Until you set this up, marketing email can’t leave with your name on it. Plan for about twenty minutes of setup plus some waiting.
1. Pick a subdomain, not your main domain
Use something like news.yourbusiness.com or hello.yourbusiness.com. Sending campaign volume from a dedicated subdomain keeps a deliverability problem from touching the reputation of the domain your everyday mail uses.
2. Add it
Open your CRM → Settings → Sending Domains → Add domain.
- If the domain’s DNS is managed through us, choose it under DNS setup and we publish the records for you.
- Otherwise leave “I’ll add the DNS records myself” and copy each record into your DNS provider.
3. Prove you own the domain
Before we set the domain up, the card shows one TXT record to add: a name starting with _ga-verify. and a long value starting with ga-verify=. Copy both into your DNS provider exactly as shown, with no quotation marks. This is how we know the domain is really yours — nobody can register a domain they don’t control. Adding it doesn’t touch your existing mail. If we manage your DNS, we add it for you.
We look for it every 15 minutes. As soon as we see it, we set the domain up and the card shows the rest of the records. Until then the status reads Prove ownership, and the 72-hour clock below has not started.
4. Publish the DNS records
The card lists every record with a Copy button: the signing records (DKIM), the bounce-handling records (a MAIL FROM subdomain with an MX and a TXT), and a recommended DMARC record.
Publish all of them. Partial setups are the most common reason a domain sits in “pending”.
5. Wait for verification
We check with the mail provider every few minutes; there’s no way to speed it up. The card’s status moves from pending to verified once the provider confirms the records. Bounce handling (MAIL FROM) verifies separately — it’s normal for it to lag a little behind.
You have 72 hours
Amazon checks for your records for 72 hours after we set the domain up (once your ownership record is seen). The card shows when it stops checking, and we email the account owner at about 24 and 48 hours if we still can’t see the records.
If Amazon doesn’t find them in time, it marks the domain Failed and stops checking for good — removing the domain and adding it again doesn’t restart it. Use Start over on the card instead. Starting over makes Amazon check again. It may issue new DKIM records: within a minute or two the card shows the three _domainkey records Amazon wants now — if they differ from the ones at your DNS provider, replace them; if they match, there is nothing to change. The feedback records stay the same. If your records went live after Amazon gave up, the card tells you they’re in place — click Start over and Amazon checks again.
6. Create a sender and make it the default
Once the domain is verified, add a sender identity on it (for example hello@news.yourbusiness.com), and set it as your default.
7. Two things to fill in before your first campaign
- Postal address — required in the footer of marketing email.
- Reply-to — where replies should land.
What “verified” means — read this twice
There are two different checkmarks, and they don’t mean the same thing:
- On a sending domain, “verified” is the mail provider’s verdict — the records are in place and mail can be signed as you.
- On a sender identity, “verified” is your attestation that you control that address. It doesn’t prove anything to the provider.
The domain verdict is the one that decides whether mail goes out as you. If the domain isn’t verified, the compose screen will refuse to send rather than quietly substituting our address.
Prove it before a real send
Send one campaign to yourself. If it arrives from your address, you’re done. If it arrives from a Growth Automations address, the domain isn’t fully verified yet — go back to step 4.
Sending limits
Accounts start with a conservative hourly and daily cap. If you need more, ask support — raising it is quick, but we do it deliberately because one account’s complaints affect everyone’s deliverability.