Set up www for your club website

When you connect a custom domain to your club site, only the exact address you entered is set up. If you connected myclub.com, then www.myclub.com won't load your site on its own. The fix is a redirect at your domain registrar (the company where you bought the domain): it sends anyone who types www.myclub.com to myclub.com. You set this up once, at the registrar, not in RumbleSeat.

Before you begin

• Your custom domain is already connected. The Domain Name section in your club's Website settings shows Connected. If it doesn't yet, start with Configure a custom domain.
• A sign-in to your registrar, such as Namecheap, GoDaddy or Cloudflare. If your DNS is hosted somewhere other than where you bought the domain, make the change where your DNS lives.
• Know which address you connected. Most clubs connect the plain domain (myclub.com) and redirect www to it. If you connected www.myclub.com instead, do the opposite: redirect myclub.com to www.myclub.com.
• Time: about 5 minutes, plus up to an hour (sometimes longer) for the change to take effect.

Step-by-step

Every registrar's screens look a little different, but the idea is the same everywhere:

1. Sign in to your registrar and open the domain you connected to RumbleSeat.
2. Find the forwarding or redirect setting for the domain.
3. Add a redirect with:
   • From: www (the subdomain)
   • To: https://myclub.com (your connected address, with your own domain)
   • Type: Permanent (301)
4. Save.
5. Leave the records RumbleSeat gave you alone. Only change www.

Pick your registrar below for its own steps.

Namecheap

1. Sign in to Namecheap and open Domain List from the left sidebar.
2. Click Manage next to your domain.
3. Open the Advanced DNS tab.
4. In the Host records section, click Add New Record.
5. For the type, choose URL Redirect Record.
6. Enter www as the host and https://myclub.com as the value.
7. In the redirect type menu, choose Permanent (301).
8. Save the record.
9. If another record already uses the www host (an A, CNAME or ALIAS record), remove it so the two don't conflict.

The Host records section only appears when your domain uses Namecheap's own DNS. If your DNS is hosted somewhere else, add the redirect there.

Namecheap's redirects can't answer on a secure https://www. address. A visitor who types www.myclub.com is redirected, but one who types or clicks https://www.myclub.com may see an error. If that matters to your club, host your DNS with Cloudflare and use the Cloudflare steps instead.

Namecheap's guide: How to set up a URL redirect for a domain

GoDaddy

1. Sign in to your GoDaddy Domain Portfolio.
2. Select your domain to open its Domain Settings page.
3. Select DNS, then Forwarding.
4. Select Add Forwarding, then choose Subdomain.
5. Enter www as the subdomain.
6. Choose https:// and enter myclub.com as the destination URL.
7. For the forwarding type, choose Permanent (301).
8. Select Save. If your domain has Domain Protection, GoDaddy asks you to verify your identity first.

GoDaddy adds or updates the www record for you, and serves the forward over https:// automatically.

Don't set up forwarding for the root Domain. That would send myclub.com away from your club site.

GoDaddy's guide: Forward my GoDaddy domain

Cloudflare

Cloudflare redirects only work on records it proxies, so this takes two parts. First, the www record:

1. Open your domain in Cloudflare and go to the DNS Records page.
2. If a www record already exists, edit it and set Proxy status to Proxied (orange cloud). Then skip to the redirect rule.
3. If there's no www record, select Add record.
4. Choose type AAAA, enter www as the name and 100:: as the address.
5. Set Proxy status to Proxied and select Save.

100:: is a placeholder Cloudflare recommends for redirect-only addresses. Visitors never reach it, because the rule below sends them on first.

Then the redirect rule:

1. Go to the Rules Overview page.
2. Select Create rule, then Redirect Rule.
3. Enter a Rule name, such as www to root.
4. Under When incoming requests match, choose Wildcard pattern.
5. Enter http*://www.* as the Request URL.
6. Under Then, enter https://${2} as the Target URL.
7. Set the Status code to 301 and turn on Preserve query string.
8. Select Deploy.

This pattern catches both http://www. and https://www. addresses. Cloudflare's own example uses https://www.*, which skips visitors who arrive on http://.

Cloudflare's guides: Redirect from WWW to root and Create a redirect rule

Another registrar

Search your registrar's help center for "domain forwarding" or "URL redirect" and use the settings from the top of this section. If you can't find it, their support team can set it up for you. Tell them: "Please permanently (301) redirect www to my root domain."

Field reference

This guide has no RumbleSeat form to fill in. Everything happens at your registrar.

What happens next

• Within about an hour, typing www.myclub.com lands on your club site at myclub.com. Some changes take up to 48 hours to spread.
• Your RumbleSeat connection doesn't change. The Domain Name section still shows Connected.
• Test it: open a private browser window and type www.myclub.com. Then try https://www.myclub.com too.

Fixing problems

• www still doesn't load. Wait an hour and test again in a private window. Your computer may be remembering the old answer.
• Your main address stopped loading. The redirect was added to the root domain (@) instead of www, or a RumbleSeat record was removed. Delete the redirect, then open Domain Name in your Website settings and click Check DNS status. Re-add any record it shows.
• The redirect works but a security warning appears. Some registrars can't serve https:// on a forwarded address. Try your registrar's support, or move your DNS to a provider that can (such as Cloudflare).
• The registrar won't save the redirect. Another record already uses www. Remove that record first, then add the redirect.

Frequently asked

Why doesn't www work on its own? RumbleSeat sets up only the exact address you enter. To a browser, www.myclub.com and myclub.com are two different addresses.

Do I do this in RumbleSeat? No. The redirect lives at your domain registrar, where your DNS records are.

Should I connect www or the plain domain? Either works. Connect one in RumbleSeat and redirect the other to it.

Will this change my club's RumbleSeat address? No. Your default RumbleSeat address keeps working too.

Related: learn about RumbleSeat's tools for car club officers →