By Gecko Studio · updated October 2026
Have you ever needed to get at your work documents and found you could not? That is exactly what happened to one of our clients. Before linking their email account to Google services, they struggled to reach their documents and to work effectively with their team.
After linking the account, everything changed. As well as online access to their documents, they gained a range of extra services, such as Gmail, Google Drive and Google Calendar. Each can be used on its own or combined to improve productivity and collaboration.
What are the advantages of linking?
A business can make the most of each of these services. With Gmail you can send and receive email more efficiently. With Google Drive you can store and share files securely. With Google Calendar you can organise meetings and events more easily.
Will I lose my emails or have to change email program?
Worried about losing your current account by linking it to Google services? There is no need. You will not lose your account, and you will not have to switch email software. You are simply adding more features and services to the account you already have.
You can also keep using your favourite email program, because linking to Google services does not replace it. It just gives you access to your documents online and to a set of extra tools.
How do you set up the link?
Setting up your email account to use Google services is simple. Sign in to your Google account and follow these steps:
- Click the Google apps icon in the top right-hand corner of the page.
- Select Gmail.
- Click "Settings", then "See all settings" and the "Accounts and Import" tab.
- Click "Add a mail account".
- Enter your email details and click "Next".
- Choose the settings you want and click "Add account".
That is all. Your email account is now linked to Google services. Menu names can change slightly between Google interface updates, so if a label looks different, look for the equivalent option.
Which Google tools help your marketing work?
At Gecko Studio we use a large number of shared reports and documents to boost productivity, and we help our clients get the most out of Google services.
- For our SEO services, up-to-date reports speed up review and give very relevant data dynamically.
- For reviewing copy in content marketing, Google's collaborative tools let you work with the client and reach the best final result.
- Our Google Ads clients can follow campaign progress quickly and make decisions at any time.
- Google Sheets is an excellent tool for working with text, translations, calendars and more, in web design and social media alike.
Linking is the easy part: which account you use is what matters
The part that gets neglected, and ends up costing money, is which account you link with, because that decision is made in five minutes and lasts for years.
The pattern repeats in almost every business we have seen over time: the Google Business Profile listing, the advertising account, analytics and domain access were all created long ago under someone's personal account. Sometimes the manager's, often an employee who has since left, and quite often the company that built the website eight years ago. While nobody moves, nothing happens. The day you need to change a phone number, reply to a review or recover the listing, the person holding the key does not pick up the phone.
Regaining control of a listing whose owner does not answer is not impossible, but it is a slow process, resolved by verification, and it does not always work first time. Meanwhile the listing stays published with whatever data it has, and you cannot touch it. It is a rare kind of problem that money and haste cannot fix.
The healthy setup is three things, done once: the owner of everything is a company account, not a person's; individuals come in as users with permissions, so they can be removed when someone leaves; and the address is on your own domain, not a free email account, because the address that appears on your website and quotes is also a signal about who you are writing to.
It is worth spending an afternoon checking who is listed today as owner of your listing, your domain and your analytics. In half the cases the answer is a surprise, and it is far cheaper to find out on a quiet Tuesday than on the day you need it. Related reading: domain names and who should own them and website maintenance.
If you also want to boost your productivity and collaboration, link your email to Google services, and contact us if you would like help doing it.