Limits to email file sharing

One day you may find it necessary to share files with your friends, family or clients.

You may have already discovered that your email client will not allow you to send files larger than 10MB. One exception is Gmail, which allows for files as large as 25MB. However, your recipient may not be able to access the files due to limits imposed by their email service.

Using a cloud service to share files is a great way to circumvent the limitations of email sharing.

Cloud Storage Services with Sharing

We have compiled a list of services which can handle the transfer of large files below.

WeTransfer

www.WeTransfer.com
WeTransfer is a great way to transfer photo files, especially if you’re sharing files with clients. They offer a free transfer of up to 2GBs. You can send your files to multiple recipients and get a confirmation email when your files have been downloaded.

Their Plus service ($10 per month) allows you to increase the transfer size to 10GBs. You can customize the landing page with your own images, password-protect the transfers, keep the files in storage long-term and get a customized domain name.

Dropbox

www.Dropbox.com
Dropbox is currently the most recognized if not the most used cloud storage service. It syncs well across all of your devices and allows users to share files through Public folders.

Box

www.Box.com

Box is very much like Dropbox, but it’s geared more toward collaboration and businesses. Due to the security needs of business, Box has more robust encryption from end-to-end than Dropbox. However, Dropbox is committing to better securing your content.

Zenfolio

Zenfolio.com and SmugMug.com
Zenfolio and SmugMug are the complete package. You can create a website, have multiple password-protected galleries and sell your images (either in digital or in print form) directly from the site.

You can share large files with friends and clients directly through Zenfolio. It’s not as easy to use as WeTransfer; you would have to upload the file, edit the access features and pass along the share link to your clients. It’s more laborious, but the landing page will be customized and branded for your company.

If you would like to make your digital files available for sale, Zenfolio and SmugMug allow you to attach pricing. They take care of the file transfer, collect payment and send you your fees after a deduction for their service.

SugarSync

SugarSync.com
SugarSync is both a file sharing service and a syncing service. One of best and most unique feature about SugarSync is that you can ‘tell’ the service which folders and files you want to sync across  multiple devices and it will take care of the organization for you. This is different from some of the other services because of how they handle syncs. Dropbox, Box, Google Drive and OneDrive all ask you to place the files you want to sync into their master-folder on your computer. SugarSync allows you to keep your files where they are and syncs them directly. Plans range from $7.49/mo to $55/month.

MediaFire

MediaFire.com
MediaFire is a file transfer service which emphasizes the transfer of media, including images, video and audio. Further they highlight sharing through Social Media and gives users control over who can access files. The interface on both the web and mobile devices is pretty slick. Files can be shared from your mobile device or from your web browser. A free account starts you off with 10GB, a Pro account gets you 100GB for $2.49 per month.

Bitcasa

BitCasa.com
Bitcasa has a few cool things going for them, they’re offering much more free cloud storage (20GB), they offer an Infinity Drive for unlimited storage, your files are full encrypted and you can share files privately.

If you visit their About page, you just might melt from all the cute doggies.

Best Practices

If you have more than one file to share with your client, it’s a good practice to compress your files into an archived ZIP file. Compressing many files into one, keeps things simple for the recipient. Taking this extra step helps to reduce confusion and keeps files organized.

Organize the files to be delivered into a single folder before compressing. I use client-friendly directories which make it easier for the recipient to find the files he/she needs. Once your files are organized in master folder, you can then compress that folder.

How to Compress Files

Resources:

http://www.gcflearnfree.org/techsavvy/9
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Email_attachment
http://www.softwareadvice.com/labs/box-vs-dropbox/
http://lifehacker.com/what-s-the-best-way-to-share-large-files-with-friends-1486810038
http://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/how-to-send-large-files-for-free/#ixzz2uNtUmz9P