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Set up a custom URL for your domain

With Readz, you can set up any custom URL to share with your audience. See below for how to configure your domain and DNS records to publish your projects under a custom URL.
Setting up a custom URL will allow all traffic coming to the specified domain to the content hosted on Readz. For search engines and all SEO purposes, all traffic on a custom URL is part of the domain traffic. Unless you set up a custom URL, your content will not be indexed by search engines.
Please follow these instructions in order to set up a branded or custom URL for your publication. Failure to adhere to the order of steps below could result in delays.
PLEASE NOTE THAT AN ADMIN ROLE IS REQUIRED TO ACCESS THE ACCOUNT AND DOMAIN SETTINGS
Go to the Domain Settings in the dashboard
Log in to Readz and go to the dashboard. If you have multiple subdomains on Readz, make sure you are viewing the correct URL in the top left corner dropdown list.
Then click on Settings to open the settings panel for this subdomain.
- In the Settings panel, go to 'Custom Domain' and select 'Manage your custom domain.'
The Domain settings panel will open up.
Here you can set up your custom domain and/or change the current (Readz) subdomain. Until your custom domain is set, you can access your content on the Readz subdomain.
Please note that as long as your custom domain is not set, your content will not be accessible for search engines!
Set your custom domain
In the above panel, select 'Custom domain name' and enter your custom domain name.
Select a value that has a prefix such as www. for www.yourdomain.com, or magazines.yourdomain.com. A subdomain can be a general one, like www. Often, this is reserved already, so common subdomains are newsletter.yourdomain.com, magazines.yourdomain.com, or content.yourdomain.com. But the choice is really yours.
Now click CONFIRM.
After clicking confirm, the platform will check the DNS settings for the subdomain you just entered. If the DNS entries are not correctly pointing to Readz, you will see the following message: 'DNS not properly set'.
Update your DNS records
- Go to your domain registrar and open the DNS settings for the custom domain
- Create a new CNAME record, and enter the subdomain where you would like the Readz content to be published on. Make sure this is the exact same subdomain you entered in Readz.
asubdomain.yourdomain.com
You can retrieve the correct DNS settings in Readz. After entering a subdomain, DNS settings appear in your domain settings.
- In the CNAME record, enter these values: NAME, VALUE and TTL
CNAME 'NAME': the subdomain you selected. e.g. 'www', 'magazines', 'news' or any subdomain you like.
Only enter the subdomain, not the complete domain name.
CNAME 'VALUE' will be in a similar format to this: CNAME 'VALUE': z{product_id}-130fc.kxcdn.com.
Important: - Make sure there is a letter 'z' in front of the ID# - Make sure there is a '.' (dot) at the end
You can retrieve the VALUE by selecting the copy box next to CNAME Value in the DNS Settings:
- Lastly, check that this value is set for TTL
TL=86400 (seconds, which = 1 day) Now save these values.
Check the domain name in your Readz console
If the DNS settings are correctly set up, you will see the message: 'All Set!'. Your custom domain is correctly set up.

Please allow up to 12 hours for the custom domain to become active and populate across the CDN.
Optional: forwarding your root domain
- To support users browsing to your root domain, you should set up a 301-redirect to -- quite literally -- redirect users searching for your customdomain.com to the subdomain. For instance, if the subdomain is m.customdomain.com, then you would set up 301 redirect from customdomain.com to m.customdomain.com
- You should setup your root domain A record to point at your URL forwarding service. Never point an A record at any IP address associated with Readz, as all of our IP addresses are served dynamically by our content delivery network. Readz does not allow for fixed IP addresses.
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