buying-an-email-address.md

layout	title	desc	hide_markbot	extra_tutorials	important	steps
lesson	Buying an email address	Walk through the process of purchasing an email account from FastMail.	true	title url Domains & DNS slide deck /courses/web-dev-5/domains-dns/ title url Email account types slide deck /courses/web-dev-5/email-account-types/ title url Domains & DNS domains	title text Delays are allowed **You can delay doing this assignment until you get further along in determining your brand—which you’ll be doing in another class.**	title before Buying email It’s best to buy email from a service provider so you can get an email address for your custom domain. I often buy my e-mail services from [FastMail](https://www.fastmail.com/?STKI=12009945)† because they are independent and have great customer service. There are two different ways to get a custom email address: 1. **Buy a forwarder from Hover** — a forwarder will send the email to another address, like Gmail or something. But you can never respond from the custom email address. 2. **Buy email from a service provider, like FastMail** — this is what I would recommend, it will give you a completely separate, business account tied to your domain. - **If you choose the Hover fowarder, [jump to this lesson on Hover forwarding emails ➔](/courses/web-dev-5/forwarding-email-addresses/)** If you choose the FastMail option, continue following along… title before Setting up FastMail Go to [**FastMail**](https://www.fastmail.com/?STKI=12009945)† and sign up for an account—you’ll need to pick the **Standard** account to be able to use your custom domain. *† The FastMail links are referral links, from me, that will get you 10% off your first year.*  title before Point your domain After you’ve purchased your e-mail service we need to do some domain pointing.  Go to your FastMail “Settings”.  Then go to “Domains”.  Then press “Add Domain”.  Type in the domain exactly as you purchased in Hover and press “Save”. title before image_steps Configure the DNS We now need to take settings from FastMail and put them into Hover to connect the two pieces together.  First, go to FastMail and edit your domain.  Open up the advanced DNS settings for FastMail. **Now is where all the fun copying-and-pasting comes in.**  Make a new tab in Cloudflare and go to the “DNS” tab.  *For each of the following items you’ll press the “Add New” button then “Save”.* url text cloudflare-mx-1.jpg Point the first `MX` record. `MX` records tell the DNS system where to find your email server. url text cloudflare-mx-2.jpg Point the second, backup, `MX` record url text cloudflare-cnames.jpg Add spam protection with a bunch of `CNAME` records—**Do each of the CNAME records individually.** url text cloudflare-txt.jpg More spam protection with the `TXT` record. title before Choose your email address The last step in this whole process is to actually choose your email address—what comes before the `@` symbol.  Go to FastMail’s “Aliases” page. **You’ll likely have to confirm your password to make changes to the page.**  Add a new alias for your email address.  *Choose what you want your email address to be by typing in the field.* I would choose something like `hey` or `hello` or `thomas` or something friendly. **That’s it—your email should start working any time now, but could take up to 24 hours.**