I have very limited knowledge about SMTP and IMAP/POP. SMTP --> sending message, IMAP--> Mainly for receiving messages.
I have a woocommerce website and i already did setup my email system to use SMTP relay using zoho. I believe zoho also provide mailbox services since I am able to communicate with my customer(both two and fro) using its email service. They have their app and i can receive and send mail from that app. Obviously, I have set up all the records including MX to send/receive the email to my zoho inbox.
No i want to move my email services to postmark or like sendinblue. All i can see the setting related to sending the mail but how/where will I receive the mail when user reply on that?? On the postmark website it says: Since Postmark is not a mailbox provider there's not the ability to generate mailboxes for receiving email using IMAP or POP3.
Question 1) Does the SMTP relay server is actually a different physical machine from IMAP server for sending/receiving messages. I guess both are different but why are these companies not providing solutions like zoho. Pardon me if I did not understand the use case.
Question 2) What to do in this case ???. My case is simple. I send notifications to customers regarding their orders. If they want they can reply or enquire. I receive the email on my phone and I can reply on the same mail-chain like we have on Gmail.
Question 3) Do i need to buy some another service along with these to receive and reply back on the email ??? Like from godaddy or somewhere else.