How To: Use a Custom Domain On Blogger.

Hello everyone. So you may have seen my post last week that basically notified you all that I had got my own domain. If you haven't seen it then you can read it here. Well today I thought I'd show you how to use a custom domain on blogger. A lot of people on twitter had been asking me about it and had asked how simple it is to get your own domain and my answer to that is 'it's quite simple'. I'm not into all this HTML stuff but I found this a breeze. A lot of people feel like getting your own domain is hard and I will admit I was one of those people, until I took the plunge and bought my own. I had been looking on all the domain sites; Godaddy, 1-2-3- Reg and Name Cheap (to name a few).

I had been debating to get my own domain since January for my blog's first birthday but I thought it was going to be too complicated but here are the steps that you will need to take to do it.

Purchasing your domain

I purchased my domain from UK Cheapest as it was the cheapest site. The domain I purchased cost me £3.79 and this is for 1 year. Although I'm sure next year I will search round again to see if any other site become cheaper. If you are planning on hosting your blog using blogger (just like me) then all you simply need to do is purchase the domain. You can ignore all those extra add ons if they come up on the site that you are purchasing it on because you probably won't need them. You give UK Cheapest the normal information you have to give when you purchase something online and then they will send you a confirmation email with your customer number and any other information you need.

Getting Blogger to use your domain

Once you've purchased your domain, you need to begin hosting your new domain through Blogger. All this really means in simple terms is, when you type your domain into your internet tab/window, it will go to your blog.

To do this you need to start by logging into your Blogger page and then you need to go to Settings > Basic. You then need to click the "Add a custom domain" link underneath your blogspot address.

In the space provided enter your full domain address including the www prefix. Then click Save in that little section. You should be greeted with an error (Error 12).

Then underneath you will be asked to put 2 CNAME's into your registrars DNS settings. These codes are different for each blog and are unique to your blog. You will need these codes when you go to your registrars website so keep the tab open.

 Then if you are using UK Cheapest you go to the domains you have and then to parking tools and then the DNS Manager.

Then you will be brought this screen which then in the 'Add new 'A', 'CNAME' or 'TXT' record' you need to put 'www' and then the other code from earlier and then you need to change the middle column to 'CNAME' and then you need to paste the link and click 'add' once you are finished. Then I copied my domain into the Blogger part from earlier and you shouldn't get an error then.

It took a day for the server to get used to redirecting my .blogspot.com to my domain but once it's done, you don't have to faff with it anymore.

My explanation might make it sound really confusing and long but it literally took me 5 minutes.

I think the process is slightly different if you use GoDaddy but if you are going to use UK Cheapest like me then just follow these steps.

I hope this post helps you get your domain up and running!