July 18, 2008

A Guide to Setting Up Domain Name From Godaddy on Blogger

This post was requested by Zewt, on custom domain name setup for Blogger using domain names purchased at Godaddy.com.

If you've purchased your own domain name, congratulations! Nothing like your own lil' dot com on that wide space called the Internet, eh? If, like me, you would like to continue to Blogger as your web host but using your own domain, well, that works too if you're on relatively tight budget. I would still recommend you to move to your own web host and to Wordpress though. I'm still searching for the best deals on web hosts, and when I do, I'll be moving my blogs over to Wordpress.

But for now, Blogger works just fine, and if you'd still like to hang on to Blogger for a bit, here's how to set up your custom domain name on your blog using Blogger.

According to Blogger.com, to use a custom domain name on your blog would be to
Buy your own domain, and create a CNAME record for it to point to ghs.google.com (unless you buy the domain through Blogger).
Enter your domain in the 'Custom Domain' option on the Settings | Publishing tab.

You can read the full details here, which I highly recommend, but in the interest of saving time, I've included screenshots of how to set up your custom domain name on Blogger. Bear in mind that the instructions below are specified for domains purchased from Godaddy.com, but the general settings, like creating the CNAME record, etc, would be the same.

DNS stands for Domain Name System, and a DNS server determines what site a given address takes you to. So far, you have a domain name but none of the servers on the internet know what to do with it yet. To take care of this, you need to create a CNAME record for your domain with the DNS, associating your domain with ghs.google.com.

You can also read the full details of the setup here. I'll be using the instructions as shown in Blogger.com, and include screenshots which would hopefully aid you in your domain name setup.


GODADDY DOMAIN NAME SETUP

1. Log in to your account at www.godaddy.com
Godaddy Login

2. Open the Domains tab and select My Domains. You'll be directed to the Domain Manager page.
Godaddy Domain

3. Click the domain that you'd like to use with your blog. (here you will see the three domain names which I already have. For explanation's sake, I shall be using www.beautyholicsanonymous.com)
Godaddy Domain Manager
Click to enlarge

4. Click the Total DNS Control And MX Records link at the bottom of the section entitled Total DNS.
Godaddy DNS Control
Click to enlarge

5. Click Add New CNAME Record in the box labelled CNAMES (aliases). If you've already created a CNAME record for your blog's address, click the pencil icon next to the existing CNAME record. (The reason I blanked the words out is that I've already created a CNAME record for the domain. Before you add a new CNAME record for your domain, this is what you should see).
Godaddy CNAME
Click to enlarge

6. For the Name, enter only the subdomain of the address you want to use for your blog. For example, if you picked www.mydomain.com as your address, enter www here.
7. Enter ghs.google.com as the Host Name. Specify a TTL or use the default setting of 1 hour.
Godaddy CNAME Alias
Click to enlarge

8. Click OK, and then click OK again.

You should now see the added CNAME record.

Godaddy CNAME 2
Click to enlarge

That's pretty much it for your domain setup on Godaddy.


BLOGGER.COM SETUP

1. Go to Blogger.com, click on Settings on the blog in which you bought the domain name for, and then click on Publishing.
Blogger Publishing
Click to enlarge

2. Click on Switch to Advanced Settings.
3. Type in your new domain name.
Blogger Publishing Advanced Settings
Click to enlarge

4. Click on Save Settings.

If nothing goes wrong, your domain should be up and running within 5 to 10 minutes. When you click on your blogspot address, you'd be directed to your new address instead.

There ya go, your very own domain name on Blogger. Just holler if you have any questions, or faced any problems.

Good luck!

5 comments:

Mummy said...

aiyoh....too complex for my nappy brain....it stopped working after the 2nd step :)

zewt said...

ok, i need to enlist some IT specialist help for this... i amn lost after a while...

guess i am in accounting for a reason.

Anonymous said...

Phooiyo! For a while, I thought I stumbled into a techie blog :D

A said...

Godaddy told me the aforementioned information doesn't work.

They suggested I changed my namesevers 1 & 2 as well as Arecord.

What am I doing wrong?

Unknown said...

Godaddy reseller site for Domain registration process the site is tucktail..