Setup email tracking subdomain

[madleo]

Hi Team,

site name: berserkers.dev

I am trying to setup a custom tracking domain.
I am following the steps here → https://www.gmass.co/blog/tracking-domain/

In short, the idea is to create a subdomain from my main site, and create a CNAME that points to “x.gmtrack.net”.

Here are steps to reproduce:

1. Create a new project / git repo
2. Create a new site on Netlify as a subdomain and connect it to the newly created git repo (in my case, I chose link.berserkers.dev)
3. Go to DNS settings for new site/subdomain on Netlify.
4. We get automatically redirected to main site’s DNS settings.
5. Add in CNAME record that points to x.gmtrack.net

Within 24 hours, the expectation is to be able to confirm setup successful.
One way to test this is to ping link.berserkers.dev, using a tool such as Remote Ping Test / Ping Online • Wormly Monitoring, and ensuring it “pings” x.gmtrack.net.

Thank you in advance.

[coelmay]

Hey @madleo

I see berserkers.dev is using Netlify DNS. If you wish to have a subdomain (e.g. link.berserkers.dev) pointing to another service, you add the record for such to Netlify DNS. You would not create a site for this subdomain to point to as it would then not point to the other service.

E.g.

from what I can see DNS for link.berserkers.dev points to x.gmtrack.net

link.berserkers.dev.	3413	IN	CNAME	x.gmtrack.net.

however it loads a Next.js app from Netlify.

[madleo]

Ah, that’s very helpful, thank you.
I deleted the ‘subdomain site’ as well as the current CNAME record.
I then re-added the CNAME record as shown in your message above.
Does not appear to be synced/working yet, but I imagine it takes some time to propagate/take effect?

[coelmay]

Propagation isn’t immediate though usually happens sooner rather than later.

[Support Guide] Why do DNS / SSL changes take up to 48 hours to propagate? (TTL)

Last reviewed by Netlify Support on August 2023 How do time to live (TTL) values affect changes to DNS records? People often ask why the changes to DNS (Domain Name System) records are not taking effect. The answer to this often involves a core mechanism of how DNS functions - the “time to live” (TTL) values for the DNS records themselves. This topic is here to answer those questions! ! If you’d prefer a TL:DR; in the form of a video, check this out: [WHAT IS PROPAGATION? - Netl…

[madleo]

Crossing fingers – appreciate the help!

[luke]

Hi, @madleo. There are conflicting NETLIFY and NETLIFYv6 type DNS records for this domain here (and this link only works when logged into your team at Netlify):

https://app.netlify.com/account/dns/berserkers.dev

If you delete the NETLIFY and NETLIFYv6 records the CNAME record will start working. If it does not, delete it and recreate it. If it still doesn’t work, please let us know.

We have a support guide with more information about these record types here:

[Support Guide] What are the NETLIFY and NETLIFYv6 type DNS records? How do I delete these records?

Last reviewed by Netlify Support - August, 2023 short answer The DNS record types of NETLIFY and NETLIFYv6 are special “alias” records within Netlify DNS. They will return the IP addresses for the closest CDN nodes based on the IP address of the system making the DNS lookup. dns_api example.com- example.com 400 - link exists, all config must be empty Are you seeing an error like this one? [dns_api 400 - link exists, all config must be empty] This happens when you try to create an A or AAAA …

[madleo]

Hey Luke!

Appreciate the follow up.
I did as you said – ended up deleting every record relating to the “link…” subdomain.
And…I believe it worked!
Thank you sir.
I can stop crossing my fingers now.