Follow this steps :
Step 1: Prepare BloggerJust so you know, I took these screenshots from a couple of blogs that I have, so don’t worry if the address or blog name change.
When you’re ready to your blog to your own domain, I’d recommend having at least two windows open - one pointed at this page in blogger - Settings: Publishing. When you go there, it will look like this, with your blogspot address filled in.
Before opening the second window, you can safely get Blogger prepared for you to save the settings. Click on Custom Domain, and then since you already have your own domain, click on “Switch to advanced settings”, and you will be taken to this screen -
Then, in the line marked Your Domain, put in the exact address you want your blog to publish on - for the most part, that will be www.{domain}.{tld}, however, you can use any prefix you wish. You will not need to worry about the missing files host, however you can read the help file on that if you wish.
Don’t save just yet; you need to make sure your domain is ready for Google’s hosting
Step 2: Prepare your domainNow, open a new window or tab and go to the site where you registered your domain. For Godaddy, this is the screen you’ll see when you first log in; click on My Account to move to the next screen.
Now, click on Manage Domains in the middle box on the My Account Page. This will bring you to this screen, where you will want to click on the domain you’re going to publish your blog on.
This will bring you to the Domain Control Center. There are a lot of options on this page, but there is only one thing that we will have to concern ourselves with for now - Total DNS Control and MX Records. In the extremely unlikely chance that you are not using the default nameservers (normally NSxx.DOMAINCONTROL.COM) then the Total DNS Control will not be available and you will need to contact the system administrator of the service that has given you the nameservers to use in order to find out how to proceed.
When you click on Total DNS Control, you will be taken to this page which has what could be described as a plethora of options for hosting. In my shots, I have it set up for Blogger already, but that doesn’t mean I can’t explain it, right?
The only thing you will need to concern yourself with clicking on is “Add New CNAME Record”, if you do not see the prefix you’re using there. If it is there, simply click on the pencil icon and replace whatever is in the “Points To” line with the information below.
When you do this, the CNAME (Alias) section will appear on the screen, and you should fill in the details as I have, with www (or whatever prefix you’ve decided to go with) in the first line, and ghs.google.com in the second. You can leave the TTL (Time to LIve) at 1 hour, that should speed up the propogation of your site.
After clicking OK, you can then Return to the List, and logout of your domain’s account. Fortunately, you will not need to adjust any more settings now that Google have added the option of forwarding the basic domain (i.e. without the www) to www.{domain}.{tld}.
Step 3: Confirm Blogger’s SettingsNow that you have your domain ready to accept Google’s request, you can now confirm the settings in Blogger. Simply hit Save Settings, and it will confirm the new configuration of your blog’s address.
If you reload the page now, it will look like this. Of particular note is the line that says “Forward {domain}.{tld} to www.{domain}.{tld}”. This is something that I have not tried out, so if you wish to try it out, it may not work, claiming that there is another blog on that domain.
There is a workaround that I did which allowed for you to forward all the traffic that was going to {domain}.{tld} to www…., which involved forwarding the domain to your old Blogspot address, however, if the redirection works out, you will not have to do that.
Lastly, if you decide to move your blog to a full-fledged host and return your old blog to its blogspot domain, simply click the blogspot.com link next to Switch to.
What do you do now?There are a few things that you will need to do after getting your blog’s address moved over from Blogspot to your own domain. Your list of things may vary, depending on what you all have on your site.
- Let everyone know about your new address, and tell them to update their links.
- If you have trackers installed, update the addresses they’re tracking to include the new address for your blog
- You will need to reclaim your new blog on Technorati. If you no longer want your old address to be listed in their listings, you can send them a note requesting that the old one be marked as irrelevant.
- If you’re a part of social networking sites like Bumpzee or Mybloglog, change the address of your blog there; on Bumpzee, that means that your blog will be placed back in the moderation queue for any communities you’re a part of.
- Update the links within your site to reflect your new domain. While all of those links will still work, it’s a good idea to change over the address in case you decide to move your blog in the future.
- This is just a tip, and not necessary - if you haven’t already done so, integrate your Blogger feed with FeedBurner, and encourage people to sign up using the FeedBurner link directly
This post has been edited by Daniel Joel: Jul 21 2008, 04:07 PM
