Set up a tracking domain

Open and click tracking needs a tracking domain that you own. There is no shared ColdMerge tracking domain, and without a verified domain of your own, tracking is simply unavailable.

This page walks the setup end to end. It takes one visit to your DNS provider and a few minutes of waiting.

Why it has to be your own domain

Tracking links are visible in every message you send. Spam filters and blocklists judge the domains inside a message, not just the domain it came from.

A shared tracking domain would put your reputation in a pool with every other sender using it. One bad actor in that pool gets the domain blocklisted, and suddenly every message with a tracking link in it is damaged, including yours. That risk is not yours to carry, so ColdMerge does not create it.

Using a subdomain you control also keeps tracking off your main sending domain. Your mail keeps coming from acme.com while your tracking links point at something like track.acme.com.

Before you start

• You need to be an Owner or Admin. Anyone can read this screen, but only those two roles can register, re-check, or remove a domain.
• You need access to your domain’s DNS records, the same place you set up your sending domain.
• Pick a subdomain, not your root domain. track.acme.com or links.acme.com, not acme.com.

Step 1: register the hostname

1. Go to Settings, then the Tracking tab.
2. In Add a tracking domain, type your full subdomain into Tracking hostname. The field’s own hint says it: “A full subdomain, not your root domain.”
3. Select Add tracking domain.

A message confirms it: “Tracking domain added. Publish the two records below, then re-check.” The screen switches to the setup view, and a Setting up pill appears in the section header.

If the hostname is not valid, the error appears right under the field and nothing is created. Fix it and try again.

Step 2: publish the two CNAME records

The setup view shows two record cards. Both are CNAME records, and both are one-time work.

Record	What it is for
Routing (CNAME)	Points your tracking hostname at our proxy, so opens and clicks are served from your domain
Certificate delegation (CNAME)	Lets us issue and auto-renew the HTTPS certificate for your hostname, so it never expires

Each card gives you the host and the value with a copy button on each.

To publish them:

1. Select the copy button next to the host on the first card.
2. In another tab, open your DNS provider and go to its DNS records screen.
3. Add a record. Set the type to CNAME.
4. Paste the host into the Name or Host field.
5. Copy the value from ColdMerge and paste it into the Value, Target, or Points To field.
6. Leave TTL at whatever your provider suggests.
7. Save, then do the same for the second card.

Copy and paste each field rather than retyping. One wrong character and the record will not match.

Note

The second record is the one people skip. Without the certificate delegation record, your hostname can never serve HTTPS, and a tracking link that cannot load over HTTPS is a broken link. Publish both.

Step 3: re-check

Come back to ColdMerge and select Re-check now. The screen tells you what it is waiting for: “Publish both records, then re-check. DNS can take a few minutes.”

The result is a three-item checklist. A filled check means done, a dashed circle means not yet:

• Routing record is visible
• Certificate-delegation record is visible
• Certificate is live (HTTPS ready)

The third item usually lags the first two. The certificate can only be issued once the delegation record is visible, so expect to re-check once more after both records go green.

After a re-check you get one of two messages:

• “Verified. Your tracking domain is live.” Setup is finished.
• “Re-checked. Some records are not visible yet.” Wait a few minutes and re-check again. DNS changes take time to spread and some providers are slower than others.

If your DNS provider reports a specific problem, it appears in an amber notice headed “Your DNS provider reported a problem”, listing exactly what it said. Fix what it names, then re-check.

The verified state

Once everything checks out, the pill in the header reads Verified and a green notice confirms it: your hostname “is live over HTTPS. Turn on open or click tracking per HTML campaign.”

That is the end of the setup. The certificate renews itself from here on, with nothing further for you to do.

Now go and turn tracking on for a campaign. See open and click tracking.

After setup: automatic re-checks

ColdMerge re-checks your tracking domain roughly once a day on its own, on top of any re-check you run by hand.

A verified domain is only ever moved back to setting-up on a definite break: a required record that is really gone or pointed somewhere else, or a certificate that has failed for good. A brief DNS hiccup on our side counts as inconclusive, not as a break, so a working domain is never switched off because of a passing error.

If a domain is demoted, nothing is deleted. The setup screen shows which record is missing, and re-checking after you fix it turns it green again.

Change or remove your tracking domain

A tracking domain cannot be edited in place, so changing it means removing the old one and adding the new one.

• On a verified domain, the button is Change domain. The confirmation explains the consequence: new campaigns send without tracking until the new domain is verified, and campaigns already launched keep working.
• On a domain still being set up, the button is Remove domain. The confirmation notes you can then add a different one, and that the DNS records you published can be deleted at your provider afterwards.

Both are Owner and Admin only, and both ask for confirmation before anything happens.

If the screen says tracking is not available

Some deployments do not serve tracking domains at all. In that case the tab shows a notice reading “Tracking is not available here”, explaining that an administrator must turn it on, and adding the reassurance that matters most: nothing here blocks your sending.