Blogger Custom Domain - Subdomain vs. Naked Domain (Use Both)

NOTE: This post will be easier to understand for those who have registered their domains at 1and1.com and for the rest, this post will surely give you a hint to redirect your custom-domain to Blogger blogs in the best possible way.

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After publishing the recent post on BloggerStop about a free domain offer from 1and1, I received a number of mails and queries from fellow bloggers with similar doubts on how to redirect their newly registered domains to their already existing Blogger blogs.

Although I have already posted a tutorial explaining the procedure to redirect a custom domain to a Blogger blog, but due to recent changes at Blogger some new issues have cropped up in this process.

An important and major issue of concern to many bloggers is the restriction imposed by Blogger on using naked-domain-names (domain names without WWW or any other sub-domain) with their blogs as a custom-domain.

As for many newbie bloggers, even this problem is difficult to understand, so let me first explain it in simple terms, what exactly the problem is:

The Basics...
A domain name, just like an email address, is simply a name registered online where a website can be hosted:
example.com is a domain name (example.net, example.org and example.info - all these are also domains with different TLDs).

Now anything to the left of these domain names (including WWW) is a sub-domain of that domain:
WWW.example.COM is a sub-domain of example.com
BLOG.example.COM is again another sub-domain of example.COM

WWW.example.INFO is a sub-domain of example.INFO

Now the Problem...

In Blogger you can use any custom (SUB)-domain (XYZ.example.com) instead of the blogger address (SOMETHING.blogspot.com) presently in use. That means, once you do this redirection, whenever somebody enters the address example.com s/he will see your blog's (SOMETHING.blogspot.com) content but the address shown in the address bar will be example.com

Earlier Blogger allowed naked as well as sub-domains to be used as custom domains. But recently it has changed its system and now it ONLY allows sub-domains.
Therefore, if presently your blog address is "SOMETHING.blogspot.com"
then you can only use sub-domains like "www.EXAMPLE.com" or "blog.EXAMPLE.com" as your new custom-domain and NOT "EXAMPLE.com"

And due to this restriction you MAY lose some of your visitors who may enter your blog address as "EXAMPLE.com" instead of "www.EXAMPLE.com". Moreover it may create some SEO issues too.

And The Solution...

To avoid these problems, you should redirect your naked-domain (EXAMPLE.com) to your sub-domain (WWW/BLOG.EXAMPLE.com) where your blog is located. Now, this can be done in three different ways:

1. A simple url-redirection (strictly NOT advisable)

2. Through DNS management (by changing CNAME records) - the general method advised by Blogger, but NOT by me (but REMEMBER that cname method is the only method you should use while redirecting your sub-domain to your Blogger blog).
This is because, once you redirect your domain to Blogger using CNAME, then you will lose your email address located at your domain (admin@example.com or info@example.com etc.)

3. Through DNS management (by changing "A Name Records") - Advised by both Blogger and Me.
To do this, once you have redirected your sub-domain to your Blogger based blog, go to the DNS management section of your naked-domain (example.com) and edit its "A Name Records" paste exactly this value in to it:

216.239.32.21

Once this is done, go to Blogger.com -> Settings -> publishing
and mark the tick-box "Redirect EXAMPLE.com to www.EXAMPLE.com "


Advantages of following this method:
1. Your blog will be hosted at the sub-domain your choice...(WWW.example123.com or BLOG.example123.com)

2. Your domain will also be redirected to your sub-domain, so if someone enters this address:
example.com/2010/07/test-post.html (a test post on your DOMAIN)
s/he will be redirected to this address:
www.example.com/2010/07/test-post.html (the test post on your SUB-DOMAIN)

3. You can access your emails on the same domain name, for example admin@example.com or ANYTHING@example.com

NOTE: To create emails on your domain name, along with editing the "A Name Records", you have to change the "MX Records" too. And edit these MX records to point them to "Google Apps" where you can create up to 50 free emails and use the free space and features provided by gmail to store your emails.

In case, you have more doubts please use the comments form below which may solve others queries as well.

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*UPDATE: How to Use Naked Domains As Custom Domains.
Thanks to Rae, now you CAN use naked-domains too, with Blogger based blogs.
To do this, keep all the settings at 1and1 as it is, viz.
(i) your naked domain (example.com) - redirected to Blogger by changing "A Name Records" (Also, edit the MX Records to access your emails via Google-Apps).
(ii) Your sub-domain (www.example.com) - redirected to Blogger by changing the CNAME value.

STEP #2
At Blogger -> Settings -> Publishing
If the tick-box "Redirect EXAMPLE.com to www.EXAMPLE.com has already been marked, then remove the mark and save the settings.

STEP #3
Then change your blog's address to Example.com (the naked domain).
NOTE (Important): As naked domains are not allowed by Blogger, so you have to enter the address with a "SPACE" before the domain name.
So enter it as " example.com" (without the quotes, but with the space present between the opening quote and the domain name).
Save Settings.
Fainally mark the tick-box "Redirect www.EXAMPLE.com to EXAMPLE.com" and save the settings.

Now your blog will be hosted at your naked domain (example.com), your sub-domain (www.example.com) wii be redirected yo your naked domain. And you will also be able to access all your emails hosted on your naked domain.

References:
1. A naked Domain
2. Using Custom domains on Blogger - Part 1 and Part 2
3. Image credits: Gp2b

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