Setting up your platform

Connect your custom domain

Point your own web address at your platform so your site, your shared links and your emails all carry your organisation’s name.

Updated 2 min read3 parts
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Your platform runs on your own domain — your organisation’s main address or a subdomain of it. Connecting it is a one-time job, done before launch by whoever looks after your organisation’s domain, working with the TKDS team setting up your platform. There’s no domain field in the Studio: the address is attached to your platform as part of that setup.

Before you start

  • Sign-in details for the account where your domain is registered or its DNS is managed — your domain provider.
  • A decision on the exact address visitors will type: the bare domain, the www version or a subdomain.
  • Someone who can change DNS records on the day, and check the result afterwards.

Connect the domain

  1. 1
    Choose one primary address

    Decide which spelling is the real one — with or without www — and use only that one in your marketing, your social profiles and your app-store listings.

  2. 2
    Send the address to TKDS

    Give the exact address to the TKDS team setting up your platform. They confirm the DNS records your domain needs.

  3. 3
    Add the records at your domain provider

    Sign in to your domain provider, open the DNS settings for your domain and add the records exactly as given. Remove any older record for the same name that points somewhere else.

The Studio
Your domain provider’s DNS settings page, with the new records added for your chosen address
  1. 1
    Forward the other spelling

    At your domain provider, set the other spelling (with or without www) to redirect to your primary address, so both reach the same site.

  2. 2
    Allow time to spread

    DNS changes can take anywhere from minutes to a day or two to reach every network. Check from a phone on mobile data as well as from your office.

  3. 3
    Look for the padlock

    Open your address and confirm the browser shows a padlock. If it doesn’t, tell the TKDS team before you share the address anywhere.

After the domain is live

  • Set From address in Studio → System → Settings → Security → SMTP to an address on your domain, so receipts and password resets look like they come from you.
  • Copy your bypass URL again from Studio → System → Settings → System → Maintenance and replace any saved copy.
  • Update your social profiles, app-store listings, printed material and QR codes to the new address.
  • Paste an event or article link into a messaging app to confirm the preview shows its title and image.
  • Check your Stripe, PayPal or Square dashboard for any setting that names your website address, and update it.
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