Using Your Own Domain For Your Website

All Rentec Pro and PM accounts include a free professional website located at https://propertymanage.biz/yourcompany, where yourcompany is the web address you choose in Website and Branding Settings.

You can also point your web domain (www.yourcompany.com) at your Rentec Direct hosted professional website. Rentec Direct will then host the content as well as manage the SSL security certificate.

Using your own domain has many benefits:

Your domain will show in your visitor's address bar, which is more professional looking which leads to brand credibility and trust.
There are search engine ranking benefits to having your own domain (eg. you will show up higher on search results)
Having your web presence on a domain provides a perception of scale. You appear to be a larger and more professional property manager.

Using Your Own Domain

Domain Settings Configuration

Add your Domain to your Rentec Direct Website & Branding settings.

In your Rentec Direct account:

Click on Settings
Under Program, click on Website & Branding
Under Advanced Options, enter your Domain Name (without www.)
Click on
1. Save if your website has not been published yet or
2. Publish
Once you have confirmed your domain is pointed at Rentec Direct and operational, you can then forward your web address at propertymanage.biz automatically to your domain by selecting Redirect propertymanage.biz/yoursite here.

DNS Settings Configuration

To have your domain hosted by Rentec Direct, there are a few DNS settings that need to be configured. These are advanced settings and should be done by your webmaster, somebody with DNS technical expertise, or with the help of your DNS provider.

SSL DNS. In order for us to order and install a SSL certificate (encryption) for your domain so it shows up without a warning in your visitors' browsers, a DNS record needs to be added as follows (replace yourdomain.com with your actual domain name). Visit https://www.rentecdirect.com/tools/check-my-domain to validate your configuration.
```
_acme-challenge.www.yourdomain.com CNAME www.yourdomain.com.ab0d29c3263b6f17.dcv.cloudflare.com 
```
Contact Rentec Direct at success@rentecdirect.com and let us know what your domain is and that your domain is ready to be activated. Please indicate that you have completed the above step in your email. Once our staff confirm your domain is set up on our end, complete step #3.
Waiting to complete step 3 is not strictly necessary; however, if your domain is already online at another web host, this will prevent it from temporarily going offline.
WWW DNS. In order to forward requests from www.yourdomain.com to the Rentec Direct server, create the following DNS record.
```
www.yourdomain.com CNAME domains.propertymanage.biz.
```

Once you've completed these steps, visit https://www.rentecdirect.com/tools/check-my-domain and type in your domain name to check if the settings are correct.

Pricing Impact: To host and provide SSL certificate and encryption for your domain, Rentec Direct will charge a $50 monthly hosting fee.

Alternative Option to Forward Domain Traffic

This option will redirect your domain (www.yourdomain.com) to your website provided by Rentec Direct at propertymanage.biz/yourname. Your clients who type in your domain will automatically redirect to your website hosted at Rentec Direct. Visitors will not see your domain in their browser address bar and search results will show the domain of propertymanage.biz/yourname instead of your domain.

Domain Hosting Provider Configuration

If you have not already purchased a domain, do so from your preferred provider (Squarespace, Godaddy, Bluehost, and HostGator are popular options, but many other providers also offer these services).

Register your domain with your preferred provider
Enable a SSL certificate for your domain. This process and cost varies with each provider; however, your providers customer service can assist you with this process.
1. Squarespace: https://support.squarespace.com/hc/en-us/articles/205815898-Understanding-SSL-certificates
2. Bluehost: https://www.bluehost.com/help/article/ssl-certificates
3. Hostgator: https://www.hostgator.com/help/article/hostgator-free-ssl
4. Godaddy: https://www.godaddy.com/help/set-up-and-install-my-ssl-certificate-562
Forward (or redirect) requests from your domain to your Rentec Direct website. Your Rentec Direct website will look like this: https://propertymanage.biz/YOUR_BRAND where (YOUR_BRAND) is the value you entered within the Web Address section at Settings, Website and Branding.
1. Here are links to each of the mentioned providers help documents on redirecting requests:
2. Squarespace: https://support.squarespace.com/hc/en-us/articles/214767107-Forwarding-a-Squarespace-domain
3. Bluehost: https://www.bluehost.com/help/article/redirecting-domain-name
4. HostGator: https://www.hostgator.com/help/article/url-redirect-how-to-create
5. Godaddy: https://www.godaddy.com/help/forward-my-godaddy-domain-12123

Important Note: If you've already invested in a search engine optimization (SEO) company or haven't done extensive SEO work, please be sure to consult your SEO expert before making any website changes. Even small changes can dramatically impact your search rankings.

Email Hosting

Would you also like to send and receive email from yourname@yourdomain.com? You can do this, while Rentec Direct hosts your website. Rentec Direct does not provide email hosting; however, we have created a partnership with Cevado and would encourage you to take a look. You may also consider looking into Google Apps for Business. Google will provide you with the necessary settings to provide to your DNS administrator.