Initial post to external email address in Google Groups for Business

Question

Ok, so I've set up a Collaborative Inbox on Google Groups for Business. It looks good so far, but one thing I can't seem to figure out:

I would like to use it for [email protected], and one of the biggest use cases would be to start a thread by writing email to a potential candidate. I tried to send email from Gmail, using "send as", to an external address - this doesn't open a thread in the group. Then I sent an email to an external address CCing of BCCing [email protected] - this opens a new thread, but the message comes from career@ and shows no sign of the external email, which seems obvious.

Within the group, I don't seem to be able to start a new thread that initially goes to an external email.

Is there a way to do this use case with Google Groups for Business / Collaborative Inbox?

Answer 1

Short answer

There is no way to add an address to the TO field from the web UI of Google Groups.

Alternatives

One alternative is to include the recipient in CC

Another alternative is to send the email from an "individual" email account and

• add the group email address to the Reply-to field
• add the group email address to the TO OR CC fields and tell the recipient to use Reply-to-all

References

• Use a group as a collaborative inbox - Google Apps Administrator Help
• Create a topic - Groups Help
• Setting the reply-to address - Gmail Help