurations.
Deliverability is the part self-hosted email deployments most commonly get wrong. We configure SPF, DKIM, and DMARC as mandatory steps in every deployment. These three DNS records tell receiving mail servers that your email is legitimate. Without them, self-hosted email lands in spam. With them correctly configured, delivery rates are equivalent to Google or Microsoft. We test delivery to Gmail, Outlook, and Yahoo before any cutover, and monitor deliverability for the first 30 days after migration.
Marketing email — own your list
For marketing email — campaigns, newsletters, drip sequences, and outreach. We deploy Listmonk or Mautic. Listmonk is our default recommendation: it handles large lists efficiently, has a clean interface your marketing team can use without technical help, and costs nothing in licensing regardless of how large your list grows.
We migrate your subscriber list, segments, and campaign history from your current platform. We configure sending via a high-volume delivery service (typically Amazon SES) at a fraction of the cost of Mailchimp at equivalent volume. We handle the IP warmup process for new sending infrastructure, configure bounce handling and unsubscribe automation, and set up feedback loop registration with major inbox providers.
For a 100,000-subscriber list, total infrastructure cost after migration is typically $25 to $40 per month. The Mailchimp equivalent is over $800 per month.
Email verification included for large lists
For businesses sending to lists above 50,000 subscribers, or to lists that have not been cleaned recently, we include an email verification pass as part of the migration. We deploy a self-hosted verification tool that checks your list for invalid, risky, and catch-all addresses before the first campaign goes out on new infrastructure. Sending to a clean list protects your reputation and improves inbox placement from day one.