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Your own domain

For
church staff (the church's owner)
Status
Beta
Last reviewed

Beta: the screen is ready; addresses start going live once DCX Logic finishes connecting its domain service

On this page
  1. How to connect your domain
  2. Good to know
  3. What DCX Logic support can do
  4. Coming from Planning Center

Put your HoW website on an address your church owns, such as www.yourchurch.org. You add one record where you bought the domain; HoW does the rest, including the security certificate. It is part of every plan.

How to connect your domain

  1. In the staff dashboard, open Website, then the Domain tab. Only the church’s owner sees this tab.
  2. Under Use your church’s own domain, type your address with www, for example www.yourchurch.org, and choose Connect.
  3. The page shows the record to add: a Type (CNAME), a Name (www) and a Value. Use the Copy buttons.
  4. Sign in to the company where you bought your domain (GoDaddy, Namecheap, Squarespace, Cloudflare and so on), open its DNS settings, and add that record. If a record named www is already there, change it to this one.
  5. Come back to the Domain tab. The address moves through three states on its own:
    • Waiting for your DNS record: HoW is looking for the record. It checks every minute.
    • Issuing the certificate: your record is in place and HoW is getting the security certificate.
    • Live: your website answers at your address.
  6. Make the address without www work too. At the same company, turn on domain forwarding (some call it URL redirect): forward yourchurch.org to https://www.yourchurch.org and choose permanent (301).

You can close the page while you wait. Check now asks HoW to look again straight away.

Good to know

  • How long it takes. Usually a few minutes after you add the record. Some companies take up to a day to publish a new record.
  • Your HoW address keeps working. Your site always answers at the address HoW gave you, with or without your own domain. Once your domain is Live, it becomes the address your links and search results use.
  • Enter it with www. HoW cannot connect the bare address (yourchurch.org) directly; forwarding in step 6 covers it. That step is a setting of your domain, so HoW cannot do it for you.
  • Moving a site that is already live. If the page shows a second, optional record, add it first, wait until the page says the certificate is issued, then add the main record. Visitors see no gap.
  • Needs attention. The page says what went wrong in plain words. Fix the record and choose Check now.
  • Removing a domain. Remove asks you to confirm. Your site stops answering at that address within a few minutes and stays available at its HoW address. You can connect the domain again later.
  • Limits. Up to five addresses per church. Your own domain here is for your public website. Addresses that belong to HoW itself (anything ending in dcxlogic.com) cannot be connected; enter a domain your church owns. To let staff and members sign in on your domain too, see Sign-in addresses on your church’s own domain.
  • If it says “HoW is finishing the connection to its domain service”. Nothing is wrong on your side. Your address goes live on its own once DCX Logic completes the connection.

What DCX Logic support can do

Support can see your address and its state, ask for a fresh check, and tell you which record is missing or wrong. Support cannot change records at the company where you bought your domain; only you can.

Coming from Planning Center

Planning Center does not offer your own domain: a Church Center site always lives at yourchurch.churchcenter.com. HoW gives you the same kind of free address from day one and adds your own domain.