How to “Point” your Domain to your WordPress site

In an earlier blog, I wrote up how to buy your domain name with GoDaddy. Now, here are the steps to “point” that domain to your blog. What that means is that when someone goes to your domain (www.supercoolperson.com or whatever you chose)  it then brings them to your blog. Or the home page of your blog site or to whatever you want.

So first, get over to GoDaddy.com and log in. This is what you will see once you are logged in.

Do you see the + to the left of where it says DOMAINS? Click that.

 

You should now see a “drop down” with your domain in it (or if you purchased more than one, you will see them all listed).

 

To the right of the domain you wish to direct, there is a ‘launch’ button. Click that.

Now you should be on your ‘Domain Details’ page.  In about the middle of the page you should see ‘Domain Settings’ and four rows below that is “Forwarding”.

 

Just to the right of that it says “Domain: Off” and beneath that is a button that reads ‘manage’. Click that. Here’s what you should see:

 

Click on “Add one now.”

Now you should see another pop up like this:

 

See where it says “Forward to” and there is a box on the left with http:// in it and then an empty box to the right? Leave the box on the left alone. You only want to fill in the box on the right. Open another tab in your browser and actually go to the blog or home page on your blog or where ever it is that you want your domain to be pointed at. Copy the link displayed. I am forwarding a domain for my writers group while I write this up. For example, the link for my writers group is: http://inkslingersguild.wordpress.com

If I wanted my domain to point to that, I would copy it leaving out the http:// since that is already saved in the pop up. Once I have inserted the link, this is what the pop up will now look like:

 

Now you’ll notice that there is a “Forward settings” selection. It is probably already set to “Forward Only” and I would leave it there. That means the domain forwards to the link you provided and then is done. So if someone is now on your blog and click on a link to another page of it, the link at the top of the browser changes to the new page title. For example. Someone goes to InkSlingersGuild.org and ends up on our blog, the actual link being: http://inkslingersguild.wordpress.com/

Once there, the person visiting decides to click on ‘Books’. Now they will be on the page: http://inkslingersguild.wordpress.com/books/ and that is what will show in the browser. Like this:

 

That is forwarding. If you were to choose the alternative which is “Forward with Masking” then no matter where the visitor to your site goes, it will only ever show the domain name that you put in. In the example I give, using InkSlingersGuild.org,  that is what will ALWAYS be in the browser name. The thing I don’t like about this, is that if you do that and someone wants to copy the link to your books page and share it with a friend or link to it from their own website or blog, it only gives the domain name and not that exact page title so that cannot provide a direct link. You don’t want that, you want people to share, share, share! I hope that makes sense.

If not, stick with forwarding. 🙂

All right, don’t mess with anything else, go ahead and click on “Add”. Then click on “Save”. Everything you just did will take a few minutes to be saved and go into effect.

I recommend running off and preparing a sandwich or grabbing a beer with your significant other (or your dog or cat or bearded dragon or unicorn, whichever is applicable and if none of those works, go sit on the damn couch) and then go back to your computer and plug in your domain name and see where it lands.

If it’s not ready yet, you’re going to see “This webpage is not available”. Check back periodically and soon enough – you’ll be able to do the happy dance. 😉