How to Add Records
Article:
DNS records let you connect to websites by matching human-readable domain names (like feathers.com) with the unique ID of the server where a website is stored.
Basically speaking, you can think of DNS records as the internet's phonebook. It lists domain names with their IP addresses, so it knows what site to fetch when people enter a URL. So, when you change your DNS records, you're changing your site's "contact details".
When you create your first site with Convertri, we give you a subdomain of our main domain, convertri.com. This means your site's address will start off as something like feathers.convertri.com - but if you have your own domain registered elsewhere, such as feathers.com, you can use this instead so that when people enter that URL they see your site.
You can do this with namesevers.
Nameservers
A nameserver is a special type of server that keeps all the DNS records of your domain name. Its job is to provide your DNS information to anyone requesting it (think of an old-timey switchboard).
Nameservers are typically managed by your domain name registrar. In this case, when you register feathers.convertri.com, we are your domain name registrar. But if you bought feathers.com elsewhere, that service will be your domain name registrar.
In order to get feathers.com to display what you created on feathers.convertri.com, you need to change the nameservers. Find out how to do that here.
Records
Once you've added your custom domain in Convertri, it will show up on your domains list. You can then edit its records by navigating to Account > Domains > Records next to the domain you want to edit.
On the Records screen, you can add and edit all the DNS records you need to make your site function how you want it to.
Here's a brief explanation of some of the records you can add and edit here:
CNAME - CNAME stands for Canonical Name. A CNAME record is a type of DNS record that’s used to point a domain name to another domain name, instead of an IP address. For example, let’s say you want to make sure that you created your website on feathers.com, but you’ve also registered feathersforsale.com and want it to go to your main website. In that case, you can set up a CNAME record so that anyone who visits examples.com would go to example.com instead. A great idea is to add a CNAME for
MX - a MX record is an abbreviation for the Mail Exchanger record. It’s another type of DNS record that defines a mail server to handle email for a particular domain name. It lets you receive email at your domain, which you would typically set up with your domain registrar, as something like hello@feathers.com. You can find out how to add MX records here, and how to get mail sent to your domain here.
TXT - a TXT record is another DNS resource record type. TXT records can have both SPF (Sender Policy Framework) and DKIM (Domain Key Identified Mail) records that add an encrypted key in outgoing mail. This information improves your email deliverability by adding a trust layer to your mail server.
SRV - a SRV (service) record is a type of DNS record that defines the location, i.e. the hostname and port number, of a server(s) for specified services. They establish connections between a service and a hostname. Often when setting up your email to work with your custom domain your registrar / hosting service service will provide you with SRV records that need to be added in Convertri. You can find out how to add SRV records here.
CONVERTRI - this is a special kind of record just for us, where you can create a subdomain such as offers.feathers.com. A great idea is to use it for "www", which means anyone who enters www.feathers.com instead of just feathers.com is guaranteed to see your website without any issues.
When you make changes to your DNS records on Convertri, they can take a little while to propagate (update), so you should allow plenty of time and keep checking back. If you're having trouble adding and editing DNS records, get in touch with support@convertri.com.