You might have heard people talking about setting up a custom domain. You probably wondered at some point if you should do this, what’s so great about it and how to set it up. If that’s the case, just keep on reading!
There’s plenty of complicated articles out there that use a lot of sophisticated tech-y lingo. We tried to explain the whole process in the easiest possible way. No one has time to bang their head against the wall trying to figure out what half of those terms mean.
The good news is that if you use Revue, your newsletter will be hosted by default on our getrevue.co domain via www.getrevue.co/profile/yourusername, which already makes things way easier! However, if you prefer to make your newsletter available through your own domain, you can easily point your DNS records for the domain to our servers!
DN-WHAT?!
First things first — don’t be intimidated by the fancy acronyms! DNS is just the Domain Name System. You knew that, right? If not, that’s also perfectly fine!
Let me explain with a simple example. DNS is like the contacts list on your phone- instead of searching for a phone number you just search for your friend’s name. So what does a contact list have to do with DNS? Well, as you might know, each website on the internet has an unique IP address (just like a person has a unique phone number). To make the internet usable for mere mortals like me, I can just remember facebook.com instead of the IP address 69.171.230.68. And this is where DNS comes in; once you go to facebook.com the corresponding IP address is looked up in the DNS so your browser will know where to go (just like your phone looks up the number tied to your firend’s name to know who to call). You can also tell your DNS to forward ‘newsletters.yourdomain.com’ to your profile page on Revue. And this what we call a custom domain :)
What benefits are there to having a custom domain?
Basically, having a custom domain is just an additional way to extend further your branding and have a domain name that is more “user friendly”. It’s a great way to give your newsletter a more personal touch.
Having your own domain means that your brand becomes more personal and it’s easier to share your newsletter! Also depending on your goals with your digest, it can make you look more professional for example. In every case, it’s highly recommended you create your own domain, especially if you have a big following. It does make you more recognizable!
Let’s look for example in the digest of Nalden, WeTransfer’s founder. He uses digest.nalden.net instead of www.getrevue.co/profile/nalden. I know what you’re thinking already: you also want this, right?
Setting up your domain
Now the interesting part comes. It’s important to mention that it takes a little bit of research before you start, since every DNS provider has a different way of setting up a custom domain. Each DNS provider has their own user interface and steps for adding or editing its domain’s DNS records. Although the specifics differ per DNS provider the overall idea is the same across all DNS providers:-
Step 1:
First things first. You have to make sure you have a PRO account on Revue. It’s super easy to sign up! Just go here and put in your details! :)
Step 2:
Next you have to acquire a domain and decide what subdomain you want to use. (f.e. newsletter.yourdomain.com).
Step 3:
Then, If you want your profile www.getrevue.co/profile/yourusername to point to newsletters.yourdomain.com you need to create a CNAME with source domain “newsletters” and destination should be “www.getrevue.co".
Step 4:
Lastly, you need to enter “newsletters.yourdomain.com” in the settings of Revue. (see screenshot)
Step 5:
The last “step” is just waiting. Although it can take up to 24 hours before the DNS records are updated, we know from experience that it usually does not take the full 24 hours (we’ve seen records being updated within the hour). Once the records are updated you can enjoy your new custom domain!
Naked domains
One thing you might be wondering about is how to redirect yourdomain.com (no subdomain, <subdomain>.yourdomain.com) to your Revue profile. Yourdomain.com is called a naked domain and domain protocols state that one shouldn’t redirect naked domains. You can read up on the technical aspects, if interested, here (Cloudflare) and here (Heroku). If you want this badly you need to be on one of these DNS providers.
We looked up a set of tutorials explaining how to setup a CNAME. Just google “CNAME <name of your DNS provider>” (without brackets) if your DNS provider is not in the list.
I hope this article was helpful and you managed to set up your custom domain! If you think that we missed a step or you have a question, just shoot us an email or let us know in the comments below, we’ll reply quickly :)
