How To Redirect Blogspot To Custom Domain | Set Up A Third Party URL

Don't you like your blog URL ending with ".blogspot.com" or do you want to apply for Google Adsense? You are in the right place. There are two main reasons for having a custom domain (1) Blog with a custom domain always look good and more professional (2) You can apply for Google Adsense and other affiliate programs to earn money via your blog.

Google Adsense, advertisers and affiliate platforms in most cases do not accept applications of those websites with non-standard URLs like ".blogspot.com", ".wordpress.org" etc. Your domain must have a standard A Class URL extension like .com, .org, .net, etc, in order to get approved.

 

In the "Redirect to Custom Domain" process you have to do two things (1) Redirect your Blogger blog to custom domain (2) Redirect your naked domain to "www" domain. The domain without "www" is called naked domain like "example.com", "http://example.com", "https://example.com". We have discussed naked domain in detail in Step 4(How to redirect naked domain to "www" section).

If you have already bought a domain directly jump to Step 3(How to redirect your ".blogspot" URL to custom domain).

In this tutorial we will cover following topics step-by-step:

• How to choose a domain name
  
• How to buy/register a new domain
  
• How to redirect your ".blogspot" URL to custom domain
• How to redirect naked domain to "www".
  

How To Choose A Domain Name

Choosing a right domain name is very very important. Often it gets trickier to choose a domain name for your blog or website, so here are some suggestions for you to choose a domain name before you buy it:

• It should be easy to remember.
• It should be easy to pronounce.
• It should be easy to type. 
• It should be brandable.
  
• Its length should not be greater than 10 to 12 characters.
• From SEO point-of-view it is best if your domain name contains a keyword relevant to your website. Let's say you have a website about Blogger tutorials. You can use the keyword "Blogger" in your domain like "bloggertips.com" or "bloggerhelp.com" etc. If your desired domain is not available with your desired keyword, no problem you can choose some other name.
• If you have a personal blog or portfolio blog you can use your own name as well.
• You can also create a domain name from your "Name" and "Business Name". Let's say your name is Smith and you have a business of glasses, you can name it "www.smithoptics.com". 

How To Buy/Register A New Domain

If you have bought a domain already then skip this step and go to next steps. If you haven't bought a new domain we will guide you step-by-step to how to buy a new domain from Namecheap web hosting. 

 

Namecheap is one of the best and affordable domain registration company with an amazing security features. It also offers PremiumDNS & FreeDNS hosting as well.

 

• Go to Namecheap Official Page. 
• Enter your domain name in the Search Box.
• Click Search Icon.

 

• It will show you all the available domain name options with different extension like ".com", ".net" with their rates.
• Click "Add to cart" corresponding to a domain name that you want to buy.

• Click "View Cart" or click "Checkout" at bottom to move to next step.

• Click "Confirm Order". 
• You can enable PremiumDNS option as well. It will cost you additional $4.88. PremiumDNS delivers 100% DNS uptime & DDoS protection with ultra-fast DNS responses worldwide. 
• "WhoisGuard" is free service for lifetime. It is a privacy protection service that hides your personal info in the public "Whois" database. It keeps your data safe and helps to avoid spam.
  

 

• Create your account on Namecheap to buy the domain.
• Once you successfully create the account pay your domain charges.
• Once you buy the domain you will get details of your domain hosting by email, so that you can access you Namecheap Dashboard.
  

How To Redirect .blogspot To Custom Domain

• On Blogger, go to Settings.
• Under the Publishing section click "Custom domain".

 

• Type your custom domain name like "www.example.com".
• Click "SAVE".

 

For Your Information: To redirect your ".blogspot" domain to custom domain Blogger provides you two CNAME Records to add in your domain's DNS Settings or DNS Zone File. The basic purpose of adding these CNAME Records to your domain's DNS Hosting is that Blogger verifies that you are the real owner of the domain and to map one domain name to other. CNAME stands for Canonical Name.

• It will return you 2 CNAME Records. Name is the Host like "www" and Destination is the URL like "ghs.google.com". We have highlighted the two CNAME records separately. Second CNAME record is different for everyone.
  
• Don't click "SAVE" here unless until you don't enter the 2 CNAME records in your domain's DNS Settings. 
• Let it remain open & follow below steps to learn how to add CNAME records in your domain's DNS Settings.
  

All those who don't have Namecheap domain follow these 4 steps to add CNAME Records:

• Login to your domain hosting account(cPanel) where your domain is hosted.
  
• Find DNS Settings or DNS Zone File icon.
• Click "MANAGE" button to add the CNAME Records.
• Click "+ ADD RECORD" to add CNAME Records one by one. 

Here we have shown how to add CNAME Records in Namecheap's DNS Hosting.

• Go to Namecheap website and Sign-In to your account.
• Click "Domain List".
• Click the "Manage" button OR home icon under the Products label.

 

• Click the "Advanced DNS" tab.

 

 

• Click "+ ADD NEW RECORD" link.

 

• Choose "CNAME Record" from dropdown list.

• Add the two CNAME records one by one.
• In the first record "www" is Host and "ghs.google.com" is the  Value(Destination URL). "60 min" is the TTL. The TTL stands for Time-To-Live. 
• Click the tick icon to save the record.
  
• Similarly same goes for the second CNAME Record as well. Add 60 minutes TTL for it as well.

 

• Here you can see that the two CNAME Records have been added successfully.
• We have hided the second CNAME Record for security reasons.

• Once you add CNAME Records successfully to your domain's DNS Settings, go back to Blogger and click Save.

 

 

 

• Now on Publishing section you will see that your ".blogspot" URL will have been redirected to your  custom domain.
• To test whether your subdomain(.blogspot) is redirected to your new domain or not, open it on your browser. 

 

Now you can apply for Google Adsense Program and other affiliate programs.
Read our complete tutorial on how to apply for Google Adsense on Blogger:

• How To Display Google Ads On Blogger - Step By Step | Monetize A Blogger Blog | Earn Money Online

How To Redirect Naked Domain To "www"

The domain without "www" is called naked domain like "example.com", "http://example.com", "https://example.com". Most of the Blogger users after redirecting their ".blogspot" domain to custom domain forget to redirect their naked domain to "www " domain.

There are 2 reasons why it is important to redirect your naked domain to "www". One, most of the people type your domain name without "www" like "example.com". If your naked domain is not redirected to "www", browser will show error to website visitors like "website not found" etc. 

 

Second, if your website is monetized with Google Adsense you will see a warning from Google Adsense that "Earnings at risk - One or more of your sites does not have an ads.txt file. Fix this now to avoid severe impact to your revenue."

To redirect your naked domain to "www" you have to add "4 A Records" in your domain's DNS Settings or DNS Zone File, as we have shown below.

 

Before you add 4 "A Records" in your domain's DNS Settings, enable the "Redirect domain" feature in Blogger.

• Go to Blogger Settings.
• Under the Publishing section, turn on the "Redirect domain" option.

 

Now go to your domain's DNS Settings and add these 4 A Records one by one:

• @ 3600 In A 216.239.32.21
• @ 3600 In A 216.239.34.21
• @ 3600 In A 216.239.36.21
• @ 3600 In A 216.239.38.21

 

For your understanding:

• "@" means root site. It is HOST. @ points to your website.
• "3600" is the TTL for each record. TTL stands for Time-To-Live. 3600 means 60 minutes.
• There are 4 Google IP addresses which are called VALUE.

 

On Namecheap account you have to add 4 A Records in the same location where you had added 2 CNAME records. This time you have to choose "A Record" instead of "CNAME" record.

• Go to Namecheap website and Sign-In to your account.
• Go to your "Domain List" section.
• Click the "Manage" button OR home icon under the Products label.

• Click "Advanced DNS" tab.

 

 

• Click "ADD NEW RECORD" link.

 

 

• Choose "A Record" option from dropdown list.

• Add the 4 "A Records" one by one. 
• Click the tick to save the record.
  

• The four A Records have been successfully added. 

• Here you can see the 4 A Records and 2 CNAME Records.
• Now test your domain in three different ways like: "example.com", "http://example.com", and "https://example.com".
• All these naked domains must redirect to "https://www.example.com". If they redirect to "www" means you have setup naked redirect successfully.

 

Some of the domain hostings do not provide DNS Settings. In that case you can use third-party FreeDNS hosting services to redirect your naked domain to www. Read our step-by-step tutorial:

• How To Redirect Naked Domain To WWW If Your Domain Hosting Doesn't Provide DNS Hosting

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