Delivery & policy updates by email providers (eg: Gmail, Yahoo) require that you verify and authenticate your domain in order to be able to continue sending emails. These requirements apply to all companies including your own work emails.

We've prepared this handy guide to walk you through the process of what you need to do to get setup and sending out emails.

Why do I have to make these updates?

From Feb 2024, Gmail & Yahoo will not accept emails that are sent from an unauthenticated address (ie: if you use a third-party platform like Connect to send an email and specify the FROM address as being from your domain, the message will not be delivered unless your domain has specifically authorised the third-party).

This means that in-order to be able to send out emails, you must first grant permission for us to send them out on your behalf. This is done by making some changes to your domain.

What changes do I need to make?
The changes must be made in the backend portal of your domain host's platform (eg: GoDaddy, CrazyDomains, NameCheap etc...) - this is the company that you purchased your domain from. 

There are four updates required to the DNS of your domain. A quick explanation of the updates:

• SPF specifies which mail servers are authorized to send emails on behalf of your domain, preventing spammers from impersonating your domain.
• DKIM adds a layer of security by digitally signing your emails, verifying their authenticity and integrity. Both SPF and DKIM contribute to your emails being trusted by email service providers and recipients, reducing the chances of them being flagged as spam.
• DMARC allows domain owners to specify how email receivers should handle emails that fail SPF and DKIM checks. It enables the domain owner to set policies that determine whether to reject, quarantine, or allow emails that don't pass authentication.
• The BOUNCE update is used for all bounce notification emails. It is commonly known as the "envelope sender".

How do I make the required updates?

There are two main steps to setting up & authenticating your domain:

1. Add the domain to your Connect CRM account.
2. Update the DNS of your domain.

Once the above two changes have been made, it can take 24-48 hours to become live. 

Adding the Domain to your Connect CRM account

1. Login to your Connect CRM account and navigate to Settings > Domain Setup.
2. Click "Add A Domain" and specify your domain name (you don't need to include the "www").
3. We'll need to verify the domain name. To do this, provide an email address and click on "Send Verification Link".  The email address provided it must be setup under that domain. So, if your domain is "myawesomevenue.com" then, your email address must be @myawesomevenue.com An email will be sent (be sure to check your junk folder) with a verification link. Click on this link to verify the domain.
4. Once verified, navigate back to Settings > Domain Setup and click "TEST DNS" to view the dns updates that are required.  These updates will need to be made on the domain using your domain host's backend platform.

Making the updates to your domain

Once you have completed the steps above, and clicked TEST DNS, you will see a table containing the four updates required.

Login to your Domain Host's backend platform, select your domain and navigate to the section that allows you to manage your DNS.

Within the Domain Setup section of Connect, the required DNS updates are provided to you. These will need to be created as new dns records in your domain. 

When creating the records in your domain host's backend, you will be asked to provide the following details:

• Name/Alias/Host
  This refers to the value in the "NAME" column of the setup page in Connect. If the "Name" column is blank, you can usually specify "@". 
  
  
• Type
  Generally, the type is specified as "TXT". However, for the Bounce record, please ensure you specify the type as CNAME. 
  
  
• TTL
  This stands for "Time-To-Live" and it determines how long it will take for the changes to be live. We recommend selecting 30 mins or 1 hour (if available). 
  
  
• Value
  Copy and paste the value exactly as it is displayed in Connect. The value is very important and must be copied exactly - we recommend using the "copy to clipboard" button in Connect.

A note on the SPF record: A domain can only contain a single SPF record. If you already have an SPF record setup on your domain, you will need to edit it and replace the value with what is displayed in Connect. To determine if an SPF record already exists, the "Current Value" in Connect will provide you with the existing record details. If the "Current Value" is blank, it means you do not have an SPF record and should create a new entry for it.

Once the updates have been made, click on "Test DNS" within the Domain Setup section of Connect to verify. You must see green ticks for each of the four items.

Depending on the "TTL" of your DNS, the changes will not propagate instantly. So, you will need to wait (24-48 hours is the average) for your changes to become live before they can be seen by our platform. 

Once you see green ticks, your domain is ready and can be used.

Who is my domain host / registar?

If you don't know who your domain host is, navigate to https://dnsimple.com/whois, enter your domain name and click on "Check Domain". In the results, the domain host's website will be listed under the "Registrar URL" value. 

Additional help & resources incase you are stuck

Unfortunately, we are unable to support making changes to your domain. We've compiled a handy list of guides for some of the most popular domain registrar's below to help you. We also recommend reaching out directly to their support team to assist you in making these changes.

Help docs for editing DNS records for commonly used Domain Hosters

• Godaddy
• Squarespace Hosting
• Webcentral
• Crazy Domains
• VentraIP
• Hostinger
• HostGator