Connecting your domain

There are two separate things people mean by “domain”, and Cobber handles them independently. This page is about your web address — the URL supporters type or click to reach your pages. For the address your email comes from, see authenticating your sending domain.

Your three options

Every Cobber site works straight away on a free Cobber subdomain. From there you can connect any address you control. These are the options, from simplest to most branded:

Ways to reach your site

Option	When to use it
Cobber subdomain yourmovement.cobberhq.com.au	Works instantly with zero setup. Great for getting started, internal testing, or a soft launch.
Subdomain of your domain action.yourmovement.org.au	Keeps your branding while leaving your existing main site untouched. Ideal during a transition.
Your top-level domain yourmovement.org.au	The full switch — your whole public site is served by Cobber. Best once you’re ready to move everything.

Using a subdomain during a transition

A subdomain like action.yourmovement.org.au is often the smoothest choice while you’re moving across from another platform. Your existing main website (yourmovement.org.au and www.yourmovement.org.au) keeps running exactly as it does today, untouched, while specific pages — donation pages, petitions, sign-up and membership forms — live on the Cobber subdomain.

From a supporter’s point of view it still looks and feels like you, because it’s still your domain. And because it’s a subdomain, there’s nothing to buy and nothing to migrate on your main site. When you’re ready, you can move the apex domain across too.

Is there a technical reason to prefer a separate domain instead? No. A subdomain of your existing domain is fully supported and routes identically to a top-level domain — all your pages (including action pages) are served the same way. A subdomain is usually the better choice during a transition: it keeps your branding and avoids registering or maintaining an extra domain.

How routing works

Connecting an address takes two pieces, and Cobber handles the fiddly parts for you:

1. You point your address at Cobber

   For a subdomain or top-level domain you control, this is a small change with your DNS provider. The Go Live page in your dashboard shows you exactly what to do for your address.

   

2. Cobber secures it with HTTPS automatically

   Once your address points at us, Cobber provisions and renews the security (SSL/TLS) certificate for you, so the padlock “just works” with no extra steps.

After that, every visit to your address routes straight to your site. Custom domains and subdomains are matched first and take priority, so there’s never any ambiguity about which site a visitor should see. All of your pages — homepage, donation pages, petitions, sign-up and membership forms, embeddable widgets — are served over the same address in exactly the same way.

You can connect more than one domain

An organisation can have several connected addresses. That means you can start on the Cobber subdomain, add a subdomain of your own domain for launch, and later add your top-level domain — all pointing at the same content. Nothing breaks as you add addresses.

Your web address and your sending domain are separate

You can host your pages at one address and send email from a different one — for example serve crm.yourmovement.org.au while sending from email.yourmovement.org.au. Neither has to match the other. See authenticating your sending domain.