How to Connect a Custom Domain to Your Website (Steps)

By Cedar & Ledger

A free website host gives you an address like yourname.netlify.app or yourname.github.io. A custom domain (greenyardco.com) looks more like a real business and stays the same even if you switch hosts later. Connecting one is mostly copying a few settings from your host into your domain registrar. This guide walks through choosing and buying the domain, adding it to your host, adding the DNS records, waiting for it to work, turning on HTTPS, and keeping it from lapsing.

The business name, domain and dollar amounts below are made-up examples, not quotes or typical prices. Hosts and registrars change their screens and prices, so follow your own host's "custom domain" help page if anything here looks different. This is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Cedar & Ledger isn't affiliated with any host or registrar named here.

Quick checklist

• ☐ Pick a short, easy-to-spell domain
• ☐ Compare the first-year price and the renewal price
• ☐ Buy it in your own account, with auto-renew on
• ☐ Add the domain in your host's settings first
• ☐ Copy the exact DNS records your host shows into your registrar
• ☐ Wait, then check both yourbusiness.com and www.yourbusiness.com
• ☐ Turn on HTTPS and update your links everywhere

The steps below walk through each one.

Step 1: Pick a short, easy-to-spell domain

Say it out loud once. If someone hearing it over the phone could spell it wrong, pick another. A few rules of thumb:

• Use your business name, or your name plus your trade ("greenyardco.com", "greenyardlawn.com").
• Skip hyphens and number swaps ("green-yard-4u.com" is hard to say).
• A .com is the one most people type by habit. Other endings work too; just say the full address when you share it.
• Search the name first to make sure it isn't someone else's business or trademark.

Step 2: Compare the first-year price and the renewal price

Registrars often show a low first-year price. The renewal price is what you pay every year after that, so compare that number.

Example (made-up numbers):

In this example, the cheaper first year costs $9 more over 3 years. Some registrars also charge extra for privacy on your contact details while others include it, so check that line too. How Much a Small Business Website Costs (Example Numbers) shows how to add the domain to the rest of your yearly website costs.

Step 3: Buy it in your own account, with auto-renew on

Register the domain in an account you control, with an email you check, even if a friend or designer is helping you. Whoever holds the account controls the domain. Then:

• Turn on auto-renew and keep a card on file that won't expire soon.
• Confirm your contact email. Registrars usually email you to verify your contact details after a purchase. If you ignore it, the domain can be suspended.
• Leave the transfer lock on unless you're moving the domain to another registrar.

If the domain lapses, your website and any email on that domain can stop working, and someone else can buy the name.

Step 4: Add the domain in your host's settings first

In your website host (for example Netlify, GitHub Pages, Cloudflare Pages or Vercel), find the setting called "Domains" or "Custom domain" and type in your domain. Do this before you change DNS at the registrar. GitHub's docs, for example, warn that pointing DNS at the host first, without adding the domain on the host side, can let someone else claim it on that host.

The host will then show you which DNS records to add. Write them down or leave that tab open.

Step 5: Copy the exact DNS records your host shows

DNS records are the settings that tell browsers where your domain lives. At your registrar, open the DNS settings for the domain and add what your host listed. You'll usually see two kinds:

Copy the values from your own host's screen, not from a guide or a forum post, because each host uses different ones. Also:

• Delete the registrar's default "parked page" record for the same name if there is one, or the two will fight.
• Don't add a wildcard record (*.yourdomain.com) unless your host tells you to. GitHub recommends against them because they can let someone take over subdomains.
• Leave email records (MX) alone if you already have email on the domain.

Some hosts (Cloudflare Pages, for one) may ask you to move the whole domain's DNS to them by changing nameservers instead. That's fine too; just follow that host's steps instead of adding records one by one.

Step 6: Wait, then check both addresses

DNS changes don't show up everywhere at once. GitHub's docs say they can take up to 24 hours. Each record has a "TTL" (time to live) in seconds: example: a TTL of 3600 means other computers may keep the old answer for up to 3600 ÷ 60 = 60 minutes before checking again.

When it's ready, open both greenyardco.com and www.greenyardco.com on your phone (with Wi-Fi off) and on a computer. One should load the site and the other should send you to it. If one doesn't work after a day, recheck the record you typed for that name, letter by letter.

Step 7: Turn on HTTPS and update your links

The free hosts named above provide free HTTPS (the padlock), usually set up automatically once DNS works. On GitHub Pages you tick "Enforce HTTPS," and GitHub says that option can take up to 24 hours to appear. Don't share the new address until the padlock shows. Small Business Website Launch Checklist (Before You Share) has the rest of the checks to run before you send the link out.

Then put the new address everywhere the old one was: your Google Business Profile, social bios, email signature, invoices, and business cards. Keep the old free address working if your host allows it, so old links don't break. If you're not on Google Maps yet, How to Put Your Business on Google Maps for Free (Steps) walks through it.

Step 8: Put the renewal in your budget

Monthly set-aside = yearly renewal ÷ 12.

Example (made-up numbers): a $20/year renewal is $20 ÷ 12 ≈ $1.67 a month. Put the renewal date in your calendar 30 days early so you can check the card on file. If you run the site for a business, pay the domain from the business account and log it with your other business costs; whether it's deductible depends on your situation, so check the IRS website or a tax professional.

Common snags

• Buying the domain in a designer's or friend's account. Ask for it in your own name and login.
• Copying DNS values from an old blog post. Hosts change their IP addresses and steps; use the host's current screen.
• Only setting up one of the two addresses. Set up both the bare domain and www.
• Checking too soon. Give DNS time before changing things again; repeated edits make it harder to tell what worked.
• Letting it lapse. Auto-renew plus a calendar reminder costs nothing.
• Changing nameservers while you have email on the domain without copying your email records over first.

A simple way to get a site to connect

Any host and any site will work with these steps. If you'd like a head start on the site itself, the One-Page Local Business Website Template ($12, HTML and CSS) is a one-page site with services, service area, reviews, hours and a tap-to-call button already laid out, 3 color themes, and a README with steps for free hosts (Netlify Drop, GitHub Pages, Cloudflare Pages). You edit one file, so it's best if you're comfortable editing text, and it doesn't include a domain; you buy that separately (details). Free One-Page Website for a Local Business: What to Include covers what to put on the page.

Honest note: I make this template and sell it under Cedar & Ledger, so I'd earn from a purchase. Not affiliated with any host or registrar named here. General information only, not legal, tax or financial advice.

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