Setup Domains & Emails in High Level
The first step is purchasing a domain. Read our guide on purchasing a domain and setting up Cloudflare as the DNS host.
Once you've setup Cloudflare as your DNS host, use the below video guide to setup your domains and email in Go High Level.
Complete Video Walkthrough Guide
The video covers:
- Connecting a domain to Go High Level
- Setting up a LeadConnector email domain
- Using Cloudflare's DMARC service
- Testing email configuration with EasyDMARC and mail-tester.com
- Configuring branded links domain
- Configuring the client portal domain
- Adding subdomains for funnels
- Configuring domain default home page and catch-all error pages
- Caveats and common pitfalls when working with domains in Go High Level
Video Transcript
this is just a quick walkr of how to set
up your domain on go high level now the
first step is you're going to need to
register the domain I recommend just
registering it or basically purchasing
it on cloudflare it just makes
everything easier but if you're using
GoDaddy or name.com or something else
that's totally fine and then you want to
use cloud flare to manage the DNS and
I'll have another video explaining that
but for this video we already had
purchased this domain on cloudflare and
the DNS is currently pointing the cloud
flare and we don't have any records on
it yet that's what we're looking at here
so this is ready to go so go to go high
level going to go to settings and then
domains and then we're going to click
add and put in the root domain
here root level is just uh without any
subdomains and you have this option here
to automatically also add dub dub dub for
most people you're probably going to
want to leave that on um and I'll also
have another video explaining situations
where you might want to have that off
but this is good we'll leave that on
click continue now go high level is
detecting where the DNS is currently
being managed so detected it's on cloud
flare it's great I'm going to click
authorize um you'll probably be prompted
to log into Cloud flare and authorized
lead connector and you'll get this
screen just click authorize and now we
just need to give it a few moments here
for high level to create the records in
Cloud flare if we come back to Cloud
flare we can actually see what's going
on here if I refresh this page there see
it's added these two new um two new
domain records and back in high level
here high level finished setting
everything up on cloud flare now it's
prompting to either connect the domain
to a funnel or to a website under
Advanced options here um you can also
set this if you skip it at this step
that's totally fine you can configure it
later on which is what I'm going to show
you here so I'm going to cancel that
we've got the two domains here the root
domain and then this dubdub dub it added
this little icon here is just letting us
know that there was actually a redirect
setup those redirects are under URL
redirects and all this is doing is if
you go to dubdub dub. LevelUp g.com it's
just going to redirect to the root
domain U which is great that's what we
want so back in domains here if I need
to now associate a funnel with it
the reason to do it here in domains is
you can set the default Pages which is
really nice and this is particularly
important for setting the 404 error page
because it's pretty common that you you
know connect a lot of funnels or maybe a
website in high level and then maybe
change the url of that funnel and you
want to make sure that ghl is going to
end UPS serving an actual page instead
of the default 404 error so if we
because we don't have anything
associated with it any demands or
funnels associated with it yet
this is what people would see so we want
to avoid that by we'll set a default
page so this is just basically like
setting a homepage for
it and okay we'll just use this one for
the
moment and usually what I do is set the
homepage as the default page and also
the error page but if you have a custom
error page you can do that as well uh
but by setting this 404 error page
you're basically just setting a catch
all so anytime someone goes to page that
or invalid URL for that domain it's just
going to serve them up the
homepage so where did that go okay we'll
set the
homepage and robots text here this is
for SEO so if you want to not allow
search engines to index the domain or if
you want to exclude certain pages you
can do that here but we're just going to
leave it as is so it can
index the whole thing now if we come
back into the page here we can see our
domain should be serving up the homepage
there we go all right now that the
domain is set up let's set up email in
high level so under settings here we're
going to come into email services and
then dedicated domain and IP and then
add domain and we're going to put in our
new domain so LevelUp
g.com now what this is going to do is
it's going to Route all emails so
anything at LevelUp jl. comom is going
to Route into high level if you wanted
to have normal inbox so you're using
Google Suite or outlook.com or something
like that and you wanted to have user at
LevelUp
g.com then in high level here you would
actually want to set a subdomain so a
common one is mail Dot and then high
level is going to be able to use that
subdomain and it's not going to conflict
with your Google Suite or Outlook in
boxes but if you want everything to just
route into high level which is what I
like to do then we're just going to put
in the root domain here and then add and
verify and high level is going to detect
that again the DNS is being managed by
cloudflare and I'm going to click
continue so it can do it for me if you
did the add manual option then it'll
give you the records that you can copy
and paste all right we're going to
authorize all right here's all the
records that it's going to add authorize
and again give it a few moments there
okay so what happened in CL
flare is it went in and created all
these MX records and the SPF record
which is
great and in high level we need to give
it a moment to verify before we can
actually use it in high level so if you
come in here and it's showing not
verified just click verify domain and
sometimes you need to do this repeatedly
until it finally updates cache and is
all fully verified okay so this happens
a lot lot so most of them are verified
but I wasn't able to verify this one yet
and then the verify button is disabled
so in that case just click back on
dedicated domains we're going to find
the domain we just added all right yeah
so here it is and it's not verified yet
so just click verified now
again and then verify
domain and you just kind of keep
repeating that process until it properly
verified it so there it is it's good to
go and we can come in here and go back
to the verify page if we need to what
high level is showing us right now is
that we do not have a DeMark field and
it's not going to automatically put in
the Demar fields and I'll show you a
better way to handle it so if we're back
on
the on this
page as long as we see here that it's
active and that the SSL is issued then
it's basically ready to go uh one of the
things you'll want to do for higher
deliverability is come in and set
headers so
so this can just be
whatever we want but we're going to want
um we do support at level up
g.com okay and save that so the reason
for the headers to do with higher
deliverability and keeping out of uh out
of the spam box the SMTP settings that's
if you want to use a mail warm-up
service which I'll have another video
about that but right now this is fully
configured and it's good to go because I
have other domains connected here into
email Services right now it's set for
this other domain to be the primary one
I'm actually going to switch it here
with this
checkbox all right and now this will be
the primary one and what that does is
that if you have emails going out in
workflows or in
conversations that sets the default
domain basically the default email that
it's going to use all right now that we
have the email service set up and again
this is set to be the default
uh but if you have multiple domains like
this connected as an email service you
can come into domain configuration and
then set the domain it's going to use
for workflows and conversations things
like that the bulk email um this is
great this frequency option is new you
can SP spread out your bulk email
sending across multiple different
domains there's lots of reasons that you
would want to do that um I often like to
have one domain being used for
conversations so that I know that's
getting higher deliverability and then
another domain being used for bulk email
that way I don't have to worry if
there's something going wrong with the
bulk email or a lot of people
unsubscribing or complaining it's not
going to uh prevent the conversation and
the workflow emails from um from getting
to
people so we've got everything now
configured for this domain except for
Demar DeMark is really important for
domain deliverability or for email
deliverability and this change in a big
way towards the early uh early part of
2024 Gmail Outlook and other providers
really started enforcing um Demar
settings so the easiest way to do this
is in Cloud flare I'm going to come back
in here and we see these are all the
records that high level set up and there
is no Demar record here yet cloudflare
offers a free Demar service which is
great so come to email DeMark management
and we're going to click
enable and we'll click
add all right and then back under
DNS it's here here's the record that
cloudfare added all right now that we
have Demar set up we can see what's
happening here coming to Demar
management now anytime somebody sends an
email using your domain so high level
which is using mail gun on the back end
whenever it sends then reports will
start to show up here in the in this
DeMark interface and just kind of let
you know who's trying to send out on
your behalf so anytime then someone is
trying to spoof your domain and send
fake emails that look like they're
coming from your domain those reports
will will also show up here all this
stuff it's really just relevant and
important for staying out of spam boxes
it's not something you need to keep a
close eye on or monitor closely once
it's all set up you should be good to go
so what we want to do now is test to
make sure everything is set up properly
a common website for doing that is easyd
Mark so easyd mark.com and just come in
and put in our
domain scan the domain and we can see
here okay there's a problem so detected
dmark and it detected SPF those are the
two most important ones and then dkm
it's not detecting it but it doesn't
actually mean that it isn't set up
properly so what happens here is the
dkim record that high level set up and
again high level is using mail gun on
the back
end so the dkim record it's actually
this thing so it's this domain key
record here either mail gun or high LEL
I'm not sure they recently changed it to
this KRS subdomain and that's a little
bit non-standard so doesn't mean it's
not going to work it just means that
easd Mark wasn't able to detect it
properly so we can actually just come
into C details
here and we are going
to click on on
dkim all right and instead of using the
auto selector I'm going just turn that
off and put in KRS and then check and
then there it was able to find it
properly okay so that's great so if
you're just following other guides and
they're they're telling you to use easyd
Mark or a similar tool just be aware
that or don't panic if it doesn't find
the DKI IM record ultimately what we
want to do is test sending out an email
that is by far and away just the best
way to make sure everything's configured
prop properly there's a couple different
ways to do that there are let's see if I
got it here okay there are a couple
different Services um and these are free
I like mail tester or mail.com it's
super simple warmup inbox also has um a
free tool and there's a lot of other
ones out there they all work essentially
the same so what we're going to do is
inside of high
level whenever or whenever we go to
mail.com it's going to randomly generate
an email address for us so I refresh
here it change that going copy this
email address and then we're going to
come back in to high level and we can
just do this
from see uh
conversations and we're going to click
new okay now we're going to send a test
email and you can put whatever subject
and message you want in here mail tester
and the other equivalent free tools
they're actually going to scan the
message content as well so if you have
any particular keywords or anything that
would potentially trigger spam just
going to analyze that for you so we're
just trying to test to make sure
everything was set up properly so we
don't need to worry too
much about the content right now but
it's always a good idea to use mail
tester or one of the other tools
whenever you're sending out bulk email
as well uh you can test an email
campaign and then make sure the score is
is looking good and it's not going to go
to spam all right let me send this
and let's come back to mail tester check
your check your score and it's just
sitting in the background and listening
for that
email you just takes a few
seconds let's
check okay so yeah ghl sent it
here
so that looks
good okay so we get a Spam result so you
really want a 9.5 or higher like minimum
of a n so there's some things we need to
fix
here all right so I had the DK but
something's going on with
it um this you know negative .1 that's
that's fine that's not the big penalty
so what's going on here is that
it's it has to do with the content that
was sent so because it was such a short
email it's getting flagged for spam and
then this
check um this is because it just
detected that it was a test message okay
so what we want to do is do a new
message let's go back and refresh this
get a
new address
there all right we're going to do new
message paste in the new
address and I always like to just put in
a name here so I know I can go back in
and delete these contacts later
on continue
okay and so saying testing
so let's
see so it wants you know fairly long
email uh let's see if we put in Laur
some stuff I don't know if that's going
to trigger it
okay and send it come back
to mail tester and wait for it to
arrive but what these tests are
confirming is that the SPF the dkim and
the DeMark those were all set up
correctly so we weren't really getting
penalized for that we were getting
penalized for the content but this does
show you the importance especially for
bulk email of always testing before you
send out to everyone and again I'd like
to have a score of 9.5 or higher
basically I like to only be penalized
for this because it's only a 0.1 penalty
uh and there's nothing we can do about
this this is just the way mail gun is
configured and um it's totally fine but
again it was penalizing us because it
was a really short message but SPF is
passing everything else is looking good
it's authenticated it's not on any block
list so that is great we just need to
send a longer email to test
all right now that email is configured
the domain is configured all that's good
now we just want to update the business
profile settings and add the Branded
domain and then we're done so come to
settings business profile we put in the
kind of default business email I'm going
to do support at levelup.com can put in
phone number all right so for Brandon
domain this is what we're interested in
so I'm going to go ahead and save this
here to make sure it's saved let's put
in the website
okay now what this is going to do is if
we don't have the Branded domain in
there any links that get sent out so
from email or conversations or SMS
especially if they're using trigger
links it's going to use the highlevel
kind of default domains which I think is
like go. messenger maybe or something
like that but we want it to be branded
for a lot of different reasons one it's
going to help with email deliverability
because anybody who is using the default
highl domains if that domain gets
blacklisted we don't want that to be a
problem for us and also too it just
looks a lot better it's more trustworthy
when it's coming from the actual domain
so a common one to use here is link so
I'm going to do link level up you can
have it be whatever subdomain you want
but I like using link all right we'll
click add domain and continue and again
this is going to check to see that okay
it's it's registered or the DNS is is
being managed by Cloud flare so it's
going to prompt us here authorized
domain and and we're going to authorize
and then just wait for this to finish
populating and then we are good okay
high level has finished updating Cloud
fair for the link domain so everything
now is good to go we've got the email
set up we've got the domain we've got
the Branded domain or basically the link
domain all of that is now configured
just one extra little note that um give
some thought to the Branded domain when
you're initially setting this up because
if you go in and change it later
you can but there's always a risk that
old links that you've sent out using the
Old Link domain or the old branded
domain that they might not work very
well anymore and then you might have to
send out new links it's not supposed to
happen the old links are still supposed
to actually work but it's just safer if
you set this up you know the first time
around with a branded domain that you're
happy with and then you don't need to
change it again so okay the last step is
to set up the client portal and this is
going to be for courses for people
logging in client portal for
Affiliates so we're going to go to sites
and then client portal settings domain
setup and we're going to enter in a
custom domain so I want to do
portal. level up gh.com click add
domain continue and again this is going
to do the cloud flare detection thing
and authorize it and then after
that any links that you're sending out
uh for somebody to log into a course or
the affiliate dashboard or anything it's
going to use this custom domain which is
great and that's it those are all the
different domains and subdomains um and
now your high level is ready to go just
there it go it's finished authorizing it
so we can come in and take a look at
this too
portal that level up ghl
and there we go got the custom domain
and our
portal this is a little kind of bonus
setup but I'm going to show you a couple
other things we do with domains that um
I do I do generally recommend that
everyone set this up at the start just
kind of makes things easier later on so
if I come back into let's go to to
settings and then
domains okay one of the things I like to
do is is always set up a subdomain for
funnels and the reason for that is
because if you if you end up with lots
of funnels or lots of websites in your
sub account and you're just looking at
the URL itself it's really hard to kind
of map that back to like which funnel is
this or like where do I actually find
this thing to edit inside of high level
so let's add a subdomain for funnels so
we
lp. vh.com
that would that's a common one for just
like landing pages or we can set up you
know
funnels and then click
continue give it a moment here it's
going to detect Cloud flare I'm going to
authorize
it all right now we just wait for cloud
flare to finish updating
here and once that's done then we can
use that funnel subdomain for all of our
funnels so that at least we know where
to find stuff
okay cloudflare has finished updating
and now we're being prompted to connect
this subdomain so funnel. LevelUp g.com
connect it to a funnel or to um to a
website um you want to be a little bit
careful when you do this because if you
already have a website set up in high
level and already connected to a domain
just be aware that if you come in here
and essentially sort of reassign it so
if I want to take LevelUp fes.com and
set the
homepage and we'll set the
default page also to the home if I link
this now that website that already
exists inside of high level it's going
to now reassign it to funnels so just be
careful whenever you're messing with
domain stuff if you already have a lot
of associations between existing funnels
and websites and domains um just be
aware that when you do this it might
replace that link and um it's a little
bit sort of hard to understand but here
I'll just I'll do this real quick so you
can
see give a moment to
link all right now if we come
into this website so that was level up
themes and if we come to settings so you
can see it switched the domain here
which is not really what we wanted so
I'm going to just quickly change this
back to level up themes and we'll save
it there
okay so that that's just a little
cautionary tail just be careful when
you're changing domain
settings um and you can do it from here
as well come in and edit when you go in
and change these it might update the URL
that that funnel or that that website
was already connected to so anytime you
add a new domain anytime you mess with
this stuff just just go in and double
check everything and make sure it's
still working like you wanted it to all
right thanks