Install A Custom Domain For Email Sending (Sender Defaults)
Nucleus Messages & Posts empowers you to send valuable and timely communications directly to your church members and site visitors through email. To ensure that your emails deliver reliably and elegantly, you can customize your Sender Defaults by connecting your domain directly to Messages.
Note: If you don’t have much experience with domains and DNS records, and terms like CNAME records and IP addresses sound foreign to you, we have an entire Overview Of Web Domains that might be helpful to reference as you make your way through the rest of this guide.
Before you proceed! Is your domain connected to Nucleus?
To configure connected Sender Defaults in Messages, you'll first need to ensure that your domain is successfully connected to your account through Nucleus Web (or Church Settings if you're not a Web user yet).
If you’re all good and connected already then it’s time to move on to the next step.
Configure Your Sending Defaults
You can send Messages & Posts without connecting your domain. By default, Nucleus will deliver your emails from info@aa89723e908123890eeaa890423-your-domain.nucleus.mail.com. On both campaign and email levels, you can override how that email is shown in your audience's inbox by configuring Sending Defaults. Your message will appear with your name, but it will still be delivered from our sending domain.
That being said, the way that Google, Yahoo, etc., chooses to honor that and display your sender information is entirely up to them, and can sometimes be unpredictable.
By connecting your domain and Configuring Sending Defaults in Settings, you'll guarantee that your sender and reply-to emails display exactly how to intend when your emails land in their destination inboxes.
Connect Your Domain
For this step, you’ll need to open your domain registrar in another tab (that’s the company you purchased your domain from). Make sure to keep your Nucleus Dashboard open as you're about to copy some CNAME records and paste them into your registrar.
Note: Because each domain registrar’s user interface is unique, the screenshots below might not look exactly like what you see. Thankfully, the principles and steps are almost universal across all domain registrars.
Once you’re logged into your domain registrar account, make your way to where you can manage/edit your DNS records for your custom domain. Note: The instructions below are to create a new CNAME record. If preexisting CNAME records exist, pay them no mind. We're simply adding three new ones.
In your domain registrar’s system, create a new record with the following information:
- Type: CNAME Record
- Name: COPY FROM YOUR NUCLEUS DASHBOARD
- IP Address / Value / Content: COPY FROM YOUR NUCLEUS DASHBOARD
- TTL: 600 seconds (or as low as possible)
This is where you’ll need to go back to your Nucleus Dashboard and copy the Content data for your CNAME record.
If you’ve accidentally closed the tab open to your Nucleus Dashboard, open another tab. Then go back to manage your Messages Settings in your Nucleus Dashboard. Click here for a quick link.
Click to Copy the Name for your CNAME record, then paste it in the Name field for the CNAME record in your domain registrar. Repeat the process to click and copy the Content to pate in the Value / Content field in your registrar.
Complete the same process for all three records.
Once you’ve created these three CNAME records in your domain registrar’s system, save those changes.
Note: Are you using Cloudflare? When creating or editing your CNAME record, make sure that the orange cloud is turned to grey so that it is set to "DNS Only" instead of "Proxied". Leaving it as an orange cloud as "Proxied" will prevent your domain from resolving to your website.
Check/Verify Your Connection
To verify the connection of your domain with Messages, click the Check Now button in your Settings. If the connection is good, after the circle spins a few times in the button, a checkmark should appear beside the Status.
If the connection status remains pending, that’s okay! This likely just means that you very recently made changes to your domain’s DNS records. Just wait a few minutes and try checking the connection again.
What Next?
Well, setting your custom send-from and reply-to defaults. You can configure those right where you are in the Settings tab above your successful domain connection.
Although these defaults will apply to all campaigns, they can be overridden on a campaign or email basis at your discretion. If you need to deliver an email from Pastor Emma, simply override the defaults in your campaign of choice.
Now that your Messages & Posts are being delivered from your custom domain, follow this guide to easily create the Ultimate Church Guest Follow-Up System, powered by Messages!